Meteorological buoy observations from the central Iceland Sea

Abstract

We present the first continuous in situ atmospheric observations from the central Iceland Sea collected from a meteorological buoy deployed for a 2 year period between 23 November 2007 and 21 August 2009. We use these observations to evaluate the ERA-Interim reanalysis product and demonstrate that it represented low-level meteorological fields and surface turbulent fluxes in this region very well. The buoy observations showed that moderate to strong winds were common from any direction, while wind speeds below 5 ms-1 were relatively rare. The observed low-level air temperature and surface heat fluxes were related to the wind direction with cold-air outbreaks most common from the northwest. Mean wintertime turbulent heat fluxes were modest (<60 Wm-2), but the range was substantial. High heat flux events, greater than 200 Wm-2, typically occurred every 1-2 weeks in the winter, with each event lasting on average 2.5 days with an average total turbulent heat flux of ~200 Wm-2 out of the ocean. The most pronounced high heat flux events over the central Iceland Sea were associated with cold-air outbreaks from the north and west forced by a deep Lofoten Low over the Norwegian Sea.