The West Florida Shelf ECOHAB-ONR-COMPS (ENC) monitoring array

This overview describes the accomplishments of the University of South Florida\´s (USF) Ocean Circulation Group (OCG) in the Gulf of Mexico using a variety of oceanographic and meteorological instruments to monitor the west Florida shelf. As knowledge of the ocean continues to improve along with new technologies, our understanding of the coastal zone is still lacking an adequate observational baseline. The OCG manages the in situ physical oceanographic measurements and modeling on the west Florida shelf not far from the College of Marine Science campus. In 1993, the OCG initiated a pilot mooring program in the Gulf that has grown into a more complete air-sea interaction processes and coastal ocean monitoring study. The ENC ("Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms" (ECOHAB)-Office of Naval Research (ONR)-"Coastal Ocean Monitoring and Prediction System" (COMPS)) array now supports basic research as well as providing data needed for management issues such as more accurate predictions of flooding by storm surge, safety and efficiency of marine navigation, search and rescue efforts and fisheries management. The overall goal of this work is to improve the understanding of how the physical processes affect material property distributions on continental shelves