Russian-American expedition to study climatic changes in Arctic

A Russian-American expedition is sailing to the Arctic to study changes in the atmosphere, ice fields and waters of the Arctic Ocean. The Academician Tryoshnikov expedition vessel of the Russian Institute of Arctic and Antarctic Studies will leave the northern port of Arkhangelsk on Sunday.

The ship’s departure is scheduled for midday, a port source told TASS.

Apart from Russians and Americans, the expedition team includes experts from Germany, South Korea, Britain, New Zealand and Poland.

"The expedition is planning to raise the buoy-based stations fixed in 2013 and put 11 new buoy stations, fitted out with metres for measuring temperature and the total salt content of saline sea water, as well as the speed and direction of the ocean flows, for a period of 2 years," the press service of the Russian Institute of Arctic and Antarctic Studies said.

In addition to that, six autonomous meteorological buoys for measuring meteorological parameters of the atmosphere will be fixed on drifting ice and in open water.

The buoys will transmit the data to the global telecommunications system of the World Meteorological Organization. The Arctic expedition will last until the end of September.

The long-term monitoring of the state of Atlantic waters in the Laptev Sea is being carried out under a cooperation programme in the field of meteorology, hydrology and oceanography between the Russian Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring (Rosgydromet) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce.

The programme’s main aim is to study the role of transformation processes of Atlantic waters on their way from Fram Strait to the Laptev Sea in forming modern climatic changes in the Arctic.

Works on this project began in 2002.
   [tass.ru]
23/8/15
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