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Observations of Continental Shelf Waves off Oregon and Washington.

American Meteorological Society

The low-frequency current fluctuations on the Oregon shelf changed dramatically from winter to spring, 1975. A much faster offshore energy decay occurred simultaneously with a sharp decrease in the alongshore propagation speed. Cross-shelf analysis in a frequency band around 0.16 cpd showed the emergence of the third-mode shelf wave, in spring from the predominantly first-mode motion in winter. At frequencies <0.1 cpd, the current fluctuations propagated southward in winter, opposite to the direction of shelf waves. On the Oregon and Washington shelves during summer (and early fall) 1972, the location of moorings on irregular topography rendered data interpretation difficult. Nevertheless, the general cross-shelf and alongshore properties of the current fluctuations were consistent with the first-mode shelf wave, in contrast to the situation during summer 1973 when the second mode was excited. The excitation of relatively high modes and the generally sharp concentration of energy in one particular mode are surprising and difficult to explain with the present shelf-wave generation theories. Nonlinear resonance between wind and current is proposed as a possible explanation. Copyright 1982 American Meteorological Society (AMS). Permission to use figures, tables, and brief excerpts from this work in scientific and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is determined to be “fair use” under Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act (17 USC §108, as revised by P.L. 94-553) does not require the AMS’s permission. Republication, systematic reproduction, posting in electronic form, such as on a web site or in a searchable database, or other uses of this material, except as exempted by the above statement, requires written permission or a license from the AMS. Additional details are provided in the AMS Copyright Policy, available on the AMS Web site located at (http://www.ametsoc.org/) or from the AMS at 617-227-2425 or copyright@ametsoc.org.

Text

2016-11-10

Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International

http://hdl.handle.net/2429/33300

Hsieh, William W. 1982. Observations of Continental Shelf Waves off Oregon and Washington. Journal of Physical Oceanography 12(8) 887-896.

Reviewed

Hsieh, William W.

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