Wind Effects on Drogued and Undrogued Drifters in the Eastern Mediterranean

Abstract The wind effects on drogued and undrogued drifters are assessed using Coastal Ocean Dynamics Experiment (CODE) and Surface Velocity Program (SVP) drifter datasets and ECMWF wind products in the eastern Mediterranean. Complex and real linear regression models are used to estimate the relative slip of undrogued SVP drifters and to extract the wind-driven currents from the drifter velocities. The frequency response of the wind-driven currents is studied using cross-spectral analysis. By comparing the velocities of cotemporal and nearly collocated undrogued and drogued SVP drifters, it appears that undrogued SVP drifters have a general downwind slippage of about 1% of the wind speed. Time-lagged complex correlations and cross-spectral results show that the wind response is almost simultaneous. The velocities of SVP drifters drogued to 15 m are poorly correlated with the winds (R2 ≈ 3%): wind-driven currents have a magnitude of 0.7% of the wind speed and are 27°–42° to the right of the wind. For undrogued SVP drifters, the correlation with the winds increases to R2 ≈ 22% and the angle between winds and currents decreases to 17°–20°. The magnitude of the wind-driven currents is about 2% of the wind speed. For CODE designs, wind-driven currents are 1% of the wind speed at an angle of about 28° to the right of the wind (R2 ≈ 8%). Spectral and cospectral analyses reveal that the drifters sampled more anticyclonic than cyclonic motions. The inner coherence spectra show that wind and currents are more correlated at temporal scales spanning 3–10 days. They also confirm that the wind response is quasi-simultaneous and that currents are generally to the right of the wind.