Profiling the Gulf Stream with a current meter mooring

A current meter mooring was deployed for one year at the mean position of the Gulf Stream at 68°W. With instruments from 400 m to 4000 m, it provides the first unambiguous evidence that the Gulf Stream extends from top to bottom of the water column. Using the strong cross‐stream temperature structure to derive a horizontal coordinate related to temperature, we estimate the width and transport of the Gulf Stream for four individual events and we determine an average profile of the vertical and cross‐stream structure of the Gulf Stream. A conservative estimate of transport for this average profile indicates that the Gulf Stream has a transport of 103 × 10 6 m³ s −1 at 68°W.