Dm. Burrage et al., MESOSCALE CIRCULATION FEATURES OF THE GREAT-BARRIER-REEF REGION INFERRED FROM NOAA SATELLITE IMAGERY, Remote sensing of environment, 56(1), 1996, pp. 21-41
The commissioning of a NOAA satellite receiving station at Townsville
in North Queensland in 1988 greatly expanded the AVHRR coverage of the
northeast Australian region to include the entire Great Barrier Reef
system and marginal seas. Selected imagery from this and a southern st
ation installed previously at Aspendale, Victoria provide a valuable n
ew perspective on oceanographic phenomena occurring in this ecological
ly significant region. This perspective could not be attained using co
nventional ship-board and in situ oceanographic sampling techniques. A
rich spectrum of mesoscale oceanographic features is revealed in the
analyzed imagery, and various features such as western boundary curren
t meanders, frontal shear waves, eddies, and jets are described. The t
emporal and spatial variability of these features appears strongly lin
ked to that of the larger-scale Coral Sea current circulation. Several
of the features identified are unique to the region, others resemble
features observed in other western boundary current systems, but are s
ignificantly modified by the complex regional topography, and by the p
resence of the Great Barrier Reef (GBR). Evidence has been found for a
number of processes which have significant implications for the origi
n and maintenance of CBR ecosystems, including shelf edge exchange pro
cesses, stratified slope water intrusions onto the shelf, and boundary
layer mixing around reefs. Such processes provide a mechanism for inj
ection of cool nutrient-rich waters into the reef matrix. The imagery
provides a clear picture of a well-organized, but spatially complex, f
rontal system existing in the southern Coral Sea, which is associated
with enhanced commercial and recreational fishing activity in the regi
on. The AVHRR imagery has thus proven to be a valuable tool for spatia
l mapping of oceanographic features throughout the CBR region, for hyp
othesis formation in dynamical and modeling studies, and for ship-boar
d reconnaissance operations.