Surface meteorological instrumentation for BOBMEX

Although India has a long experience in ship-borne experiments and oceanogr aphic instrumentation, the atmospheric component has not received much atte ntion in the past. In this paper, the basis of the atmospheric instrumentat ion system assembled for use on board ORV Sagar Kanya for the BOBMEX-Pilot experiment is described along with some representative results. Wherever po ssible, Woods Hole's IMET recommendations for meteorological sensors for ap plications in the marine environment have been followed to keep our measure ments in par with international standards. The sensors were tested during t he BOBMEX-Pilot experiment and all sensors worked well. Velocity, humidity and temperature data have been successfully collected using fast sensors. I t is shown that the component due to the ship's pitching motion can be remo ved from the measured vertical velocity by making use of an accelerometer. This makes it possible to calculate the surface fluxes by direct methods.