rather than along the line of stations running from the Pribilof 

 Islands to the Bering Strait. In general, the warmer and less 

 saline water is found toward the Alaskan coast. The iso- 

 therms tend to run southwest-northeast in the region of the 

 four southernmost stations; however, the ridge extending 

 out from Cape Romanzof appears to deflect the warm coastal 

 water west, so that the isotherms run southeast-northwest 

 in the region south of St. Lawrence Island. 



The isotherms and isohalines for the southernmost four 

 stations are not parallel; the isohalines run from southeast 

 to northwest, while the isotherms run approximately southwest- 

 northeast, as mentioned above. The protrusion of the iso- 

 halines to the west in the region of Cape Romanzof occurs 

 somewhat south of the same protrusion of the isotherms. 

 North of St. Lawrence Island the isotherms and isohalines 

 run approximately parallel, converging toward Bering Strait. 



The highest surface temperatures encountered occurred 

 in Norton Bay, where temperatures of 58 degrees F were 

 observed. Although the lowest surface temperature obtained 

 south of Bering Strait was 41 degrees F , the trend of the 

 isotherms indicates that much lower temperatures exist off 

 the Siberian coast opposite Seward Peninsula. 



Vertical cross sections of the temperature and salinity 

 along a line running from just south of the Pribilof Islands 

 up through Bering Strait and thence north along the l69°W 

 meridian to 7 2°N latitude are plotted in figures 23 and 24. 

 The left-hand portions of these sections, from stations Nl 

 through N9, apply to the Bering Sea. The temperature struc- 

 ture for figure 23 shows the protrusion of a cold tongue near 

 the bottom at stations N3 and N4 (58° to 59°N), but the water 

 over the ridge between Cape Romanzof and St. Lawrence 

 Island (60° to 63°N) is uniformly warm from top to bottom. 

 The temperature decreases again at subsurface depths north 

 of St. Lawrence Island (63°N). 



The salinity cross section (fig. 24) also shows the extension 

 of a low salinity tongue off Cape Romanzof (60° to 63°N). The 

 major features of the salinity section occur farther south than 

 corresponding features in the temperature section. 



Typical temperature-depth and salinity-depth traces for 

 this section of the Bering Sea are shown in figure 25. The 

 salinity-depth traces show only slight variation of salinity 

 with depth in the central Bering Sea. To the south, in the 

 region of the Pribilof Islands, and to the north of St. Lawrence 

 Island, cold bottom water is found (traces A and C). Off Cape 

 Romanzof, however, the temperature structure remains 

 relatively warm to the bottom (trace B). 



