ture greater than 4° is somewhat greater in figure 38 than was found m 

 1952. The area within the 5° isotherm is about the same as in 1952. 

 Using temperature as an indicator of the relative magnitude of the 

 contributions of the Irminger Current and the East Greenland Current 

 this increase in the cross sectional area within the 4° isotherm would 

 mean an increase in the Irminger Current component of the West 

 Greenland Current. Figure 39, however, contradicts this and shows 

 no salinity that is even as much as 34.95%o. The salinity maximum 

 found in 1953 was 34.925%o which is the lowest value found since 1949 

 when the Irminger Current component of the West Greenland Current 

 disappeared from this vicinity. On the basis of temperature alone and 

 assuming that the West Greenland Current off Cape Farewell is made 

 up exclusively of an East Greenland Current component of constant 

 mean temperatm^e of 3.2° and an Irminger Current component of 

 constant mean temperature of 5.5° the observed volume transport of 

 the West Greenland Current of 7.23 with a heat transport of 27.92 

 and a mean temperatiu-e of 3.86 may be broken down into an East 

 Greenland Current component of 5.15 volume of flow (compared with 

 a seasonal normal of 1.57) and an Irminger Current component of 

 2.08 (compared with a seasonal normal volume of 2.95), as shown in 

 figure 20, The low salinity maximum, however, indicates that the 

 warm water involved is not Irminger Current water but more probably 

 is a du-ect contribution of water from the outer margins of the North 

 Atlantic eddy. 



As mentioned earlier, 1,500 decibars was used as the reference sm-face 

 in this section across the Labrador Sea in order to make the resulting 

 dynamic topography, velocities, and transports comparable with the 

 results of earlier work. Examination of the complete velocity section 

 shows that using this reference surface the net volume transport across 

 the section from South Wolf Island to Cape Farewell is 3.67 north- 

 westerly. There is normally a small net contribution into the Baffin 

 Bay-Labrador Sea system tlirough the northern openings and it is not 

 reasonable to account for such a large northwesterly transport by 

 sinldng and outflow below the reference surface. Analysis of the 

 computations shows the net northwesterly transport to be present at 

 all levels with the maximum rate occurring in the upper 300 meters 

 and decreasing with increasing depth to the reference surface. A 

 deeper sm-face was suggested as being more nearly motionless. The 

 volume of flow was recomputed using for reference the 2,000-decibar 

 surface, which gave 3.13 net northwesterly and again using for refer- 

 ence the 2,500-decibar surface which gave 1.77 net southeasterly. 

 Although the motionless surface was probably undulatory the most 

 nearly motionless surface seems to have been between 2,000 and 2,500 

 meters. 



Using the 2,500-decibar surface produces little change in the com- 

 puted values of the West Greenland Cm-rent, giving a value of 7.35 



30.3589—55 7 85 



