10 MARION AND GENERAL GREENE EXPEDITIONS 



meter isobath, extends farther southwest of Iceland than heretofore 

 supposed (approximately 900 miles) ; (b) Atlantic water (the 

 Trminger Current) extended closer toward Cape Farewell and in 

 greater volume in 1928 than in 1930; {c) the Arctic water appar- 

 ently was subject to greater variations during these years than was 

 Atlantic water; {d) Arctic and Atlantic water mix along the outer 

 edge of the East Greenland Current called the polar front; {e) sub- 

 Arctic waters composed of Atlantic mixed water, mixed water from 

 the polar front, and water from the Labrador Current all mix with 

 Atlantic water along the fifty-first parallel of latitude in a so-called 

 secondary polar front; {d) surface temperatures, salinities, and de- 

 duced circulation in the region appear to agree with the early 

 hypotheses of Nansen. 



The Newfoundland Fishery Research Laboratory located at Bay 

 Bulls, Newfoundland, Harold Thompson, director, made two annual 

 cruises with its research vessel during the period 1931 to 1935. The 

 survey embraced the coastal waters from Hamilton Inlet southward 

 to the Laurentian Channel including the off-lying Grand Banks to 

 the continental edge. The oceanographic work consisted of tem- 

 peratures and salinities collected surface to depths of 500 meters 

 and the release of drift bottles, A record has thus been kept of the 

 variation in Arctic water over the area during the period. (This 

 information is contained in Newfoundland Fishery Research Labora- 

 tory, Annual Reports, 1931 to 1931.) 



The new British hydrographical ship Challenger in 1932 took 

 three hydrographical sections in the northwestern North Atlantic 

 from surface to bottom. One was taken from the tail of the Grand 

 Banks to St. John's, Newfoundland, another from St. John's east- 

 ward along the fiftieth ])arallel, and the third near Cape Harrigan 

 and normal to the Labrador coast from shore into deep water. 

 Challenger station number 8, northwest of Flemish Cap, latitude 

 49°51', longitude 42°09', with temperatures >10° C. and salinities 

 >35%o at depths down to 385 meters, is of special interest to us. 



In September 1935 the Atlantis^ oceanographic ketch of the Woods 

 Hole Oceanographic Institution, ran two sections south from the 

 Tail (8 stations) to about the fortieth parallel and another section 

 (8 stations) along the fortieth meridian from latitude 40° to 50° N. 

 Temperatures and salinities were secured from the surface to bottom. 

 The physical results are referred to by Iselin (1936) . 



February and March 1935 witnessed another cruise of the German 

 research vessel Meteor to the waters southwest of Iceland, the expedi- 

 tion being of unusual interest since it collected wintertime observa- 

 tions in a practically unknown region south of Cape Farewell long 

 suspected of contributing at this time of year to the su]iply of bottom 

 water of the North Atlantic. No published report of the scientific 

 results has yet appeared, but through the courtesy of the director 

 of the Institut fiir Meereskunde a copy of the temperature and 

 salinity data has been placed at our disposal and is later discussed 

 as it bears upon our data taken during summer only. 



The Danish Meteorological Institute in its annual publication, the 

 State of the Ice in Arctic Seas (Publilvationer frn Det Danske 

 Meteorlogiske Institut 1926), has published a series of 12 monthly 



