After its deployment, the buoy 

 moved southward through the 

 Flemish Pass and along the 

 eastern edge of the Grand Banks, 

 approximately following the 1000 m 

 isobath. During this period (14-20 

 April, 104-120), the average speed 

 was 30-45 cm/s and the sea 

 surface temperature increased 

 slightly from -1 .4°C to 0.6°C. 



On 30 April (120), 4556 began to 

 move rapidly (50-70 cnn/s) to the 

 east, north of the warm core eddy 

 that was surveyed during IIP 87-1 . 

 This eastward motion of a buoy 

 deployed in the Labrador Current 

 and encountering a warm core 

 eddy near the eastern edge of the 

 Grand Banks is similar to that ob- 

 served in 1986 (Murphy et al, 

 1986). The buoy's motion around 

 the eddy suggests that a portion of 

 the Labrador Current left the 

 eastern edge of the Grand Banks 

 at approximately 44-1 ON and 

 traced a path partially around the 

 eddy. Buoy 4556's temperature 

 record, which showed a slow in- 

 crease in temperature (0.6 to 

 2.0°C), suggests that it did not 

 enter the eddy, instead remaining 

 in the Labrador Current. 



On 4 May (124), 4556 started a 

 general northeastward drift, which 

 is typical of many IIP buoys that 

 become entrained in the North 

 Atlantic Current. Over the next 

 twelve days the temperature in- 

 creased 8°C (2-1 0°C). This period 

 is also remarkable in that the 

 buoy's trajectory shows that it 

 became entrained in a small 

 (< 40 km in diameter) cyclonic 

 eddy that was propagating north- 

 eastward and apparently decreas- 

 ing in size. The trajectory shows 

 that the buoy made three circuits of 

 the eddy while the eddy moved 

 northeastward at about 5 km/day. 



BUOY 4556 

 1987 



TEMP. 



188 



HE 



126 



13B M6 



YEAR DATE 



136 



176 



U-COMP 



176 



106 



126 



136 146 



YEAR DATE 



1S6 



166 



176 



Figure C-8. Temperature, U and V velocity components 

 for buoy 4556. 



79 



