In August ONC hosted an international gathering of scientists to look at the oceanographic applications of high frequency radar. Participants travelled to Race Rocks, a Marine Protected Area at the entrance to the Strait of Juan de Fuca, to visit one of ONC’s recently installed oceanographic radar. Watch the video above.
Oceanographic radars have been installed in high traffic locations near busy ports along the coast of British Columbia. Different from marine radars, these sophisticated, high frequency, land-based oceanographic radars...
Understanding how the oceans work is hard, because we almost always don't have enough measurements to even know what the ocean is doing, never mind why. One of the exciting things in the VENUS Observatory expansion plan was the installation of a radar system that was specially designed to provide estimates of surface currents over a large region covering the Fraser plume. What's the Fraser plume?
This image depicts the surface ocean currents in the Strait of Georgia, measured during a strong ebb tide. The currents, averaged over an hour, were measured using a CODAR (Coastal Ocean Dynamics Applications Radar) system. The VENUS CODAR system consists of two antennae, one at the Iona Wastewater Treatment plant, near Vancouver Airport, the other at the Westshore Coal Terminal, near the BC Ferries port at Tsawwassen. These are labelled in the image as “VION” and “VCOL”, respectively.
A 4-member team from Ocean Networks Canada traveled to the Strait of Georgia shore station, located near Vancouver Airport, to calibrate the newly-installed CODAR antenna.
Generally, an antenna pattern measurement (“APM”) is performed using a powerboat to carry the radio transponder, but the shallow mudflats surrounding the Iona shore station made this impossible. Waiting for high...
Paul Macoun (Ocean Networks Canada Engineering team) prepares the second CODAR antenna for installation at our shore station near Vancouver airport. Following the final testing, the antenna will be collecting radial velocity data from the surface waves in the Strait of Georgia.
The first CODAR antenna, installed at the West Shore Terminal, Delta, BC, has been operating since fall 2011. The...
The CODAR station at the Westshore Terminal in Tsawwassen measures surface ocean currents using radio signals reflected off waves in the Strait of Georgia.
A second station, near Vancouver Airport, will be installed in the next month or so, after which it will be possible to resolve north-south and east-west components of the currents. In the meantime, with only a single station operating, it is possible to measure only radial current velocities–that is to say, only the components of ocean currents that are directly towards or directly away from the receiving antenna can be detected.
The first of two High Frequency (HF) coastal radar Stations was successfully installed on Nov. 24th at the Westshore Coal Terminal in Delta, BC. The station is now monitoring radial surface currents within a 20 km range in the Strait of Georgia. The installation timeline happened to overlap with the onset of a strong winter storm. The engineering team managed to erect the antenna in strong winds, but were able to escape the worst of the storm by 2 hours.
