Potential for Predicting the Loop Current Extension From Pressure‐Sensing Inverted Echo Sounders (PIES) in Yucatan Channel

Abstract

The Loop Current is the dominant circulation feature in the Gulf of Mexico, with peak velocities exceeding 1.5 m/s in the core and in associated mesoscale eddies. Its location varies, as it meanders along its path. Stakeholders in offshore industrial operations, fisheries, and hurricane prediction need to know where it is, in order to do their jobs successfully and safely. Previous studies have shown that zonal shifts of the Loop Current where it enters the Gulf through Yucatan Channel can act as a predictor of how the current will evolve inside the Gulf during the following month. A mooring array called “Canek” is currently deployed in Yucatan Channel that collects direct current observations with instruments. Here, we use data from two Pressure‐sensing Inverted Echo Sounders (PIES) together with co‐located temperature and salinity from moorings, which were collected 2018–2020 and overlap with existing Canek data. Geostrophic currents through Yucatan Channel, averaged across the entire channel, calculated from PIES together with temperature and salinity data agree well with those from Canek. From the Canek data, we then simulate whether a set of five PIES instruments can capture the zonal fluctuations inside the channel, as opposed to the transport through the entire channel from the two‐PIES set. Results suggest that these currents can indeed be captured, and such observations provide predictive skill for the Loop Current evolution downstream. Together with existing technology for data telemetry to access PIES data in near‐real‐time, this opens up possibilities to aid operational forecasts of the Loop Current system.