01-05 December 2025
INCOIS, Hyderabad, India.
| Abstract Submission No. | ABS-04-0073 |
| Title of Abstract | Tracking Arabian Sea High-Salinity Water Intrusion into the Bay of Bengal and its Interannual Variability: Insights from Ocean Glider Observations and modelling |
| Authors | Saraswathy Sabu*, Abhisek Chatterjee, Suresh Kumar N, Aneesh Lotliker, E. Pattabhi Rama Rao |
| Organisation | Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, Hyderabad |
| Address | Incois residential quarters Hyderabad, Telangana, India Pincode: 500090 E-mail: saraswathysabu13@gmail.com |
| Country | India |
| Presentation | Oral |
| Abstract | A large amount of river discharge and a net freshwater surface flux make the upper water column of the Bay of Bengal (BoB) fresher. The intrusion of high-salinity water from the Arabian Sea (commonly referred to as the Arabian Sea High-Salinity Water mass; ASHSW) into the BoB during summer monsoon plays a key role in maintaining the salinity balance of the basin. However, the pathway of the intrusion of ASHSW into the BoB and its seasonal distribution is not clear. Repeated Ocean glider transects in the BoB under the Deep Ocean Mission, along with existing observations, provided a rare opportunity to document the presence of ASHSW along the entire latitudinal stretch of the basin. Additionally, a Lagrangian particle tracking model is used to augment the observational findings to understand further the intrusion pathway of this ASHSW mass and its subsequent distribution over the basin. We show that the ASHSW intrusion into the BoB predominantly occurs through the southcentral BoB between 85 °E-88 °E during the early phase of the summer monsoon. Once the water mass crosses 10 °N, the pathway becomes chaotic and can be traced in the northern part of the Bay in winter. Notably, this pathway shows a strong interannual variability, with the least intrusion observed during Indian Ocean dipole years. |
| Are you part of IIOE-2 endorsed project | no |
| Keywords | Arabian sea high Salinity Water, Ocean glider, langrangian particle tracking, Interannual variability |
| For Awards | no |