Distinctive features of water exchange across the Słupsk Sill (a full-scale experiment)

The flows of brackish waters in the upper layer and saline waters in the lower layer meet above the Slupsk Sill, which makes this one of the most significant features of the Baltic Sea, controlling as it does the ventilation of the deep basins in its central region. Earlier high-resolution measurements using towed scanning probes conducted here for more than ten years had revealed the complexity and variability of the water dynamics in this area. Mapping surveys repeated in quick succession are needed to study the water exchange in such an area. A survey of this kind was attempted in October 2003 during the 57th cruise of the r/v ‘Professor Shtokman’. Three surveys were carried out in the areas of the Slupsk Sill, the eastern Bornholm Basin, and the western Slupsk Furrow by means of a scanning probe towed along closely-spaced transects. The water structure around the sill was different each time, despite the rather short time gaps between the surveys. As follows from the data analysis, during the first survey, the saline Bornholm waters flowed over the sill as an axially symmetrical jet and entrained the adjacent freshened cold waters of the intermediate layer. In ten days, this joint flow displaced to the southern flank of the sill and propagated