Internal Bores and Breaking Internal Tides on the Oregon Continental Slope

Abstract

bservations of breaking internal tides on the Oregon continental slope during a 40-day deployment of 5 moorings along 43°12?N are presented. Remotely generated internal tides shoal onto the slope, steepen, break, and form turbulent bores that propagate upslope independently of the internal tide. A high-resolution snapshot of a single bore is captured from lowered acoustic Doppler current profilers (LADCP)/CTD profiles in a 25-h time series at 1200 m. The bore is cold, salty, over 100 m tall, and has a turbulent head where instantaneous dissipation rates are enhanced (ε > 10?6 W kg?1) and sediment is resuspended. At the two deepest slope moorings (1452 and 1780 m), similar borelike phenomena are observed in near-bottom high-resolution temperature time series. Mean dissipation rates and diapycnal diffusivities increase by a factor of 2 when bores are present ( W kg?1 and m s?1) and observed internal tides are energetic enough to drive these enhanced dissipation rates. Globally, the authors estimate an average of 1.3 kW m?1 of internal tide energy flux is directed onto continental slopes. On the Oregon slope, internal tide fluxes are smaller, suggesting that it is a relatively weak internal tide sink. Mixing associated with the breaking of internal tides is therefore likely to be larger on other continental slopes.