184
Carl Wunsch
of the oceanographic community feeling bruised, as the meteorological community
wanted oceanographic ships as meteorological observing platforms, but cared nothing
for the possible oceanography that might be done. With their much greater numbers,
and national and international organizations, the weather forecasters essentially commandeered significant seagoing resources, leaving the oceanographers primarily as
onlookers and passengers. But with the end of FGGE, GARP turned to their second
goal—which was the understanding of climate change. When it came to climate, it
was much harder to make a convincing argument that the ocean was largely irrelevant
(although some meteorologists very seriously tried to do so, both then and today)
and, internationally, efforts were begun to open a dialogue with the oceanographic
community.
Thus, the situation in 1979 was that some oceanographers had a sense that
the ocean was a far more dynamic place than historically believed; that it probably
varied on all time scales—not just those of the newly discovered eddies; that we
were being confronted with important societal questions about the ocean that were
far beyond our ability to address, either theoretically or observationally. The question
was what, if anything, could be done? If nothing could be done, it was clear that
physical oceanography would become a marginal science of interest only to a few
fluid-dynamics-oriented academics with the much larger meteorological community
simply assuming that the ocean was basically passive (“swamp models” of the ocean
are only now beginning to disappear). That NSF and ONR budgets for oceanography
were shrinking was interpreted by some as demonstrating a field in decline, with no
new ideas.
In 1979, I was invited to attend a meeting in Miami of a group called the Committee for Climate Change and the Ocean (CCCO) that had been formed by the IOC
(Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission) and SCOR (Scientific Committee
for Ocean Research) and GARP to study the question of how one might address the
problem of better understanding how the ocean influenced climate change. Thompson
et al. (2001) describe the discussions that led to the calling of this meeting. I went,
torn between the sense that we, as an oceanographic community, had to do something
and that we probably could, and the realization that I was taking a tiger by the tail. If
I was to be successful, I was condemning myself and others to years of organization
and meetings.
To the extent that I can recall the thinking of the time, it was that our problem
was primarily an observational one, and that sufficiently promising new technologies
were being developed that, with some collective effort, might go a long way toward
solving the fundamental problem. The observational problem was to (1) observe the
ocean globally; (2) observe it spatially and temporally at sufficiently short intervals
that one could define the dominant modes of variability everywhere. At a time when
the main observational tool was still the ship, floats with tracking ranges of hundreds
of kilometers, and expensive current meter moorings capable of operating for about a
year, the question would immediately arise as to why anyone would think the global
ocean could be adequately observed?
Carl Wunsch
of the oceanographic community feeling bruised, as the meteorological community
wanted oceanographic ships as meteorological observing platforms, but cared nothing
for the possible oceanography that might be done. With their much greater numbers,
and national and international organizations, the weather forecasters essentially commandeered significant seagoing resources, leaving the oceanographers primarily as
onlookers and passengers. But with the end of FGGE, GARP turned to their second
goal—which was the understanding of climate change. When it came to climate, it
was much harder to make a convincing argument that the ocean was largely irrelevant
(although some meteorologists very seriously tried to do so, both then and today)
and, internationally, efforts were begun to open a dialogue with the oceanographic
community.
Thus, the situation in 1979 was that some oceanographers had a sense that
the ocean was a far more dynamic place than historically believed; that it probably
varied on all time scales—not just those of the newly discovered eddies; that we
were being confronted with important societal questions about the ocean that were
far beyond our ability to address, either theoretically or observationally. The question
was what, if anything, could be done? If nothing could be done, it was clear that
physical oceanography would become a marginal science of interest only to a few
fluid-dynamics-oriented academics with the much larger meteorological community
simply assuming that the ocean was basically passive (“swamp models” of the ocean
are only now beginning to disappear). That NSF and ONR budgets for oceanography
were shrinking was interpreted by some as demonstrating a field in decline, with no
new ideas.
In 1979, I was invited to attend a meeting in Miami of a group called the Committee for Climate Change and the Ocean (CCCO) that had been formed by the IOC
(Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission) and SCOR (Scientific Committee
for Ocean Research) and GARP to study the question of how one might address the
problem of better understanding how the ocean influenced climate change. Thompson
et al. (2001) describe the discussions that led to the calling of this meeting. I went,
torn between the sense that we, as an oceanographic community, had to do something
and that we probably could, and the realization that I was taking a tiger by the tail. If
I was to be successful, I was condemning myself and others to years of organization
and meetings.
To the extent that I can recall the thinking of the time, it was that our problem
was primarily an observational one, and that sufficiently promising new technologies
were being developed that, with some collective effort, might go a long way toward
solving the fundamental problem. The observational problem was to (1) observe the
ocean globally; (2) observe it spatially and temporally at sufficiently short intervals
that one could define the dominant modes of variability everywhere. At a time when
the main observational tool was still the ship, floats with tracking ranges of hundreds
of kilometers, and expensive current meter moorings capable of operating for about a
year, the question would immediately arise as to why anyone would think the global
ocean could be adequately observed?