Direct measurement of turbulent fluxes on a cruising ship

The result of an attempt at the direct measurement of turbulent fluxes on the top of the mast of a cruising ship is presented. The three-dimensional components of wind relative to the ship measured by a sonic anemometer are corrected for ship motion; from these the fluxes of momentum, sensible heat and water vapor are computed using the outputs of a fine-wire thermocouple psychrometer. The observations were made by this method on the Northwestern Pacific. The results indicate that this technique is usable for determining the distribution of fluxes over the ocean.