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NOMADs in Port

At the port of Kaohsiung, Taiwan, workers prepare to bring two yellow NOMAD buoys aboard the R/V Roger Revelle in July, 2010. The buoys were too large to be trucked by road, so a tug and barge brought them from the staging warehouse to the ship. The NOMAD is a boat-shaped buoy designed to operate in high seas, high latitudes, and deep water. WHOI’s Mooring Operations Group deployed the buoys as part of the ITOP (Impact of Typhoons on the Pacific) project to understand how cyclones affect the ocean. Each NOMAD carries instruments that measure wind speed and direction, currents, waves, temperature, and other aspects of the air and water. The WHOI team will return to Taiwan at the end of February to recover the buoys.(Photo by John Kemp, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)