Modeling and observational studies off the entrance of Juan de Fuca Strait

M. Foreman¹, W. Wiggins¹, E. Di Lorenzo², B. Hickey³, A. MacFadyen³, V. Trainer⁴

¹Institute of Ocean Sciences, Fisheries and Oceans Canada P.O. Box 6000, Sidney, BC V8L 4B2 Canada
²School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30306 United States
³School of Oceanography, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195 United States
⁴Northwest Fisheries Science Center, NOAA/NMFS/ECD 2725 Montlake Blvd. E., Seattle, WA 98112 United States

The interaction of strong tidal and estuarine flows in Juan de Fuca Strait with rapidly changing bathymetry and along-shore currents off western Vancouver Island and Washington make the entrance to the Strait a very dynamic region. In summer, it is also home to the Juan de Fuca (or Tully) Eddy, a feature that recent studies suggest is an initiation site for the toxigenic phytoplankton Pseudo-nitzschia that impact shellfish along the Washington coast. As part of ECOHAB PNW, a project funded by the Ecology and Oceanography of Harmful Algal Blooms program, data collected from five cruises have been combined with bio-physical model simulations using the Regional Ocean Modeling System (ROMS) to better understand the dynamics and ecology of the region. This talk will describe select project results including the generation of internal tides at the entrance to the strait and the role that winds, estuarine flow, and tides play in the formation of the eddy.