A cluster of 20 CARTHE-type drifters were deployed in the open sea area in front of Livorno (Italy) on October 8, 2020.
The deployment was part of the DDR20- "Drifter demonstration and Research 2020" experiment performed in collaboration with the CMRE-NATO and Consorzio LaMMA, and supported by many EU projects, such as SICOMAR plus, JERICO-S3, SINAPSI, and IMPACT.
CARTHE-type drifters are biodegradable drifters, spanning the first 60cm of the water column (Novelli 2017, 2018, 2020).
The deployment strategy consisted of releasing drifters on a regular grid (about 3km side and 500m step) in a time window of about 2 hours.
5 drifters heading south were collected on October 10, 2020 and re-deployed, on the same day, approx. 2.5 nm to the north of the initial deployment area.
3 stranded drifters were redeployed on November 11, 2020 in the open sea area in front of the La Spezia Gulf.
Each file contains a drifter trajectory in the NetCDF format (ex: 001.nc, 002.nc, etc...).
Trajectories of those drifters that were collected and re-deployed are splitted in different files (ex: 001_a.nc, 001_b.nc).
Nominal drifter transmission rate: 10 minutes. Positions available until January 23, 2021.
The dataset includes raw positions; outliers were removed.

References:

• Novelli, G., C.M. Guigand, C. Cousin, E. Ryan, N. Laxague, H. Dai, B. Haus, and T.M. Özgökmen (2017). A biodegradable surface drifter for ocean sampling on a massive scale. J. Atmos. Oceanic Technol., 34(11), 2509-2532.

• Novelli, G., C.M. Guigand, T.M. Özgökmen (2018). Technological Advances in Drifters for Oil Transport Studies. Marine Technology Society Journal, 52(6), 53-61.

• Novelli, G, C.M. Guigand, M. Boufadel, T.M. Özgökmen (2020). On the transport and landfall of marine oil spills, laboratory and field observations. Marine Pollution Bulletin, 150, 110805.

• http://interreg-maritime.eu/web/sicomarplus

• https://www.jerico-ri.eu/

• http://interreg-maritime.eu/web/sinapsi

• http://interreg-maritime.eu/web/impact