i NASA ECCO - Gallery (Detail)

Gallery

Composite of wind/ocean circulation layers
Composite of wind/ocean circulation layers. Credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio (M4V, 28.4 MB).
Composite of wind/ocean circulation layers
Composite of wind/ocean circulation layers. Credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio (M4V, 28.4 MB).

Wind and Ocean Circulation

[01-Oct-2013] In this visualization a camera slowly pushes in towards Earth revealing global wind patterns. The wind patterns are from the MERRA computational model of the atmosphere. As the camera continues to push in, the winds fade away, revealing ocean currents which are driven, in part, by the winds. The ocean currents are derived from the ECCO-2 computational model of the oceans and ice. Only the higher speed ocean currents are shown. The camera then moves around the Western Atlantic highlighting the Gulf stream from above and below before finally emerging from beneath the sea to showcase the Loop Current in the Gulf of Mexico.
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