The gyre-scale circulation of the North Atlantic and sea level at Brest

ISI Document Delivery No.: 576UU Times Cited: 15 Cited Reference Count: 19 Cited References: Allan R, 2006, J CLIMATE, V19, P5816, DOI 10.1175/JCLI3937.1 Bindoff NL, 2007, CLIMATE CHANGE 2007: THE PHYSICAL SCIENCE BASIS, P385 DELAGRYE JJB, 1890, ANN HYDROGR, V12, P32 Gomis D, 2006, J GEOPHYS RES-OCEANS, V111, DOI 10.1029/2005JC003186 Kolker AS, 2007, GEOPHYS RES LETT, V34, DOI 10.1029/2007GL031814 Kuttel M, 2010, CLIM DYNAM, V34, P1115, DOI 10.1007/s00382-009-0577-9 Leorri E, 2008, MAR GEOL, V251, P60, DOI 10.1016/j.margeo.2008.02.005 Luterbacher J, 2002, ATMOS SCI LETT, V2, P114, DOI DOI 10.1006/ASLE.2001.0044 Miller L, 2007, GEOPHYS RES LETT, V34, DOI 10.1029/2007GL030862 POUVREAU N, 2008, THESIS U LA ROCHELLE POUVREAU N, 2010, EVOLUTION SEA UNPUB STURGES T, 2009, OCEAN SCI DISCUSS, V6, pC724 STURGES T, 2009, OCEAN SCI DISCUSS, V6, pC733 TSIMPLIS M, 2009, OCEAN SCI DISCUSS, V6, pC894 Woodworth PL, 2009, INT J CLIMATOL, V29, P777, DOI 10.1002/joc.1771 Woodworth PL, 1999, GEOPHYS RES LETT, V26, P1589, DOI 10.1029/1999GL900323 Woodworth PL, 2009, GEOPHYS J INT, V176, P19, DOI 10.1111/j.1365-246X.2008.03942.x Woppelmann G, 2008, GEOPHYS RES LETT, V35, DOI 10.1029/2008GL035783 Woppelmann G, 2006, OCEAN DYNAM, V56, P487, DOI 10.1007/s10236-005-0044-z Woodworth, P. L. Pouvreau, N. Woeppelmann, G. Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales We thank Marcel Kuttel of the University of Bern who first made us aware of the progress with the ship logbooks project. Bruce Douglas and Chris Hughes provided valuable comments and advice on the data analysis. In addition, we are very grateful to the two reviewers of the Discussion Paper (Professors Sturges and Tsimplis) for their remarks which may be read alongside the present paper. Nicolas Pouvreau acknowledges a postdoctoral fellowship funded by the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales. 15 COPERNICUS GESELLSCHAFT MBH GOTTINGEN OCEAN SCIThe relationship between the gyre-scale circulation of the North Atlantic, represented by air pressure near to the centre of the sub-tropical gyre, and sea level measured at the eastern boundary of the ocean has been investigated using records commencing in the middle of the 18th century. These time series are twice as long as those employed in an earlier study of this relationship. Near-continuous values of annual mean sea level and mean high water from Brest, and air pressure fields for the eastern North Atlantic derived from terrestrial instrumental pressure records and ship logbook information, have been used to demonstrate that sea level on the eastern boundary does indeed appear to be related to air pressure at the centre of the gyre (subject to reservations concerning short sub-sections of data near to the ends of the records). These findings confirm the earlier conclusions but over much longer timescales. This relationship can explain at least part of the century timescale accelerations in European sea level records obtained from tide gauge and saltmarsh data. This finding has important implications for interpretation of the observed sea level rise and acceleration on the European Atlantic coast, suggesting that redistribution of water could play an important role instead of (or as well as) change in ocean volume