The Bermuda Testbed Mooring and HALE-ALOHA Mooring Programs: Innovative Deep-Sea Global Observatories Tommy Dickey 1 , Grace Chang 1 , Casey Moore 2 , Al Hanson 3 , Dave Karl 4 , Derek Manov 1 , Frank Spada 1 , Don Peters 5 , John Kemp 5 , Oscar Schofield 6 , and Scott Glenn 6 1 Ocean Physics Laboratory, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106 2 WET Labs, Inc., Philomath, OR 97370 3 SubChem Systems, Inc., Narragansett, RI 02835 4 University of Hawaii at Manoa, Honolulu, HI 96822 5 Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA 02543 6 Coastal Ocean Observation Lab, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ 08901 I. INTRODUCTION Interdisciplinary time series observations are important for understanding and predicting ocean variability on time scales from seconds to decades. Plans are being made to implement open ocean observatories at key sites in the world ocean (e.g., OceanSITES and ORION). The Bermuda Testbed Mooring (BTM), located southeast of Bermuda (BATS site), and the HALE-ALOHA (H-A) mooring, north of Hawaii (HOT site) are prototypes for autonomous sampling interdisciplinary open ocean observatories. Both moorings are located in the deep sea (over 4500 m water depth) and provide fundamental measurements of meteorological, physical, biogeochemical, biological, and optical variables. The BTM program was initiated in 1994 and the H-A program was implemented in 1997. These programs have served as magnets for oceanographers for testing new technologies and sensors, for satellite sensor calibration and validation (cal/val), and for scientific measurements used for novel analyses and model development and testing. In this paper, 1) key objectives of the BTM and H-A mooring programs are summarized, 2) some of the recent technologies being developed at the BTM and H-A sites are reviewed, and 3) a few of the recent scientific results are highlighted. Finally, we outline a few of the plans for expanding the utility of these two mooring projects. II. OBJECTIVES OF THE BTM AND H-A MOORING PROGRAMS The BTM and H-A programs have four major objectives: 1) To develop and test new deep-sea technologies, interdisciplinary sensors, anti-biofouling techniques and hardware, and data telemetry systems. For example, a new interdisciplinary surface buoy design, which is now being used extensively, was developed for the two programs (Fig. 1). Representative instrumentation tested using the BTM and H-A include: an atmospheric dust and aerosol sampler, several different multi-wavelength Figure 1. Photographs of the buoys used for the Bermuda Testbed Mooring (left) and HALE-ALOHA mooring (right). optical sensors, chemical samplers and sensors (i.e., for macro- and micro-nutrients, carbon dioxide, oxygen, nitrogen, and noble gases), an in situ primary production device, and acoustic current meters (Fig. 2a). Several new data telemetry systems have been developed and tested. Plans are also underway to move an existing fiber- optic cable to the H-A/HOT site enabling collection of high volumes of data from instrumentation requiring high power. The H-A mooring could be linked to an underwater node connected to this cable. The BTM and H-A moorings are ideal test platforms for electrical- optical-mechanical (EOM) cable development and testing. 2) To facilitate scientific studies requiring high frequency, sustained interdisciplinary data. Complementary ship- based, sediment trap mooring, AUV, glider, and satellite data sets have been used along with BTM and H-A data to expand the utility of several regional scientific research efforts off Bermuda and Hawaii (Fig. 2b). The BTM and