Gliders as maturing technology: Using gliderpalooza as means to develop an integrated glider community

Underwater autonomous gliders have transitioned from exotic experimental systems to becoming a standard platform capable of collecting data over a critical range of spatial and temporal scales in the ocean. The data are proving to be extremely valuable for addressing a wide range of basic and applied research questions. These communities are growing from distributed research and/or education groups. It is crucial as systems continue to evolve that there is an effort to “harmonize” data products while preserving the diversity of approaches/science/experimentation. As the gliders have matured and new battery solutions provide additional energy, there is an increased focus on the integration of a wider range of sensors to be incorporated into gliders. Many of these new classes of sensors will be particularly effective for characterizing biological processes in the coastal ocean. As biological sensors generally provide proxy estimates of a parameter, developing robust quality control and assurance procedures is critical. These new sensors will be more power intensive thus requiring the development of planning tools for increasing energy efficiency during missions. Given the significant growth in the highly distributed glider community, efforts are now focusing on the development mission planning tools to allow for efficient operation of glider fleets. To further collaboration and standardization of the growing number of glider operators we have initiated a series of community efforts called glider paloozas. We had an exceptional turnout last year, encompassing 18 U.S. and Canadian partners, 28 gliders, 36 glider deployments, and spatial coverage from coastal regions of Newfoundland to the Gulf of Mexico and offshore to Bermuda. The coordinated effort focused on several research themes including continental shelf circulation, fish migrations, and storm activity. The main goals of last year's effort were to produce a seamless flow of real-time glider data into the Global Telecommunications System (GTS) via DMAC and into the regional ocean models and demonstrate the potential of a U.S. national glider network. This is in line with the goal to increase glider data accessibility from Federal and Academic oceanographic modeling communities, the U.S. Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS), and other federal funding agencies (i.e., NSF). In order to demonstrate the value and necessity of the planned U.S. national glider network and build on last years successes, we hope to continue these efforts and require that all glider data produced by Gliderpalooza 2015 participants be uploaded by the individual operators to the DAC 2.0 and into GTS.