28th & 29th October – Discussion and Test with IMOCA racing boats for next year’s OceanRace
The EUMETNET E-SurfMar Programme collaborates with EUMETSAT, CLS and OceanOPS to deploy our drifting buoys.
The new phase of the programme requires us to deploy buoys in all oceans. We must therefore have at our disposal a panel of ships allowing us to optimize our deployments. With the help of OceanOPS we have established a strong link with the world of racing sailing, in particular with the Imoca class and more recently with the Ocean Race which will leave in January for a crewed round the world race.
To better understand the constraints of these racing boats, we went to Saint Malo for the “Route du Rhum”. This allowed us to meet the technical teams of ships that will deploy our buoys during the Ocean Race. Several limiting factors have been addressed to enable future deployments. We had with us a buoy from the programme allowing the crews to better understand our problems. We were also able to understand their questions. The Ocean Race, which is organizing its round-the-world trip, will make reinforced bags to allow our buoys to be moved safely during the race without damaging the ship, which is entirely made of carbon.
So we did tests on the ships. We were also able to communicate about our activities within the programme and explain to this community the importance of these buoys for weather forecasts.
