The float was launched in a triad with NPS#41 and NPS#46 , and was also associated with NPS#42 . The triad was launched off Monterey Bay (Figure 1) in a triangular pattern with one point above the 500-m isobarh and two others at the offshore side of a nearly equilateral triangle with about 11 km on a side.
The float was entrained in the Undercurent but left it off San Francisco. On August 19, 1996 the float first turned turned first to south-eastward and then off shore (Figure 2). Between the end of August and the beginning of December, 1996 the float moved along an anticyclonic curve and then again entered the California Undercurrent. In the middle of June, 1997 the float turned offshore and started moving westward.
On July 3, 1997 the float was entrained by an anticyclonic eddy (Figure 4) with diameter of 140 km and period of 74 days
Number of loops 1.5 Diameter, km 141.2 Duration, days 111 Period, days 74 Swirl velocity, cm/s 0.6 Translation velocity, cm/s 0.5 Direction, degrees 347.4 Rossby number 0.01
and remained there till the end of the mission.The float was ballasted for 275 dbar but was steady sinking from 455 to 530 dbar during the mission. While in the anticyclonic eddy (~last 120 days of the mission) the depth was 526.3 ± 4.1 dbar (Figure 3).