Argo Floats

We have been finding out all about Argo Floats. There are over 3600 of them in our oceans, measuring temperature and salinity (the saltiness).



Argo Floats are a cool piece of technology. Each float sinks to 1000m for 9 days and on the 10th day sinks further to 2000m and for the next 10 hours, takes its measurements up the water column. It then sends the info off at the surface to a satellite  (and anyone can access this data).

Google Earth has an awesome app that lets you see where the Argo Floats are in real time. Click here to download the app from the Argo website.
Your Google Earth will start to look like this... lots of little green dots appearing- showing you the location of the Argo Floats. You can also zoom in and get information about any of these floats, along with seeing where they have travelled- their trajectory.

Argo Float Cross section- used by permission

Argo Floats sink and float because they have an internal oil bladder and a battery that pumps the oil from one part to the other- very similar way to how a Cartesian diver works. We had a go at making Cartesian divers to see this for ourselves.