Tasman Outflow

The existence of the outflow was published by scientists of the Australian CSIRO's Division of Marine and Atmospheric Research team in August 2007, interpreting salinity and temperature data captured from 1950 to 2002.

[1] The Tasman Outflow is seen as the missing link in the supergyre of the Southern Hemisphere and an important part of the thermohaline circulation.

This water, which escapes from the East Australian Current and moves past Tasmania, is called the Tasman Outflow.

Furthermore, the Tasman Outflow functions as the second gateway for Pacific waters to reach the Indian Ocean, besides the Indonesian Throughflow.

[5] It is colder, less saline and denser than the other two routes, which is caused by the fresh input from the Antarctic Intermediate Water in the South Pacific.

Eventually, the East Australian Current picks up the water and moves it further southwards, where it rounds the south of Tasmania to the west and through the Tasman Outflow ends up in the Indian Ocean.

When compared to the Drake Passage and Indonesian Throughflow routes, the Tasman outflow endures fewer influences from outside.

It thus functions as a stable and constant supply of fresh water, which could work to counteract the changing heat transport in the thermohaline circulation.

Before being injected into the South Pacific subtropical gyre system and subsequently into the Tasman Outflow, the water has travelled many times around Antarctica.