ABSTRACT
The moored buoy network in Indian Ocean revolutionized the observational programs with systematic time series measurement of in-situ data sets from remote marine locations. The real time meteorological and oceanographic data sets significantly improved the weather forecast and warning services particularly during extreme events since its inception in 1997. The sustenance of the network requires persistent efforts to overcome the multitude of challenges such as vandalism, bio-fouling, rough weather, corrosion, ship time availability, telemetry issues etc. Besides these, the COVID-19 pandemic constrained the normal functioning of activities, mainly by delaying the maintenance of the network that resulted in losing a few expensive buoy system components and precious data sets. However, the improvements in the buoy system, in-house developed data acquisition system and efforts in ensuring the quality of measurements together with ‘best practice methods’ enabled 73 % of the buoy network to be functional even when the cruises were reduced to 33 % during the Covid lockdown in 2020. The moored buoys equipped with Indian buoy data acquisition system triggered high frequency transmission during the Super cyclone Amphan in May 2020, which greatly helped the cyclone early warning services during the Covid pandemic. The Covid lockdown point towards the reliability and enhanced utility of moored buoy observations particularly when other modes of measurements are limited and also necessitates more such platforms to better predict the weather systems. The present study analyses the enhancement of the buoy program and improvisation of the buoy system that extended the lifetime beyond the stipulated duration and enabled the high frequency data transmission during cyclones amid the Covid lockdown. The recommendations to better manage the remote platforms specifically in the event of a pandemic based on the operational experience of more than two decades is also presented.