Characterizing the Oxygen Minimum Zone (OMZ) in the Costa Rican Eastern Tropical Pacific using in situ data from field campaigns

Abstract

For conservation and sustainable fisheries, it is important to characterize the Oxygen Minimum Zones or OMZ in and around the methane seeps of the Eastern Tropical Pacific (ETP), Costa Rica, through the analysis of temperature, salinity, density, and oxygen profiles. The data used in this work were collected during several oceanographic research campaigns in the Pacific continental margin and offshore of Costa Rica, between 2009 and 2019, using a CTDs, as the profiler of physical parameters of the water column. In general, it was observed that dissolved oxygen gradually decreases with depth to the thermocline, then its concentration decreases more rapidly and remains low, indicating the presence of the OMZ and tends to increase slightly at greater depths. Mean vertical extension of the OMZ near and around the seeps was 763 m and the mean depth for the minimum dissolved oxygen value was 393 m. Spatial differences of measurements taken at stations near the methane seeps were calculated with respect to the measurements at the station located above them. Overall, a greater variability of the oxygen anomalies was observed within the mixed layer, while under the thermocline their values remain stable and around zero.