At Colby, there are many ways students are able to quench their academic curiosities. One example is the senior capstone projects. Senior Zack Dubosky, with faculty mentor Aleja Ortiz, went to Allen Island on Sept 26th, 2021 to work on his senior honors thesis.
On the island, Zack and Professor Ortiz deployed 9 different wave instraments in the channel between Allen and Benner Island to measure the local wave climate and test the efficacy, precision and accuracy of handmade DIY wave pressure sensors to a professional wave buoy. Thei initial deployment is for 1 month, where they will return to recover the instraments at the end of October. The data gatehrd by both sets of instruments will be compared as part of Zack’s senior capstone project. He will develop code for estimating wave climate statistics including wave direction based on the data.
At the moment, they have deployed a SoFar Ocean Buoy at the Northernmost Mooring of Allen Island in teh Channel between Allen and Benner Island. It has hourly free-available wave data reporting that can be accessed at: https://spotters.sofarocean.com/?spotter-filter=SPOT-1470