2025 Drifter Tracks
Resolving transport pathways through New England's continental shelf waters and beyond
updated every few hours
See a GoogleMap of just this month's tracks.
Go to Student Drifters Homepage.
See how to navigate a drifter track animation portal
Find out how to get involved with the project
Access the historical drifter data from the old NOAA site.
Access the historical drifter data from new Stonehill/ODN site after watching a 2-min video on how.
See list of peer-reviewed publications using these drifter data.
Get information on a related unmanned sailboat project
Plots of recent tracks are linked in the table below.
Drifter tracks from 2022 are here and those from 2023 & 2024 are here.
Drifter tracks from in previous years (email james.patrick.manning@gmail.com).
To get PYTHON processing routines, email James Manning for the latest versions.
To see information on individual clusters, click the links in the following chronological table
| Institution (data) |
PI (report/blog) | Deployers (deploy video) | Date Deployed (animation) | Dropsite (forecast) | #units | Science (sensor map) | Status (googlemap) | ID-Type of Unit (photo) | Fate (photo) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Caterbury School of Florida/ USF | Audrey Mitchell/Chris Stallings | RV Weatherbird II | Mar 14, 2025 | Gulf of Mexico | 1 | education and SHELF Research Program | underway | surface "irina" drifter | 253250841 took a few days to power up but eventually started reporting ... finally made it around the corner in July to head north and ... |
| Falmouth MA High School | Cheryl Milliken | R/V Tioga | Apr 8, 2025 | Cape Cod Bay | 5 | education | done | surface "Irina" drifter with 2 miniboats and 2 makerbuoys | 254410701 progressed slowly towards the southeast for a few days, went into the canal on April 13th including a short stay inside Sandwich Boat Basin, went back into the bay, landed near the mouth where Alison McDonald recovered it.
254410702 (miniboat Riptide) quickly went ashore near "Bayberry Rd" north of Ellisville, brought up the beach by "Cory", and recovered by JiM; 254410703 (miniboat Rockstar) quickly went ashore during first tidal cycle a bit south of "Pilgrim Way" recovered; 254410704 MakerBuoy minidrifter landed at 48 Salt Marsh Rd in Sandwich on 13 April after traversing most of the bay and strong winds from the north picked up by Alison McDonald; 254410705 MakerBuoy minidrifter landed at 64 Salt Marsh Rd in Sandwich on 13 April after traversing most of the bay, got lodged in the rocks so Alison McDonald recovered it the next day; |
| Southern Maine Community College | Tarbox | Jeff Putman's F/V Captain B Obie Spear's F/V Tenacious ? |
Apr 25, 2025 Apr 30, 2025 Jul,2025 |
Jeffrey's Ledge | 1, 1 1 |
education | underway | surface "brian" drifters | 254430701 slowly headed southeastward on normal track to Georges Bank but then headed north for the circumnavigation of the gulf ... near Grand Manan in mid-July 254430702 came ashore May 4th just south of Kennebunkport on some rocks at the end of Crescent Surf Drive and then recovered ... brought to 82 Ross Road in Kennebunk ... and then back to SMCC |
| NOAA/NEFSC | Dave Richardson | ??? | July 16, 2025 | MAB Shelf/Slope Front | 1 | Fish Larval Transport | done | "Dave" drifter w/light-trap tethered below | one short deployment of only a few hours so not included in the master database |
| Cohasset Center for Student Coastal Research | Buckley | Joe Barrow's F/V Ryan Joseph; Tom Depersia's Bigfish III Sportfishing Charters; ?? |
21 July 2025; 23 July 2025; ?? Aug 2025 |
Mass Bay | 1; 1; 8 |
education | underway | surface "irina" drifters | 257420701 recovered 3/4 miles off Scituate about 24 hours into its track by Kevin Ricketts a charter fisherman; 257420702 redeployed unit by charter fishermen ~7 miles east of Green Harbor... 25?420703 ... 25?4207010 |
| WHOI Sea Grant OSTEAM | Simpkins | ? | Aug 2025? | Mass Bay? | 8 | education | planned | surface "irina" drifters? | 258420701,2,...8 |
| Great Lakes Environmental Research Lab | Steve Ruberg | ? | July 2025 | Lake Michigan? | 5 | Fish Larval Transport? | planned | surface "eddie" drifters? | 257440861 ...; 257440862 ...; 257440863 ...; 257440864 ...; 257440865 ...; |
| Stockton University | Anna Pfeiffer-Herbert | ?? | 2025? | off New Jersey | 1 | education | planned | surface "irina" drifter | 233400731... |
Note: Most units are prepared by students in the classroom. The majority are standard surface drifters" marking only the top 1-meter of the water column, and some have subsurface drogues typically centered at 10m-15m below the surface. For details, call 508-566-4080 or email james.patrick.manning@gmail.com.