Particulate concentrations in Lake St. Clair as recorded by a shipborne multispectral optical monitoring system

Abstract Methodology is developed to convert the upwelling multispectral radiance observed by a ship-mounted dual radiometer reflectance system into the subsurface volume reflectance normalized to a standard solar zenith angle and a standard downwelling light field. This normalized multispectral subsurface volume reflectance is then utilized to evaluate the capacity of effectively conducting, from a moving research vessel, a continuous monitor of the total seston and suspended sediment concentrations in the generally turbid, shallow waters of Lake St. Clair. Good agreement is obtained between remotely predicted and directly sampled concentrations of both seston and suspended sediments.