Greetings all,

Once a year in April, the Mercator Ocean Forecasting Center in Toulouse and the Coriolis Infrastructure in Brest publish a common newsletter. Papers are dedicated to observations only.
• The first paper introducing this issue is presenting the Coriolis 2014-2020 framework which was renewed in 2014 in order to go on integrating in-situ ocean observation infrastructure for operational oceanography and ocean/climate research.
• Next paper by Poffa et al. describes how some Argo floats are deployed by the sailing community, through ship-based non-governmental organization or trans-oceanic races. It allows Argo floats to be deployed in poorly sampled areas where there is no regular shipping. Sailors got also involved in oceanographic science activities. An example of float deployment is given in the case of the Barcelona World Race.
• Next paper by Pouliquen et al. describes the EURO-ARGO ERIC infrastructure which is now officially set-up since May 2014. The objective of the Euro-Argo ERIC is to organize a long term European contribution to the international Argo array of profiling floats.
• Le Traon et al. are then presenting how the assessment of the impact of ARGO in Ocean models and satellite validation is conducted in the context of E-AIMS (Euro-Argo improvements for the GMES/Copernicus Marine Service) FP7 project. Observing System Evaluations and Observing System Simulation Experiments have been conducted to quantify the contribution of Argo to constrain global and regional monitoring and forecasting centers and validate satellite observations. Recommendations for the new phase of Argo are also elaborated.
• Kolodziejczyk et al. follow with the presentation of the complementarity of ARGO and SMOS Sea Surface Salinity (SSS) observations to help monitoring SSS variability from basin to meso scale. Using a 4-year time-series of SMOS SSS data and the global Argo array of in situ measurements, a statistical approach and an optimal interpolation method are used to characterize biases and reduce noises. Results are promising and show strong complementarity between SMOS and Argo data.
• Herbert et al. then describe Shipboard Acoustic Doppler Current Profilers (SADCP) observations which are carried out in the Tropical Atlantic during yearly cruises in the framework of the PIRATA program. The present note displays the SADCP data processing methodology applied for 8 PIRATA cruises by using CASCADE software.
• Cravatte et al. follow with a paper presenting the new international TPOS2020 project (2014-2020). The project objective is to build a renewed, integrated, internationally-coordinated and sustainable observing system in the Tropical Pacific, meeting both the needs of climate research and operational forecasting systems and learning lessons from the great success-and finally partial collapse- of the TAO/TRITON array.
• Saout-Grit et al. next present an updated procedure for CTD-oxygen calibration along with new data processing that was applied to hydrographic cruise “BIFURCATION” (September 2012) in the Coral Sea. They describe the content and acquisition models of hydrological and chemical data that are used for the calibration, the post-cruise calibration method and the calibration results.
• Dussurget et al. is showing the recent improvement in surface current estimation from satellite altimetry, contributing to a better understanding of the Sea Surface Salinity processes in the Subtropical North Atlantic in the context of the SPURS experiment.
• Finally, Mortier et al. are presenting the GROOM project and the Glider European Research Infrastructure. During the last three years, the GROOM community has studied the feasibility and advantages of a European Research Infrastructure for gliders. The design study has proposed operational contours for a future distributed Glider (dedicated) European Research Infrastructure (GERI).
We will meet again soon with an issue dedicated to the various achievements of the MyOcean projects now handing over to the EU Copernicus Marine Service. Moreover, we will meet again next year in April 2016 for a new jointly coordinated Newsletter between Mercator Ocean and Coriolis. We wish you a pleasant reading,

Laurence Crosnier and Sylvie Pouliquen, Editors.

• CORIOLIS 2014-2020: AN INTEGRATED IN-SITU OBSERVATION INFRASTRUCTURE FOR OPERATIONAL OCEANOGRAPHY AND OCEAN/CLIMATE RESEARCH By P-Y. Le Traon
•  DEPLOYING ARGO FLOATS IN THE BARCELONA WORLD RACE By N. Poffa , N. Lebreton , M. Kramp
•  THE EURO-ARGO ERIC OFFICIALLY SET UP By S. Pouliquen, P-Y. Le Traon and Euro-Argo Members and Observers
•  ASSESSESMENT OF THE IMPACT OF ARGO IN OCEAN MODELS AND SATELLITE VALIDATION FROM E-AIMS PROJECT By P.Y. Le Traon, E. Remy, J. Ballabrera-Poy
•  ARGO AND SMOS SSS COMBINATION HELPS MONITORING SSS VARIABILITY FROM BASIN SCALE TO MESOSCALE By N. Kolodziejczyk, J. Boutin, O. Hernandez, A. Sommer, G. Reverdin, S. Marchand, N. Martin,J.-L. Vergely, and X. Yin
•  FRENCH PIRATA CRUISES S-ADCP DATA PROCESSING By G. Herbert, C. Kermabon, J. Grelet, B. Bourlès
•  TPOS2020: TROPICAL PACIFIC OBSERVING SYSTEM FOR 2020 By S. Cravatte, A. Ganachaud, B. Dewitte, F. Hernandez
•  CALIBRATION OF CTD OXYGEN DATA COLLECTED IN THE CORAL SEA DURING THE 2012 BIFURCATION CRUISE By Carole Saout-Grit, Alexandre Ganachaud, Christophe Maes, Luc Finot, Léocadie Jamet, François Baurand and Jacques Grelet
•  SURFACE CURRENT FIELD IMPROVEMENTS- REGIONAL ALTIMETRY FOR SPURS By R. Dussurget, S. Mulet, M-I. Pujol, A. Sommer, N. Kolodziejczyk, G. Reverdin, M.-H. Rio
•  THE GROOM PROJECT AND THE GLIDER EUROPEAN RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE By Laurent Mortier, Pierre Testor, Victor Turpin