Rapid Climate Change (RAPID) was originally a £20 million, six-year (2001-2007) program of the Natural Environment Research Council. This monitoring effort was continued in the NERC-funded follow-on program RAPID-WATCH 2008-2014. The program aimed to improve the ability to quantify the probability and magnitude of future rapid change in climate, with a main (but not exclusive) focus on the role of the Atlantic Ocean's Thermohaline Circulation. The program used a combination of observations (present day and palaeo) and modelling (atmospheric, oceanic, terrestrial, cryospheric). Observations such as moorings were used for testing simulations of Thermohaline Circulation variability and climate change including the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation, long-term transports and mixing processes and atmospheric forcing of ocean convection, and large-scale ocean transports.
The specific scientific objectives of the RAPID program were agreed by the Rapid Climate Change Steering Committee and are detailed in the RAPID Science Plan (https://rapid.ac.uk/rapid/Scienceplan.php).
In the Maritimes the Rapid moorings were mostly on the Scotian shelf and slope off of Halifax from 2004 to 2010.
