High-Resolution CTD/STD Ocean Profiles from USNS Thomas Washington

High-resolution CTD/STD data from the USNS Thomas Washington provides nearly continuous vertical profiles of ocean properties in the North Pacific. Collected over a 16-day period in May 1984, the data includes temperature, salinity, density, and possibly dissolved oxygen or transmissivity at depth intervals as fine as one meter. Each station record includes cruise information, position, date, time, and may include concurrent meteorological and sea surface conditions.

Use Cases

• Analyzing vertical water column structure based on high-resolution temperature and salinity profiles.
• Studying oceanographic variability over a 16-day cruise period using time-series station data.
• Calculating derived ocean properties like density (sigma-t) from the reported conductivity, temperature, and depth measurements.
• Correlating subsurface ocean conditions with surface meteorological data reported at the time of each cast.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a standard high-resolution format (NODC F022), suggesting quality control.
• Profiles are high-resolution, with data potentially reported at depth intervals as fine as 1 meter.
• Time range is precisely defined from 1984-05-05 to 1984-05-20.

Limitations

• Key metadata is missing across sources: exact column names, row count, file size, and license are unknown.
• Data is from a single, short cruise in 1984, limiting temporal and spatial scope.
• The dataset's presence on NASA Earthdata lacks any descriptive metadata, indicating incomplete cataloging.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Collected using CTD (Conductivity-Temperature-Depth) and STD (Salinity-Temperature-Depth) instruments deployed from the USNS Thomas Washington.

Time Range

1984-05-05 to 1984-05-20

Freshness

Metadata was last updated on 2026-03-05, though the underlying data is from 1984.

Geography

North Pacific Ocean