GOM TRACS: Oil Slick Classification from Remote Sensing in the Gulf of Mexico

NOAA's Deepwater Horizon Lessons Learned Studies produced this dataset on oil slick detection methods. The data, shown in NOAA's Environmental Response Management Applications (ERMA), are part of field research at the chronic MC20 oil discharge site undertaken in 2016, 2017, and 2018. Research was funded by the U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, and the Oil Spill Preparedness Division.

Use Cases

• Train machine learning models for oil slick classification based on remote sensing imagery mentioned in the description.
• Analyze the relationship between surface oil characterization and subsurface oil slick data as part of the study.
• Validate satellite and airborne imagery analysis techniques for estimating oil coverage and thickness.
• Study the characteristics of a chronic oil discharge site (MC20) based on multi-year field data.

Strengths

• Data is part of a formal NOAA study funded by multiple U.S. government agencies.
• Research integrates multiple data collection methods: satellite, airborne, surface, and subsurface.
• Field research was conducted over three years (2016, 2017, 2018).

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Available file formats (PDF, HTML) suggest the primary data may be embedded in reports rather than raw structured files.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Department of Commerce.

Collection Method

Field research involving synoptic collection of satellite imagery, airborne imagery, surface oil characterization, oil and water chemistry, and subsurface oil slick data.

Time Range

Field research undertaken in 2016, 2017, and 2018.

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 22:26:22.018261; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Mississippi Canyon lease block #20 (MC20) in the Gulf of Mexico, off the coast of Louisiana.