Great Lakes Ice Reports with Weather and Icebreaking Data

1961 through 2004 ice observations from U.S. Coast Guard vessels and shore stations on the Great Lakes. The dataset includes measurements of ice thickness, concentration, weather conditions, and ice breaking activity. Data from 1961/62 to 1966/67 have been processed into a standard ASCII format and are sorted by year and station.

Use Cases

• Analyzing historical ice thickness trends across the five Great Lakes.
• Correlating ice concentration reports with concurrent weather observations.
• Studying the timing and location of Coast Guard icebreaking operations.
• Comparing shore station and vessel-based ice observations for data consistency.

Strengths

• Contains a multi-decade record spanning from 1961 to 2004.
• Includes multiple observation types: ice metrics, weather, and operational activity.
• Data for the initial six winter seasons (1961-1967) are processed into a standardized format.

Limitations

• Column names and exact row counts are not provided by any source.
• Sources conflict on the last update date (2004 vs 2026) and license details.
• The processing level and availability format for data after 1967 is unclear.

Provenance

Source

U.S. Coast Guard vessels and shore stations.

Collection Method

Observations reported via teletype messages and ice logging forms.

Time Range

1961 - 2004

Freshness

2026-03-13 01:49:32.381700

Geography

The five Great Lakes (Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, Ontario).