IMOS - Ships of Opportunity - Sea Surface Temperature Sensors for Australian Vessels Sub-Facility provides near real-time sea surface temperature data from volunteer and research vessels worldwide. The data is quality assured, placed on the Global Telecommunications System, and used for satellite SST validation and operational analyses. Data is supplied by vessels including five from the Australian Volunteer Observing Fleet and two with newly designed real-time systems.
Use Cases
- Calibrating and validating remotely sensed satellite SST data based on high-quality in situ observations.
- Improving ocean and climate model inputs based on near real-time SST data from global ship routes.
- Analyzing SST patterns in regions lacking buoy observations, such as the Western Pacific Tropical Warm Pool.
- Monitoring sea surface temperature for operational regional and global SST analyses based on data fed into the Bureau of Meteorology's system.
Strengths
- Data is supplied in near real-time, within 24 hours.
- Sensors include high-accuracy Sea Bird SBE 48 and SBE 38 models.
- Routes cover key regions including the Southern Ocean, coastal Australia, Bass Strait, and the Tasman Sea.
Limitations
- Row count and column-level documentation are unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
- Some historical SST observations from four vessels are not currently available in real-time.
- Last updated 2026-05-05 22:43:37.169735; freshness should be verified.
Provenance
- Source
- Australian Ocean Data Network
- Collection Method
- Data collected from automatic weather stations and specialized sensors on ships of opportunity and research vessels.
- Time Range
- Includes near real-time streams and historical periods from 2008 to 2012.
- Freshness
- Near real-time (within 24 hours)
- Geography
- Worldwide oceans, with focus on Australian coastal regions, Southern Ocean, Western Pacific Tropical Warm Pool, Bass Strait, Pacific Ocean, South-East Asia, Tasman Sea.