OMG Narwhals: Oceanographic CTD Profiles from Greenland Fjords

NASA's OMG Narwhals project deployed seafloor moorings with acoustic recorders and oceanographic instruments near three glacier fronts in Melville Bay, northwest Greenland, to investigate why narwhals show high site fidelity to specific glacial outlets. The dataset contains ship-based full water column Conductivity, Temperature, and Depth (CTD) profiles collected during summer mooring deployment and recovery cruises. These measurements link physical ocean conditions to marine mammal presence in a rapidly changing Arctic environment.

Use Cases

• Correlating narwhal acoustic detections with concurrent oceanographic conditions like temperature and salinity.
• Analyzing water column structure near glacier fronts to understand heat transport to marine-terminating glaciers.
• Studying seasonal oceanographic biases by comparing summer cruise data with potential year-round mooring records.
• Mapping the physical habitat characteristics of glacial fjords known to be frequented by narwhals.

Strengths

• Data is part of a NASA mission (Oceans Melting Greenland), indicating a high-caliber observational campaign.
• Collects concurrent oceanographic and marine mammal acoustic data at three distinct glacier fronts, enabling ecological linkage.
• Focuses on a data-sparse region (northwest Greenland) and addresses a known observational bias toward summer months.

Limitations

• Critical metadata is missing: column names, row counts, and file sizes are listed as 'unknown' or 'None' across all platforms.
• Conflicting 'last updated' dates (2026-04-09 and 2020-08-31) create uncertainty about data currency and management.
• The temporal coverage is implied but not explicitly stated; the title suggests 2018-2020, but descriptions only reference summer cruises.

Provenance

Source

NASA's Oceans Melting Greenland (OMG) campaign, OMG Narwhals project.

Collection Method

Ship-based full water column CTD profiles obtained during summer mooring deployment/recovery cruises.

Time Range

2018-2020

Freshness

2026-04-09 23:18:51.573646

Geography

Melville Bay, northwest Greenland, near three glacier fronts.