Seaglider Oceanographic Measurements from Washington Coast, September 2002

Oceanographic data collected by an autonomous Seaglider vehicle during a mission off the Washington and Oregon coast. The dataset contains measurements of temperature, salinity, and depth-averaged currents taken along a sawtooth trajectory from September to November 2002. It was collected by the University of Washington and archived by NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information.

Use Cases

• Analyze vertical profiles of temperature and salinity to identify water mass boundaries and stratification.
• Calculate depth-averaged currents from glider navigation data to study coastal circulation patterns.
• Correlate sensor measurements with the glider's sawtooth dive trajectory to understand spatial sampling density.
• Validate regional ocean models using in-situ temperature and salinity time-series from the deployment period.

Strengths

• Data collected by a specialized autonomous underwater vehicle designed for long-duration scientific missions.
• Measurements cover a specific coastal region over a continuous 54-day mission from September 11 to November 3, 2002.

Limitations

• Dataset is over 20 years old, limiting its relevance for analyzing current oceanographic conditions.
• Specific sample count, sensor resolution, and data completeness are unknown from the provided metadata.

Provenance

Source

University of Washington's School of Oceanography and Applied Physics Laboratory, archived by NOAA NCEI.

Collection Method

Data gathered by a buoyancy-driven Seaglider autonomous underwater vehicle performing programmed dives.

Time Range

2002-09-11 to 2002-11 -03

Freshness

Static historical dataset; last updated date corresponds to the mission end date of 2002-11-03.

Geography

Coastal waters of Washington and Oregon in the North Pacific Ocean.