ATOMIC: Saildrone Ocean and Atmosphere Measurements from Barbados Campaign

Three autonomous Saildrones collected high-resolution surface and water column data offshore Barbados for 45 days in early 2020. The campaign, jointly funded by NASA and NOAA, targeted mesoscale ocean eddies to understand air-sea interactions. Data includes 1-minute surface observations and 5-minute current profiles from instruments like CTD, fluorometer, and ADCP.

Use Cases

• Analyzing air-sea heat and momentum fluxes using concurrent wind, air temperature, and sea surface temperature measurements.
• Investigating phytoplankton biomass distribution via chlorophyll-a concentrations from the fluorometer.
• Studying ocean current structure and variability with 5-minute Acoustic Doppler Current Profiler (ADCP) data.
• Examining near-surface thermal stratification using vertical temperature loggers along the hull.
• Validating satellite-derived ocean and atmospheric parameters with high-quality, near real-time in-situ observations.

Strengths

• High temporal resolution with 1-minute surface data and 5-minute ADCP profiles.
• Multivariate observations from a suite of seven instruments on autonomous platforms.
• Data is CF/ACDD compliant netCDF, adhering to NOAA/NCEI specifications.
• Campaign involved a coordinated fleet of three drones over a focused 45-day period.

Limitations

• Key metadata conflicts: last update date is listed as both 2020-03-02 and 2026-04-09.
• Column names and exact row/size counts are not provided in the available metadata.
• Data coverage is limited to a specific region (Atlantic offshore Barbados) and time period.

Provenance

Source

NASA and NOAA-funded Saildrone ATOMIC campaign.

Collection Method

Deployment of three wind/solar-powered unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) equipped with instrument suites.

Time Range

17 January to 2 March 2020.

Freshness

2026-04 09 22:46:21.798412 (conflict with 2020-03-02 date noted in limitations)

Geography

Atlantic waters offshore of Barbados.