Navy Ship XBT Temperature Profiles 1973-1983

Temperature profile data from expendable bathythermograph (XBT) instruments deployed from US Navy ships of opportunity between April 25, 1973, and December 12, 1983. The data was processed by the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC) into the standard C116/C118 format, containing temperature-depth pairs recorded at non-uniform inflection points. This dataset provides a historical record of ocean temperature structure from the surface to depths of up to 1830 meters.

Use Cases

• Analyzing decadal changes in ocean temperature structure by examining temperature-depth pairs across the 1973-1983 period.
• Calibrating or validating ocean climate models using historical in-situ temperature profiles from ships of opportunity.
• Studying the vertical thermal structure of the ocean at inflection points rather than uniform depth intervals.
• Researching the operational use and data characteristics of expendable bathythermograph (XBT) instruments prior to July 1994.

Strengths

• Data spans a significant decade-long time range from 1973 to 1983, providing a historical baseline.
• Profiles are processed to a standardized NODC format (C116/C118), ensuring consistency for analysis.
• Measurements can reach depths up to 1830 meters, capturing deep ocean thermal structure.

Limitations

• Specific column names, row counts, and dataset size are unknown across all platforms.
• The license for the data is not specified in any provided source description.
• A conflict exists in the 'last updated' metadata between platforms (2026-03-05 on Data.gov vs. 1983-12-12 on NASA Earthdata).

Provenance

Source

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), originally from US Navy ships of opportunity.

Collection Method

Collected using expendable bathythermograph (XBT) instruments and processed by NODC into C116/C118 format.

Time Range

1973-04-25 to 1983-12-12

Freshness

2026-03-05 23:33:29.257477

Geography

Global oceans, specific locations determined by ship tracks (not explicitly stated).