The Magnitude and Frequency of Combined Flow Bed Shear Stress dataset provides regionalisation maps of seabed exposure to oceanographic processes for the Australian continental shelf. Output from numerical models predicting waves, tides, winds, and currents was used to compute combined flow bed shear stresses over an 8-year period from March 1997 to February 2005. The Australian Ocean Data Network published this dataset to quantify exposure for marine habitat classification and policy.
Use Cases
- Regionalising seabed exposure based on combined flow bed shear stress magnitude and frequency.
- Correlating oceanographic exposure with physical sediment properties like grain size and carbonate content.
- Distinguishing benthic environments dominated by high-frequency (diurnal/semi-diurnal) versus low-frequency (synoptic/annual) events.
- Quantifying seabed habitat exposure for marine planning and habitat classification schemes.
Strengths
- Provides data for the entire Australian continental shelf.
- Covers an 8-year temporal period from March 1997 to February 2005.
- Uses three distinct classification methods for oceanographic exposure.
Limitations
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
- Data may reflect temporal bias inherent to the 1997-2005 period.
Provenance
- Source
- Australian Ocean Data Network
- Collection Method
- Output from a suite of numerical models predicting oceanic processes.
- Time Range
- March 1997 - February 2005
- Freshness
- Last updated 2026-05-05 01:10:09.021928; freshness should be verified.
- Geography
- Australian continental shelf