Bonney Coast Upwelling Spatial and Temporal Variability from MODIS, 2002-2016

More than 170 MODIS satellite images from July 2002 to December 2016 were used to map a seasonal coastal upwelling system. The data includes sea surface temperature and chlorophyll-a imagery at approximately 1km resolution, processed with Topographic Position Index and segmentation techniques. This study was presented at the 2017 Australian Marine Science Association Conference and sourced from Geoscience Australia.

Use Cases

• Modeling seasonal upwelling dynamics based on the identified November-April occurrence window.
• Analyzing inter-annual variability in upwelling intensity based on the described strong year-to-year differences.
• Investigating links between upwelling events and ENSO cycles based on the mention of further investigation.
• Mapping nutrient-rich water plumes based on extracted chlorophyll-a and SST signatures of upwelling areas.

Strengths

• Includes over 170 images spanning more than 14 years, providing a substantial time-series.
• Spatial resolution of approximately 1km allows for detailed coastal analysis.
• Results quantify upwelling influence, such as surface areas over 10,000 km2 and SST anomalies over 1°C.
• Methodology combines established techniques (TPI and image segmentation) for systematic mapping.

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Data freshness should be verified; the last metadata update was 2026-05-14.

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia Data

Collection Method

Processed MODIS satellite imagery using Topographic Position Index and image segmentation.

Time Range

July 2002 to December 2016

Freshness

Data covers July 2002 to December 2016; metadata last updated 2026-05-14.

Geography

Bonney Coast, Australian southern shelves from Cape Jaffa, SA to Cape Nelson, VIC