Himawari-8 Sea Surface Temperature Data for Oceanographic Phenomena

Himawari-8 satellite data provides high-frequency (10-minute) and high-resolution (~2km) sea surface temperature observations. The dataset was used in a 2019 AMSA Conference presentation to study upwelling events on the Bonney Coast (2016–17), the East Australian Current (July 2015–Sept 2017), and Madden-Julian Oscillation diurnal variations (summers 2015–16, 2016–17). The data originates from Geoscience Australia and is intended for integration into the Digital Earth Australia platform.

Use Cases

• Monitoring coastal upwelling events based on area, temperature, and duration metrics mentioned in the description
• Analyzing seasonal and intra-seasonal variations of major ocean currents like the East Australian Current
• Investigating diurnal sea surface temperature cycles correlated with atmospheric phenomena like the Madden-Julian Oscillation
• Correlating sea surface temperature variations with surface wind speed and short-wave latent heat flux

Strengths

• High temporal resolution (10-minute intervals) for capturing rapid changes
• High spatial resolution (~2 kilometers) for detailed geographic analysis
• Covers specific, well-documented phenomena (Bonney Coast upwelling, EAC, MJO) over multiple years

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
• The primary input is a conference abstract; the underlying raw data files and their accessibility are not detailed

Provenance

Source

Geoscience Australia Data

Collection Method

Satellite remote sensing from the Himawari-8 geostationary satellite

Time Range

Includes analysis periods from July 2015 to September 2017

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-25 16:23:19.912774; freshness should be verified

Geography

Focus on Australian regions: Bonney Coast, East Australian Current, northwest shelf, northern NSW, eastern Tasmania