Historical Upper Ocean Temperature Profiles from BEGOR Cruise

November 1958 to March 1959 temperature-depth profiles from the BEGOR cruise in the East China Sea, North Pacific Ocean, Philippine Sea, and South China Sea. The dataset contains observations processed by the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC) into the standard C128 format for Mechanical Bathythermograph (MBT) data. Each profile provides paired temperature and depth values at uniform 5-meter intervals, capturing the thermal structure of the ocean's upper layers to a maximum depth of approximately 285 meters.

Use Cases

• Analyzing seasonal thermal structure changes in the upper ocean from late 1958 to early 1959.
• Calibrating or validating historical ocean model simulations for the western Pacific basins.
• Studying the vertical temperature gradient and mixed layer depth from paired temperature-depth values.
• Mapping the spatial distribution of near-surface ocean temperatures across the East China Sea and Philippine Sea.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a consistent standard (NODC C128 format), ensuring structured temperature-depth pairs.
• Provides a focused temporal snapshot over a 4-month cruise, useful for seasonal analysis.
• Includes key metadata for each observation: cruise information, date, position, and time.

Limitations

• Instrument limitation: MBT maximum depth is ~285m, restricting analysis to the ocean's upper layers only.
• Precise row count, column names, and dataset size are unknown across all sources.
• Sources conflict on the 'last updated' date (2026-03-05 vs. 1959-03-17), indicating potential metadata inconsistency.

Provenance

Source

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), originating from the BEGOR cruise.

Collection Method

Observations gathered using a Mechanical Bathythermograph (MBT) instrument and processed by NODC.

Time Range

1958-11-11 to 1959-03-17

Freshness

2026-03-05 22:54:56.970724

Geography

East China Sea, North Pacific Ocean, Philippine Sea, South China Sea