Mechanical Bathythermograph Profiles from the North Pacific Ocean

Temperature-depth profiles from a single-day oceanographic cruise by the CAYUSE in the North Pacific Ocean on July 6, 1971. Data is formatted to the NODC C128 standard, recording temperature at uniform 5-meter intervals down to a maximum depth of approximately 285 meters. The dataset is hosted by NOAA NCEI and also appears on NASA EarthData, indicating its use in cross-agency climate and ocean studies.

Use Cases

• Analyzing the vertical temperature gradient in the upper 285 meters of the North Pacific Ocean using paired temperature-depth values.
• Studying short-term, single-day thermal conditions for a specific geographic location from cruise, date, position, and time metadata.
• Benchmarking or validating ocean model outputs for historical surface layer conditions.
• Researching the application and structure of the NODC standard Bathythermograph (MBT) C128 data format.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a recognized standard format (NODC C128), ensuring structured consistency.
• Measurements are recorded at a uniform high-resolution depth interval of 5 meters.
• Cross-platform presence on NOAA NCEI and NASA EarthData signals importance and curation for scientific use.

Limitations

• Extremely limited temporal coverage from a single day (1971-07-06).
• Instrument limitation restricts observations to the upper ocean layers only, with a maximum depth of ~285 m.
• Critical metadata conflicts exist: 'last updated' dates differ significantly between Data.gov (2026) and NASA EarthData (1971).

Provenance

Source

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI).

Collection Method

Collected via Mechanical Bathythermograph (MBT) instrument during the CAYUSE cruise and processed by NODC.

Time Range

1971-07-06 to 1971-07-06

Freshness

2026-03-05 22:48:37.197856

Geography

North Pacific Ocean.