Historical Ocean Temperature Profiles from the LEOPARD Expedition

Mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) data from the vessel LEOPARD provides temperature-depth profiles for the upper ocean layers. The dataset covers a multi-ocean voyage from 1959 to 1962, processed by the NODC into its standard C128 format. Each observation includes cruise metadata, position, time, and paired temperature readings at 5-meter depth intervals.

Use Cases

• Analyzing thermal structure of the upper ocean (up to 285m) across multiple basins.
• Studying historical sea surface temperature and subsurface temperature gradients.
• Mapping cruise tracks and correlating temperature profiles with location and time.
• Validating or supplementing climate reanalysis models with in-situ historical data.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a documented standard format (NODC C128), ensuring consistency.
• Covers a wide geographical range including the Gulf of Guinea, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, and Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
• Provides a multi-year time series from June 1959 to February 1962.

Limitations

• Instrument limitation: MBT maximum depth is ~285m, restricting analysis to the upper ocean only.
• Critical metadata conflicts: row count, column names, and exact data size are unknown across all platforms.
• Data freshness is unclear; the last metadata update is far in the future (2026), suggesting a system error.

Provenance

Source

NOAA NCEI (National Centers for Environmental Information).

Collection Method

Collected via mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) instrument during the LEOPARD cruise and processed by NODC.

Time Range

1959-06-04 to 1962-02-19

Freshness

2026-03-05 23:55:25.995178

Geography

Gulf of Guinea, Indian Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, North Atlantic Ocean, South Atlantic Ocean, South Pacific Ocean.