Historical Ocean Temperature Profiles from R/V Little Rock

6800623 contains bathythermograph (MBT) data collected by the research vessel LITTLE ROCK across the Alboran Sea, Mediterranean Sea, and North Atlantic Ocean. The dataset provides temperature-depth profile pairs recorded at uniform 5-meter intervals, processed by the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC) into its standard C128 format. Observations are limited to the upper ocean layers, with a maximum depth of approximately 285 meters.

Use Cases

• Analyzing the thermal structure of the upper ocean (0-285m) using temperature-depth pairs.
• Studying spatial temperature gradients across the Alboran Sea, Mediterranean Sea, and North Atlantic Ocean.
• Investigating short-term oceanographic variability during the January-February 1968 cruise period.
• Using cruise information, date, position, and time metadata to contextualize historical observations.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a consistent standard format (NODC C128), ensuring structural uniformity.
• Temperature values are recorded at a uniform 5-meter depth interval, facilitating direct comparison.
• Covers a specific, well-documented 47-day research cruise from January 6 to February 22, 1968.

Limitations

• Key metadata such as row count, column names, and file size are unavailable across all sources.
• The MBT instrument's maximum depth of ~285m restricts analysis to the ocean's upper layers only.
• The last updated date conflicts between sources (2026-04-01 on datagov vs. 1968-02-22 on nasa_earthdata).

Provenance

Source

NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI), originally from NODC.

Collection Method

Collected via mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) instrument from R/V LITTLE ROCK and processed to NODC standard C128 format.

Time Range

1968-01-06 to 1968-02-22

Freshness

2026-04-01 15:15:40.826777

Geography

Alboran Sea, Mediterranean Sea, North Atlantic Ocean