Historical Ocean Temperature Profiles from USNS Mission Santa Cruz

Bay of Biscay and North Atlantic Ocean temperature-depth profiles collected by the USNS MISSION SANTA CRUZ from December 31, 1966, to July 21, 1967. The dataset contains mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) observations processed by the NODC into the standard C128 format. It provides paired temperature-depth values at uniform 5-meter intervals, useful for studying the thermal structure of the ocean's upper layers.

Use Cases

• Analyzing seasonal thermal structure changes in the upper 285 meters of the ocean using temperature-depth pairs.
• Studying historical ocean conditions in the Bay of Biscay using cruise, date, position, and time metadata.
• Calibrating or validating ocean model simulations of the North Atlantic's mixed layer with precise depth-interval data.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a recognized standard (NODC C128 format), ensuring consistency.
• Provides a focused time series over a seven-month period for seasonal analysis.
• Observations include precise metadata: cruise information, date, position, and time for each profile.

Limitations

• Row count, total size, and specific column names are unknown from the provided sources.
• Instrument limitation: MBT maximum depth is ~285 meters, restricting analysis to the ocean's upper layers only.
• There is a conflict in 'last updated' metadata between platforms (2026-04-01 on datagov vs. 1967-07-21 on nasa_earthdata).

Provenance

Source

NOAA_NCEI (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Centers for Environmental Information).

Collection Method

Collected via mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) instrument from the USNS MISSION SANTA CRUZ and processed by NODC.

Time Range

1966-12-31 to 1967-07-21

Freshness

2026-04-01 15:02:01.777872

Geography

Bay of Biscay and North Atlantic Ocean.