NOAA Ship David Starr Jordan: XBT Temperature Profiles in the North Pacific

Bathythermograph (XBT) data from NOAA Ship David Starr Jordan captures ocean temperature-depth profiles in the North Pacific Ocean's coastal waters of California from April 25 to June 18, 1986. The data is processed to the NODC C116 format, recording temperature at non-uniform 'inflection point' depths to define the temperature curve, with standard instruments reaching 450 or 760 meters. This dataset provides a snapshot of ocean thermal structure for a specific cruise and time period.

Use Cases

• Analyzing vertical ocean thermal structure based on temperature-depth profile pairs.
• Studying seasonal or spatial temperature changes in the Coastal Waters of California during the 1986 cruise period.
• Calibrating or validating ocean models using historical in-situ temperature observations.
• Researching data processing methods for legacy expendable bathythermograph (XBT) instruments.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a documented standard format (NODC C116) by a recognized authority (NODC/NOAA).
• Provides specific temporal coverage for a continuous cruise from 1986-04-25 to 1986-06-18.
• Contains detailed methodological context, including instrument types (XBT) and depth capabilities (up to 1830 m).

Limitations

• Critical metadata is missing: column names, row count, and file size are unknown, hindering immediate analysis.
• The dataset's freshness is ambiguous, with a metadata update in 2026 but data collection ending in 1986.
• Spatial coverage is described at different levels of specificity ('North Pacific Ocean' vs. 'Coastal Waters of California').

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Collected via expendable bathythermograph (XBT) instruments deployed from NOAA Ship David Starr Jordan and processed by the National Oceanographic Data Center (NODC).

Time Range

1986-04-25 to 1986-06-18

Freshness

2026-04-01 (metadata last updated on Data.gov); 1986-06-18 (data collection end date on NASA Earthdata).

Geography

North Pacific Ocean, specifically the Coastal Waters of California