USS T.J. Gary Upper Ocean Temperature Profiles from 1966

Mechanical bathythermograph data from the USS T.J. Gary's 1966 cruise in the South Pacific and Southern Oceans. The dataset contains temperature-depth profile pairs recorded at uniform 5-meter intervals down to a maximum of approximately 285 meters. Data was processed into the NODC standard C128 format by the National Oceanographic Data Center.

Use Cases

• Analyzing the vertical temperature structure of the upper ocean from paired temperature-depth values.
• Studying short-term thermal variability in the South Pacific and Southern Oceans during January 1966.
• Calibrating or validating historical ocean model outputs for the upper 285 meters.
• Investigating cruise-specific oceanographic conditions using reported date, position, and time for each observation.

Strengths

• Data is processed to a known standard format (NODC C128), ensuring structural consistency.
• Provides a focused two-week temporal snapshot (1966-01-02 to 1966-01-16) from a single research vessel.
• Temperature data is recorded at a uniform 5-meter depth interval, facilitating direct profile comparisons.

Limitations

• The maximum observation depth of ~285 meters limits analysis to the ocean's upper thermal layer only.
• Key metadata such as exact row count, column names, and license are unavailable across all sources.
• Data is from a single, short cruise, limiting spatial and temporal generalizability.

Provenance

Source

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Commerce

Collection Method

Collected via mechanical bathythermograph (MBT) instrument from the USS T.J. Gary.

Time Range

1966-01-02 to 1966-01-16

Freshness

2026-03-05 22:29:10.537112

Geography

South Pacific Ocean and Southern Ocean