Sea Surface Temperature

Description:

Sea surface temperature, much like the atmosphere’s temperature, is constantly changing. The interaction between the ocean and the atmosphere is one that scientists are constantly researching, especially in light of climate change. Water warms up and cools down at a slower rate than air, so diurnal variations (heating during the day and cooling during the night) seen in the atmosphere are hard to observe in the ocean. The seasons, however, can be seen as the warmest water near the equator expands toward the United States during the summer months and withdraws again during the winter months.

Fleet Numerical SST April 13, 2005 - October 31, 2006 (4 mb)

Sea surface temperature data is available in three different formats. The first is available daily from April 13, 2005 through October 31, 2006. The data was obtained from the Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center and is created by the Navy Coupled Ocean Data Assimilation. The temperature range for the sea surface temperature is indicated on the color bar in degrees Celsius below. O° is equivalent to 32°F and 30°C is equivalent to 86°F. The second is available every eight days from July 4, 2002 through September 9, 2006. This data is from the MODIS satellite. Dark purple is 28°F and bright red is 95°F. The third dataset is from the NASA Earth Observations site , which used data from NOAA satellites to create the animation. It contains monthly images from September 1981 through December 2006. The black areas that appear in the ocean are from missing data due to cloud cover.

Sea Surface Temp Monthly Sept 1981 - Dec 2006 from NEO (15 mb)

Fleet Numerical Daily SST Color Bar

NASA Earth Observations Monthly SST Color Bar

Notable Features:

Growth and reduction of the warm water during the changing seasons
Fleet Numerical SST is available daily from April 13, 2005 through October 31, 2006
MODIS SST is available every eight days from July 4, 2002 through September 9, 2006
NEO SST is available every month from September 1981 through December 2006

Data Category

Major: Ocean

Keywords:

Ocean, sea surface temperature

Data Set Name	Fleet Numerical SST (April 13, 2005 - October 31, 2006)
Data Set Directory Name	fleet_sst
Data Set Source	Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center
Data Set Developer	Navy Coupled Ocean Data Assimilation
Visualization Developer	Steve Albers, NOAA/GSD
Audio	No
Download	FTP

Data Set Name	Modis Sea Surface temperature 2002-2006
Data Set Directory Name	modis_sst
Data Set Source	NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Data Set Developer	NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Visualization Developer	NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Audio	No
Download	FTP

Data Set Name	Sea Surface Temp Monthly Sept 1981 - Dec 2006 from NEO
Data Set Directory Name	neo_sst
Data Set Source	NOAA Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer
Data Set Developer	NASA Earth Observations
Visualization Developer	NASA Earth Observations
Audio	No
Download	FTP