NORTH ATLANTIC OCEAN STATION ECHO 



TERMINAL REPORT 



1966 - 1973 



by 



ADRIAN W. LONGACRE 1 



INTRODUCTION 



Ocean Station ECHO, (figure 1), one 

 of five stations in the North Atlantic 

 Ocean formerly occupied by U.S. Coast 

 Guard Cutters on which meteorological and 

 oceanographic data was collected, was 

 centered at 35" OO'N latitude, 48" OO'W 

 longitude. Oceanographic stations at ECHO 

 were first taken by the USCGC CASCO in 

 January 1963. The final occupation 

 was by the USCGC INGHAM in June 

 1973, after which Ocean Station ECHO 

 was disestablished. Between those dates, a 

 total of eighty-six oceanographic occupa- 

 tions occurred. Data from the first occupa- 

 tion, January - February 1963, was pub- 

 lished in U.S. Coast Guard Oceanographic 

 Report No. CG 373-2 (Morse and McGary, 

 1964). Data coUected between September 

 1966 and October 1967 was published in 

 U.S. Coast Guard Oceanographic Report 

 No. CG 373-21 (Shuhy, 1969) and that 

 from November 1967 to December 1968 

 were covered in U.S. Coast Guard Oceano- 

 graphic Report No. CG 37349 

 (Rosebrook, 1971). 



DATA COLLECTION AND 

 PROCESSING 



A total of 2048 oceanographic stations 

 were taken by U.S. Coast Guard Cutters 

 during the 86 patrols between January 

 1963 and June 1973. A summary of 

 these oceanographic operations since 



•'1 Formally of the U.S. Coast Guard 

 Oceanographic Unit, Building 159-E, 

 Navy Yard Annex, Washington, D.C.'' 



January 1963 is presented in Table 1. 

 Nine hundred eleven stations were occu- 

 pied using an STD system, vnth the 

 remaining 1137 consisting of shallow and 

 deep Nansen casts. Data was collected 

 using established procedures outlined in the 

 U.S. Coast Guard Manual for Oceano- 

 graphic Operations (CG-410). 



Temperature data from Nansen casts 

 were transmitted to the U.S. Coast Guard 

 Oceanographic Unit immediately after each 

 cast for real-time data processing and 

 quaUty control. Corrected temperature 

 values were forwarded to the Navy Fleet 

 Numerical Weather Central, Monterey, 

 Cabfornia, for use in forecasting synoptic 

 oceanographic conditions. 



Upon completion of a cruise, col- 

 lected data were processed and quality 

 controlled and submitted to the National 

 Oceanographic Data Center (NODC). 

 Observed values of temperature, salinity, 

 and dissolved oxygen and computed values 

 of sigma-t and sound velocity for occupa- 

 tions 21 through 87 are presented in 

 Appendix A. 



TEMPERATURE 



August was the warmest month as indi- 

 cated by the surface water temperature, 

 figure 2, with the average surface tempera- 

 ture between 26.8 C and 24.5 C, averaging 

 26° C over all years. The coldest average 

 surface temperature was between February 

 and April, usually in March. Below 100 



