Explanation of Oceanographic Station Data 



Description of Entries, Units, and Codes on NODC Station Listing 



1. Surface Observations 



Entry Description of Field 



NODC REF. ID. NO NODC reference identity number. 



COUNTRY CODE Indicates nationality of the institute or agency conducting the survey or expedition. 



CRUISE NUMBER A reference number assigned by NODC for storage-retrieval purposes. NODC Publication 



C-l, Reference Sources of Oceanographic Station Data, gives complete bibliographic 

 and other pertinent information for each cruise. 



SHIP CODE Alphabetic representation of ship's name (or ICES numeric ship code). 



LATITUDE Degrees, minutes, and tenths of minutes, N. or S. 



LONGITUDE Degrees, minutes, and tenths of minutes, E. or W. 



DRIFT INDICATOR The letter D appears in this column if extensive drift occurred while on station. 



MARSDEN SQUARE: 



10° Marsden square number according to the Marsden square system. 



1° The 1° square number according to the Marsden square system. 



STATION TIME: 



(GMT) Date and time given by the originator (GMT). 



MONTH Month (GMT). 



DAY Day (GMT). 



HR. 1/10 GMT to nearest tenth of an hour. 



YEAR Year. 



ORIGINATOR'S Alphabetic or alpha-numeric designator as assigned by the originator. If the year of 



CRUISE NUMBER. the cruise forms part of the cruise numbering system, the year digits are found in 



preceding field. 



STATION NUMBER Originator's station number or designator. 



DEPTH TO BOTTOM Corrected or uncorrected sounding depth in meters. 



MAX. DEPTH OF Depth of deepest sample in hundreds of meters to nearest hundred-meter interval. 



SAMPLES. 

 WAVE OBSERVATIONS: 



DIR Direction from which the dominant waves are coming, in tens of degrees, according 



to WMO Code 0885. 



HGT Height of dominant waves according to WMO Code 1555. 



PER Period of dominant waves according to WMO Code 3155. 



SEA AMT Sea amount (sea state) according to WMO Code 3700 (preceded by the letter A). 



WEATHER CODE If preceded by the letter X, weather according to WMO Code 4501. A numeric two-digit 



entry indicates weather according to WMO Code 4677. 



*INSTR. /CLOUD This field is used either for recording instrument code when electronically obtained data 



are being reported, or for reporting cloud type and cloud amount when conventional 

 Nansen cast data are being reported. 



♦INSTR A two character code representing instrument package of system. 



TYPE Cloud type according to WMO Code 0500. 



AMT Cloud amount according to WMO Code 2700. 



NODC STATION Assigned by NODC for data storage and retrieval purposes. The NODC Reference Identity 



NUMBER. and Station number combined, uniquely define each station in the NODC archives. 



*DT/*S d /d This indicator specifies that the reported data have been obtained electronically rather 



than by Nansen-type casts. U (up) and D (down) are cast indicators for electronically 

 obtained serial data and specify that the data were taken while hoisting or lowering 

 respectively. 



WATER COLOR Water color according to Forel-Ule Code. 



TRANS, (m) Water transparency in meters as determined by Secchi disc. 



WIND: 



DIR Direction from which wind is blowing in tens of degrees, according to WMO Code 0877. 



SPEED OR FORCE If preceded by letter S, wind speed in knots ; if preceded by letter F, wind force in 



Beaufort code. 

 BAROMETER (mbs) Barometric pressure in millibars ; tens, units, and tenths places only. 



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