INTRODUCTION 



Major problems in developing oceanographic forecasting techniques 

 include: (1) formulation of a quantitative description of thermal struc- 

 ture variables in various areas; (2) determination of the size of an 

 area that is covered by a point temperature structure forecast within 

 statistical limits; (3) determination of the temporal extent of a point 

 forecast within statistical limits; (h) whether assumed predictors can 

 be isolated and ranked statistically; and (5) if so, whether the para- 

 meters of the predictors can be determined. 



For examination of these and other thermal structure problems, the 

 Sonar Experimental Research Card (SERC) deck of punchcards was created. 

 The deck, as described below, includes bathythermographs (BT) and associ- 

 ated weather data from four experimental cruises, each of which was about 

 three weeks in duration. These surveys covered each season between Novem- 

 ber 1958 and September 1959 at ocean weather station (OWS) ECHO located 

 at 35N,^W. ECHO was chosen for this study, because its location in the 

 Sargasso Sea was thought to assure minimum advection and typical seasonal 

 thermal structure cycles in the surface layers. 



The experimental survey data from ECHO are composed of half- hourly 

 BT's covering the entire cruise, some observations taken at lO-minute 

 intervals for short periods of time, and several sets of simultaneous 

 BT's. These data are supplemented by about 12 years of historical 

 weather ship data (BT's and meteorological observations) from stations 

 ECHO, BRAVO (56n,51W), CHARLIE (52N,35W), DELTA (Mj-N,ij-lW), and HOTEL 

 (36n,70W). About 8,000 observations from CHARLIE, 5,000 from DELTA, 

 7,500 from ECHO, and 7,700 from HOTEL have been tabulated and punched on 

 IBM cards. An additional 15>000 to 20,000 observations remain to be tab- 

 ulated and punched on cards. 



A large majority of the observations were taken with a 450-foot 

 mechanical BT. Some 200-foot obseirvations were included. The ECHO 

 experimental cruises used the 900-foot mechanical BT. 



SERC CODING AND THE DATATRON PROGRAM 



After coding, BT and weather data from each observation are punched 

 on a master and three detail IBM cards (figure 1). The first I7 columns 

 of each card are reserved for latitude, longitude, date, and time. Columns 

 18 through 54 of the master card contain meteorological and additional 

 identifying data. Detail card no. 1 contains the water temperature (°F) 

 at 20-foot increments from the surface to 360 feet and at UO-foot incre- 

 ments from 360 throiogh 440 feet. Detail card no. 2 contains the temper- 

 ature at 40-foot increments to the end of the trace. Space remains on 

 the card for temperature data from the 1,300-foot electronic BT. Columns 



