Ocean Weather Station

Ocean Weather Station

As defined by the World Meteorological Organization, an Ocean Weather Station (OWS) is a specific maritime location occupied by one or more ships (typically one at a time) equipped and staffed to observe weather and sea conditions and report the observations by international exchange.

In January 1940 President Roosevelt established the "Atlantic Weather Observation Service" using Coast Guard cutters and US Weather Bureau observers. At the service's peak in World War II, there were 22 Atlantic and 24 Pacific stations. At war's end, the Navy intended to discontinue weather ship operations, but pressure from several sources resulted instead in establishment of a permanent peacetime system of 13 stations. By 1970, new jet aircraft were coming to rely less on fixed ocean stations, and satellites were beginning to provide weather data. In 1974, the Coast Guard announced plans to terminate the US stations, and, in 1977, the last weather ship was replaced by a newly developed buoy. [cite news |url=http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/viewArticle.do?id=2343 |title=Alpha, Bravo, Charlie... Ocean Weather Ships 1940-1980|first=Robertson P. |last=Dinsmore |publisher=Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Marine Operations |date=December 1996 ]

However, as of 1983, data was still being collected by OWS Mike, Romeo, Charlie and Lima [ [http://www.bodc.ac.uk/data/information_and_inventories/edmed/report/1048041/ North Atlantic Ocean Weather Ship (OWS) Surface Meteorological Data (1945-1983)] ] , and searches for data at many of the OWS locations will result in up-to-date infomation [ [http://www.ices.dk/ocean/ ICES Oceanographic Database and Services] ] .

The seventeen Ocean Weather Stations in the northern hemisphere, with their locations [ [http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/General/NODC-Archive/bt.txt Code Tables used with any bathythermograph file type] ] , follow below:

References


Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем решить контрольную работу

Look at other dictionaries:

  • Weather station — at Mildura Airport, Victoria, Australia. A weather station is a facility, either on land or sea, with instruments and equipment for observing atmospheric conditions to provide information for weather forecasts and to study the weather and climate …   Wikipedia

  • Weather forecasting — weather forecaster redirects here. For other uses, see Weatherman (disambiguation). Forecast of surface pressures five days into the future for the north Pacific, North America, and north Atlantic ocean. Weather forecasting is the application of… …   Wikipedia

  • Weather radar — in Norman, Oklahoma with rainshaft …   Wikipedia

  • Weather balloon — and student volunteer at NWS Weather Forecast Office, Riverton, Wyoming, USA …   Wikipedia

  • Weather ship — The weather ship MS Polarfront at sea. A weather ship was a ship stationed in the ocean as a platform for surface and upper air meteorological observations for use in weather forecasting. They were primarily located in the north Atlantic and… …   Wikipedia

  • Weather buoy — operated by the NOAA National Data Buoy Center Weather buoys are instruments which collect …   Wikipedia

  • Ocean observations — The following are considered essential ocean climate variables by the OOPC[1][clarification needed] that are currently feasible with current observational systems. Contents 1 Ocean climate variables 1 …   Wikipedia

  • weather forecasting — Prediction of the weather through application of the principles of physics and meteorology. Weather forecasting predicts atmospheric phenomena and changes on the Earth s surface caused by atmospheric conditions (snow and ice cover, storm tides,… …   Universalium

  • Station model — A station model is a symbolic illustration showing the weather occurring at a given reporting station. Meteorologists created the station model to plot a number of weather elements in a small space on weather maps. Maps filled with dense station… …   Wikipedia

  • Ocean thermal energy conversion — Temperature differences between the surface and 1000m depth in the oceans Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion (OTEC) uses the difference between cooler deep and warmer shallow or surface ocean waters to run a heat engine and produce useful work,… …   Wikipedia

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”