Blending TAC and BUFR marine in situ data for ICOADS near-real-time release 3.0.2

We also describe how the TAC and BUFR streams were merged to upgrade R3.0.1 into R3.0.2 with duplicates removed. Finally, we compare the number of reports and spatial coverage of essential climate variables (ECVs) between R3.0.1 and R3.0.2. ICOADS NRT R3.0.2 shows both quantitative and qualitative gains from the inclusion of BUFR reports.

The number of observations in R3.0.2 increased by nearly 1 million reports per month, and the coverage of buoy and ship sea surface temperatures (SSTs) on monthly 2 DEG; x 2 DEG; grids increased by 20%. The number of reported ECVs also increased in R3.0.2. For example, observations of SST and sea level pressure (SLP) increased by around 30% and 20%, respectively, as compared to R3.0.1, and salinity is a new addition to the ICOADS NRT product in R3.0.2.Significance StatementThe International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (ICOADS) is the largest collection of surface marine observations spanning from 1662 to the present.

A new version, ICOADS near-real-time 3.0.2, includes data transmitted in the Binary Universal Form for Representation of Meteorological Data (BUFR) format, in combination with Traditional Alphanumeric Codes (TAC) data. Many of the organizations that report observations in near-real time have moved to BUFR, so this update brings ICOADS into alignment with collections and archives of these international data distributions.

By including the BUFR reports, the number of observations in the upgraded version of ICOADS increased by nearly one million reports per month and spatial coverage of buoy and ship SSTs increased by 20% over the previous version.