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Datasets / Australian Ocean Data Network (AODN)

Temperature Loggers Climatology for the GBR region (NESP TWQ 4.2, AIMS)

Sea Surface Temperature

The climatology of the temperature record is important as a reference point for comparison of future values. It also allows computing the anomalies which represent the deviations from an established baseline. The data come from the AIMS temperature loggers program and contain temperature records as old as 1991, providing for some sites, a time series of water temperature of more than 28 years.

The climatology of the GBR temperature loggers is based on the hourly registers from loggers with 10 or more years of data, up to 2012 and for reef slope (SL) and reef flat (FL) locations.

For each location (SL or FL), the original temperature values, normally at 10 minutes interval, are averaged to the hour and the timestamp set to the beginning of the hour. Only good data is used (QC flag 1) for the calculations. The hourly records are summarised into daily values according to the day-of-the year for each year, and the average temperature for each of the days is calculated. Additional statistical descriptors are also calculated for each day(daily median, minimum, maximum, standard deviation, median absolute deviation and the 0.03, 0.01, 0.1, 0.32, 0.50, 0.68, 0.90, 0.99, and 0.997 quantiles). No aggregation is done for February 29th (leap years), so the resulting climatology is of 366 days. The resulting file (CSV, comma separated) has the following variables:

Variable, Description, Possible values

Site, site name

Location, location name reef flat (FL) reef slope (SL)

Yday, Day of the year, 1-366

Temp.dmm, Average temperature for the day in °C, 19.4 - 30.7

Temp.dmax, Maximum temperature for the day in °C, 19.4 – 34.4

Temp.dmin, Minimum temperature for the day in °C, 17.1 – 29.9

Temp.dsd, Standard deviation of the daily temperature values in °C, 0.001 – 2.165

Temp.mad, Median absolute deviation of the daily temperature values in °C, 0 – 2.73

Temp.q003, 0.003 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 18.49 – 30.18

Temp.q01, 0.01 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 18.73 – 30.18

Temp.q10, 0.10 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.29 – 30.18

Temp.q32, 0.32 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 30.36

Temp.q50, 0.50 quantile (the median) of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 30.57

Temp.q68, 0.68 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 30.92

Temp.q90, 0.90 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 32.06

Temp.q99, 0.99 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 32.58

Temp.q997, 0.997 quantile of the daily temperature values in °C, 19.40 – 32.69

For each of the sites/location a plot of the climatology is also provided including reference lines for mean values for the summer, the maximum and minimal mean and the Maximum Monthly Mean (MMM).

The climatology is produced using a dedicated R code function. This function could provide the table of climatological values and the climatological plot. It has a set or arguments that allow the user to customise the output. There is also a short demonstration notebook on how to use the function.

Data and resources

Additional information

Date (revision)2026-10-24
Statuscompleted
Update frequencyasNeeded
Metadata languageen
LicenseCreative Commons Attribution 4.0
Source metadataISO 19115 XML
Last updated2026-11-05
Created2026-11-05
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