International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set
Original (non-English) name
Acronym
ICOADS
Citation
Abstract
The International Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (ICOADS) offers surface marine data spanning the past three centuries, and simple gridded monthly summary products for 2° latitude x 2° longitude boxes back to 1800 (and 1°x1° boxes since 1960)—these data and products are freely distributed worldwide. As it contains observations from many different observing systems encompassing the evolution of measurement technology over hundreds of years, ICOADS is probably the most complete and heterogeneous collection of surface marine data in existence.
As the result of a US project starting in 1981, available global surface marine data from the late 17th century to date have been assembled, quality controlled, and made widely available to the international research community in products of the Comprehensive Ocean-Atmosphere Data Set (COADS). A new name, International COADS (ICOADS), was agreed in 2002 to recognize the multinational input to the blended observational database and other benefits gained from extensive international collaboration, while maintaining continuity of identity with COADS, which has been widely used and referenced.
The original COADS project, and the continuing US contribution toward the new international partnership on ICOADS, is the result of cooperation since 1981 between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Science Foundation's National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). The NOAA portion of ICOADS is partially funded by the NOAA Climate Program Office (CPO).
ICOADS data are made available in two primary forms:
Observations: Surface marine reports from ships, buoys, and other platform types. Each report contains individual observations of meteorological and oceanographic variables, such as sea surface and air temperatures, wind, pressure, humidity, and cloudiness.
Monthly summary statistics: Ten statistics (such as the mean and median) are calculated for each of 22 observed and derived variables, using 2° latitude x 2° longitude boxes back to 1800 (and 1°x1° boxes since 1960).