April 9, 2019

The SPURS (Salinity Processes in the Upper Ocean Regional Study) project is a NASA-funded oceanographic process study and associated field program that aim to elucidate key mechanisms responsible for near-surface salinity variations in the oceans. SPURS employs a suite of state-of-the-art in-situ sampling technologies that, combined with remotely sensed salinity fields from the Aquarius/SAC-D, SMAP and SMOS satellites, provide a detailed characterization of salinity structure over a continuum of spatio-temporal scales. While SPURS-1 focused on the salinity maximum region of the sub-tropical N. Atlantic, SPURS-2 concentrated on the dynamic and seasonally variable, rainfall dominated region of the eastern tropical Pacific centered at 10N, 125W.  The SPURS-2 campaign involved two month-long cruises by the R/V Revelle in August 2016 and October 2017 combined with complementary sampling on a more continuous basis over this period by the schooner Lady Amber.

This initial SPURS-2 data release includes the first seven of what will ultimately be a total of twenty eight in-situ datasets produced during the SPURS-2 field campaign that will be archived/distributed by the PO.DAAC.  Datasets comprising this release include: vertical profile data from lowered Conductivity, Temperature, Density (CTD), Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT) and ARGO profiling float instruments, water column current velocity profiles from shipborne Acoustic Doppler Current Profile (ADCP), along-track multivariate sensor measurements from Saildrone, WAMOS wave radar data, and precipitation imagery data from the SEA-POL rain radar.  Sample data plots of six of these datasets are illustrated in figure 1 below.

SPURS-2 Resources at PO.DAAC:

 

SPURS-2 Figure 1

Figure 1:  A) SEA-POL rain accumulation imagery data, B) XBT temperature profile time series plot, C) lowered CTD station salinity profile plot, D) ARGO float vertical salinity profile, E & F) WAMOS along-track WAMOS mean wave period trajectory and time series plots, G & H) ADCP u-current velocity trajectory and vertical profile series, and I & J) surface temperature trajectory and times series from Saildrone.