http://pathfinder.nodc.noaa.gov News and information from the AVHRR Pathfinder Sea Surface Temperature Project en-us http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/img/PathfinderV5.jpg http://pathfinder.nodc.noaa.gov/ Pathfinder graphic 26 September 2007 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0074 An RSS news feed has been established for the Pathfinder Project. 12 October 2007 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0073 The volume tables in the Quality Assurance section have been fixed to properly follow symbolic links, and so now give accurate representation of the data volumes, even for the files that are in the archive. 03 July 2007 (07:20 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0072 Interim Version 5.0 data for all of 2006 are now available! Data are available for all averaging periods. 30 May 2007 (03:15 pm, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0071 The User Guide and Data Available pages have been updated to include Live Access Server and GoogleEarth data access mechanisms through our colleagues at NOAA's Southwest Fisheries Science Center. 23 April 2007 (08:18 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0070 Jason Roberts of Duke University identified several extraneous files in the Daily, 1999 directory. 18 December 2006 (08:40 am, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0069 The problem noted below on 18 August has been corrected. All of the affected Pathfinder data files have been recovered and restored to their proper condition. The problem was limited to the 1985 trough 2001 yearly directories. 24 August 2006 (11:00 am, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0068 PLEASE NOTE - We are experiencing a problem with many of the Pathfinder HDF files which have been corrupted. You will be able to tell a file has been corrupted if it is only a few kilobytes in size... normal Pathfinder HDF file sizes are on the order of megabytes. We are working to resolve this problem. Thank-you for your patience. 18 August 2006 (1:00 pm, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0067 Thanks to Jason Roberts of Duke University for reporting that one of the 1994 8-day SST files was not able to be read. While the file in question is partly accessible, trying to read the entire contents of the data array appears to hang various applications. 11 July 2006 (02:30 pm, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0066 Thanks to Scott Heron of NOAA's Coral Reef Watch project for finding a bad quality flag file, which has a patch of erroneous quality flags extending from Florida, USA through parts of the Gulf of Mexico and down to northernm South America. 28 June 2006 (11:45 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0065 To avoid possible confusion regarding older NOAA16 interim data for 2003 and 2004 that still reside on the server (both of which were updated back in March of 2005 to use NOAA17 data instead), several directories under Version5.0_interim_NOAA16 have been renamed. 28 June 2006 (7:30 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0064 Good news: We have found funding for the Pathfinder project for another year. Production of interim 2006 data has commenced and should be available for the first 5 months of 2006 in early July. 28 June 2006 (6:00 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0063 All 5-day, 7-day, 8-day, monthly, yearly, and daily files for the remainder of 2005 have been added to the collection, quality-controlled, and placed on-line. At this point, there is no funding to continue the processing of AVHRR Pathfinder data so unless this situation changes there will be no data for 2006 and beyond, or for years prior to 1985. 13 March 2006 (2:00 pm, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0062 Thanks to Grayson Wood of NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service for identifying an inconsistency in the way we've named the variables inside the V5 Pathfinder data. The names all make sense except for the standard deviation files (with sdev in the filename), which were inadvertantly named "sst" instead of "sdev". 07 March 2006 (2:30 pm, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0061 Interim data for 2005 are now available through day 309, week 44, and month 10. Data for the 5-day and 8-day averages are also available through that time. All portions of the web site, user guide, and data access tables have been updated to reflect these newly available data. 19 January 2006 (1:00 pm, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0060 An entry was made in the Known Problems section of the User Guide describing a warning to users of the data that they may need to apply a "reality check" to the data to make sure they aren't using pixels with a physically unreasonably cold SST. 29 December 2005 (2:15 pm, EST) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0059 A corrupted file, Daily/1993/1993249.s04d1pfv50-sst-16b.hdf, was discovered and replaced with the correct copy from the archives. 28 September 2005 (9:45 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0058 Example coe for reading the Pathfinder data in Matlab, IDL, and Fortran has been added to the web site. 17 August 2005 (9:30 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0057 All of the browse imagery for NOAA-17 2003 and interim NOAA-17 for 2004 and 2005 has been updated. A new category of browse imagery was also added: declouded SSTs using only pixels with an overall quality flag of 7. 01 June 2005 (1:30 pm, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0056 In order to comply with a broader naming convention that includes NASA MODIS data on Terra and Aqua, the NOAA-17 files for formal 2003 and interim 2004 and 2005 have been given day-night flags of "2" for daytime and "4" for nighttime, instead of the "3" for daytime and "1" for nighttime used in all of the previous Pathfinder data files from NOAA-9, 11, 14, and 16. 25 May 2005 (10:30 am, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0055 The interim 2004 and 2005 data from NOAA-17 found in the directories called "Version5.0_interim_NOAA17" and the formal NOAA-17 data for 2003 found in "Version5.0_NOAA17" have been renamed to fix the day-night naming problem. 24 May 2005 (3:30 pm, EDT) http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0054 A change was made to the User Guide to better describe the file naming convention. 24 May 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0053 Important note: All of the NOAA-17 data (both formal data for 2003 and interim data for 2004-2005) are incorrectly named. If you have downloaded any of these data (prior to 3:30 pm EDT, 24 May 2005 -see correction note on that date/time above), you must reverse the day and night designations (simply reversing the file names will fix the problem). 24 May 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0052 A new batch of interim NOAA17 data for 2005 is now available via ftp, http, and OPeNDAP. 05 May 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0051 An error in the description found in the User Guide concerning the use of sea ice masking was corrected. 12 April 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0050 Formal data for 2003 have been added to the Pathfinder dataset. In addition, interim data for 2002, and 2004-near present have also been added. 02 March 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0049 Climatologies corresponding to each averaging period are now available as part of the Pathfinder Version 5 collection. 25 February 2005 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0048 Several changes were made to the Pathfinder Version 5 User Guide including the additional of information regarding satellite overpass times and drift rates. 17 November 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0047 Additional tables documenting the number of files and the volumes contained in the browse image and data directories are now being generated hourly and are being made available through the Quality Assurance page. 05 October 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0046 A problem has appeared with the daily number of observations file: Daily/1993/1993153.m04d1pfv50-num.hdf. Although it previously passed quality control procedures it now appears that this file can no longer be opened and read. This problem is being investigated. 27 September 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0045 Another error in the land mask was discovered, this one in the Antarctic. A graphic describing the problem is available in the Known Problems section of the User Guide. 07 September 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0044 Another error in the land mask was discovered on the Grand Bank off Newfoundland. A graphic describing the problem is available in the Known Problems section of the User Guide. 01 September 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0043 FTP access was not functioning since June 24, but has been restored. We apologize for the inconvenience. 28 June 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0042 Several updates were made to the web site today, including new information on accessing the data via the OPeNDAP Data Connector and more complete and accurate georeferencing information. These changes have been made in the Available Data page and in the User Guide page. 22 June 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0041 We are pleased to announce that some of the Version 5.0 Pathfinder SST data are now available through the NASA PO.DAAC. 11 June 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0040 Information regarding which NOAA satellites were used for the Pathfinder V5 dataset was added to the User Guide, as was information regarding an error discovered in the landmask off the east coast of South America. 06 April 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0039 Interim data are being generated for 2002, 2003, and for 2004 within about a week of real-time. The processes to put these interim products online is being established now. Within a few weeks these data should be available online. 25 March 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0038 A Calendar date conversion chart added to the User Guide to facilitate converting between YYYYDDD and calendar dates. 25 March 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0037 The six missing monthly files identified below on 29 January have been generated and placed on the server. 03 March 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0036 Data and corresponding browse images have been added for the missing data in 1996, including the 5-day, 7-day, 8-day, monthly, and yearly averaged fields. However, six monthly data files are still missing. The cause is being investigated now and the files will be replaced as soon as possible. 29 January 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0035 Data and corresponding browse images have been added for the year 1996. However, a total of 55 days of data are missing including a large gap spanning days 126 through 167. These gaps are a result of repeated DLT tape failures. Level 1B AVHRR files are being retrieved from NOAA CLASS, and will be processed to fill these gaps. 15 January 2004 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0034 Data and browse imagery added for 2001. 10 December 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0033 A Draft User Guide has been made available on line. While incomplete and still very rough, the user guide provides some details not available on the rest of the web site. 08 December 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0032 The problem with the 8-day SST file for year 2000, 2000089-2000096.s0483pfv50-sst-16b.hdf, has been corrected. The new file and its corresponding browse image have been updated on the server. 08 December 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0031 A problem has been identified in an 8-day average SST file for year 2000, days 89-96: 2000089-2000096.s0483pfv50-sst-16b.hdf. An obviously artificial band of missing data in the southern hemisphere is present. The problem is currently being investigated. 03 December 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0030 Data and corresponding browse images have been added for the year 2000. Both 1996 and 2001 are nearly complete save a few short gaps. Those two years will be added to the server once the gaps have been filled. 03 December 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0029 Data and corresponsing browse images have been recovered and generated for two sets of missing files from the 1993 8 day averaging period. These files, corresponding to the 1993009-1993016 and 1993217-1993224 periods, have been placed on the server. 03 November 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0028 Several issues related to small gaps are currently being addressed, including data gaps in 1985 and 1993. 30 October 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0027 Data and browse imagery for all years and periods from 1985 through 1999, except 1996, are now online and available. A small gap in the 1996 processing is still being filled. When it is complete the entire year will be put online. 20 October 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0026 Data and browse imagery for the 8-day, Monthly, and Yearly means for 1995 have been added to the server. All years and averaging periods for 1985-1995 are now on-line. Data for 1997-1999 have been processed and are currently being transfered from RSMAS. 15 October 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0025 Large amounts of new data have been added to the server, including all averaging periods for 1985-1989, as well as daily, 5-day, and 7-day files for 1995. Corresponding browse images have also been updated (except for the daily browse images, which are still being generated). 02 October 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0024 The problems with the OPeNDAP server have been resolved, and now core OPeNDAP functionality appears to be working normally, including basic browsing and clicking on OPeNDAP file names to bring up the HTML form. 11 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0023 Quality assurance procedures identified a set of missing files in the 8day/1993 directory. These files correspond to the periods 1993009-1993016 and 1993217-1993224 (YYYYDDD). These files are being regenerated and will be placed on the server shortly. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0022 Yearly files for 1990 through 1994, along with their corresponding browse images, were added to the server. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0021 Monthly files for 1992, 1993 and 1994, along with their corresponding browse images, were added to the server. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0020 8-day files for 1992 and 1993, along with their corresponding browse images, were added to the server. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0019 7-day files for 1986 and 1988, along with their corresponding browse images, were added to the server. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0018 5-day files for 1992 and 1993, along with their corresponding browse images, were added to the server. 04 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0017 Weekly files for 1992, 1993, 1997, 1998, and 1999 were added to the server. Corresponding browse images were also added. 02 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0016 Direct FTP access to all of the files has been enabled at ftp://data.nodc.noaa.gov/pub/data.nodc/pathfinder/Version5.0 01 September 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0015 A Quality Assurance page was added to the web site to clairfy steps taken to insure the intergrity and availability of the data files. 24 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0014 A complete set of browse images for the data available to date have been created and placed on line. These images are very small and very coarse looks at the available data files (only one of every thirty-two pixels in latitude and longitude is displayed). They are part of the quality assurance system, enabling rapid visual inspection for any gross file errors and testing file access and format integrity. 24 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0013 Of the over 40,000 files currently on the system, eight were identified as missing during a systematic review performed yesterday and today. The missing files were all from the 1990, 8-day average period for days 017-024. 24 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0012 The Change Log was added to the Pathfinder data server. 11 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0011 The land mask used in Pathfinder V5 processing was added to the web site. 10 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0010 Several new batches of files have been added to the server: Monthly means for 1990 and 1991; 8-day means for 1990, 1991, and 1994; 7-day means for 1990 and 1991; and 5-day means for 1990, 1991, and 1994. 08 July 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0009 The file Version5.0/Daily/1991/1991308.s04d3pfv50-sdev-16b.hdf was discovered to have been corrupted during the transfer process to NODC. The corrected file has been placed on the server and the incorrect version deleted. 23 May 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0008 The file Version5.0/Daily/1990/1990006.m04d3pfv50-num.hdf was discovered to have been corrupted during the transfer process to NODC. The corrected file has been placed on the server and the incorrect version deleted. 23 May 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0007 Daily and (correctly computed) 7-day average files for 1994 have been placed on the server. 22 May 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0006 The incorrect weekly files (1990-1992 and 1999) described in the note below have been removed from the server. 22 May 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0005 A problem has been discovered with the 7-day average files (found under "7day"). A processing error resulted in lower quality observations going into the mean SSTs than was intended. The mistake has been corrected and new files will be reissued soon. http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0004 Daily and 7-day average files for 1993 have been placed on the server. 25 April 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0003 Four years of Daily and Weekly data (1990, 1991, 1992, and 1999) are now online and accesible via http and OPeNDAP. 15 April 2003 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0002 Web site established on NODC intranet developmental server 01 August 2002 http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/SatelliteData/pathfinder4km/status.html#item0001 A kickoff Pathfinder team meeting was held in Miami at the UMiami/RSMAS campus from 21-22 August, 2002. 21 August 2002