Anomalous anomalies in averaged hydrographic data

Abstract

A comparison of a recently assembled hydrographic database for the North Atlantic with the Levitus atlas shows striking differences in the vicinity of the Gulf Stream and the North Atlantic Current. On isopycnal surfaces in the main thermocline, isolated pools of warm, saline water are found in the Levitus database but are absent in the new database. Using synoptic data as a proxy for temporally averaged climatological data, it is shown that the anomalous features can be accounted for by the differences in the averaging process. -from Authors