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Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition 2017: motion sensor and GPS data

Created 17/11/2025

Updated 17/11/2025

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Raw GPS and ship motion data collected during the Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition 2016/2017. Waves in the Southern Ocean are the biggest on the planet. They exert extreme stresses on the coastline of the Sub-Antarctic Islands, which affects coastal morphology and the delicate natural environment that the coastline offers. In Antarctic waters, the sea ice cover reflects a large proportion of the wave energy, creating a complicated sea state close to the ice edge. The remaining proportion of the wave energy penetrates deep into the ice-covered ocean and breaks the ice into relatively small floes. Then, the waves herd the floes and cause them to collide and raft. There is a lack of field data in the Sub-Antarctic and Antarctic Oceans. Thus, wave models are not well calibrated and perform poorly in these regions. Uncertainties relate to the difficulties to model the strong interactions between waves and currents (the Antarctic Circumpolar and tidal currents) and between waves and ice (reflected waves modify the incident field and ice floes affect transmission into the ice-covered ocean). Drawbacks in wave modelling undermine our understanding and ability to protect this delicate ocean and coastal environment.
By installing a Wave and Surface Current Monitoring System (WaMoS II, a marine X-Band radar) on the research vessel Akademic Thresnikov and using the meteo-station and GPS on-board, this project has produced a large database of winds, waves and surface currents. Dara were collected during the Antarctic Circmumnavigaion Expedition, which took place from Dec. 2016 to Mar. 2017. The instrumentation operated in any weather and visibility conditions, and at night, monitoring the ocean continuously over the entire Circumnavigation. Records can support

the assessment of metocean conditions in the Southern Oceans; and

calibration and validation of wave and global circulation models.

Data - AAS_4434_ACE_GPS contains basic metereological conditions acquired form the ship’s meteo-station, gepgraphical coordinates (latitude, longitude and altitude) from the ship’s GPS and ship motion data from the ship’s Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU). These data are stored as time series with a sampling frequency of 1Hz.

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Additional Info

Field Value
Title Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition 2017: motion sensor and GPS data
Language eng
Licence Not Specified
Landing Page https://data.gov.au/data/en/dataset/2e771cf5-374d-499f-b6af-2c81b9f71700
Contact Point
Australian Ocean Data Network
metadata@aad.gov.au
Reference Period 22/01/2017 - 18/03/2017
Geospatial Coverage
Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors
{
  "coordinates": [
    [
      [
        -180.0,
        -69.0
      ],
      [
        180.0,
        -69.0
      ],
      [
        180.0,
        -50.0
      ],
      [
        -180.0,
        -50.0
      ],
      [
        -180.0,
        -69.0
      ]
    ]
  ],
  "type": "Polygon"
}
Data Portal Australian Oceans Data Network

Data Source

This dataset was originally found on Australian Oceans Data Network "Antarctic Circumnavigation Expedition 2017: motion sensor and GPS data". Please visit the source to access the original metadata of the dataset:
https://catalogue.aodn.org.au/geonetwork/srv/eng/csw/dataset/antarctic-circumnavigation-expedition-2017-motion-sensor-and-gps-data1