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Global Surface Summary of Day (GLOBALSOD) Database Version 5, via WWW
Entry ID: GLOBALSOD_NCDC

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Summary

Abstract: The NCDC home page address on the WWW is
'http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/'. To obtain the data via direct
internet-FTP: open ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov OR open hurricane.ncdc.noaa.gov;
login: anonymous; password: your email address; cd
/pub/data/globalsod; readme.txt file complete with explanation of
dataset along with GIF image of station locations.

Users may also link to the data at:
"ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/globalsod/"

The Global Surface Summary of Day (GLOBALSOD) database was built
monthly by the National Climatic Data Center (NCDC), Asheville, NC.
The hourly data used in building these daily summaries are obtained
from the Air Weather Service (AWS) Global Climatology Division,
located in the Federal Climate Complex with NCDC. The latest month of
the daily summary data is placed on line by NCDC for easy access and
download by outside users, and is normally available about 1 month
after the end of the data month. Over 8000 stations' data are
typically included each month. Other periods of GLOBALSOD (up to 20
years or more) can be obtained off-line from NCDC. The daily elements
include mean temperature, mean dew point, mean sea level pressure,
mean station pressure, mean visibility, mean wind speed, maximum
sustained wind speed, maximum wind gust, maximum temperature, minimum
temperature, precipitation amount, snow depth, and indicator for
occurrence of fog, rain, snow, hail, thunder, tornado/funnel cloud.

The GLOBALSOD data for 18 surface meteorological elements are derived
from the synoptic/hourly observations contained in TD-9950 (AWS
DATSAV2 Surface data). The TD-9950 data are normally available about 4
weeks after the end of the data month. Historical data are generally
available for 1973 to the present, with some stations having data back
to about 1930. Generally, data from 1982 (beginning of current
synoptic code) to the present are the most complete. For some
periods, one or more countries' data may not be available due to data
restrictions or communications problems. In deriving the summary of
day data, a minimum of 4 observations for the day must be present
(allows for stations which report 4 synoptic observations/day).
Although the synoptic/hourly data are stored in the hourly database in
metric units, they are converted to English units for this summary of
day data.

The mean daily values are based on the hours of operation for the
station. For some stations/countries, the visibility will sometimes
'cluster' around a value (such as 10 miles) due to the practice of not
reporting visibilities greater than certain distances. The daily
extremes and totals (such as precipitation) will only appear if the
station reports the data sufficiently--such as the daily maximum and
minimum temperatures, or one or more precipitation totals. Therefore,
values for peak wind gust, maximum/minimum temperature, precipitation,
and snow depth will appear less frequently than other values. Also,
these 5 values are derived from the stations' reports during the day,
and may comprise a 24-hour period which includes a portion of the
previous day. The data are reported/summarized based on Greenwich
Mean Time (GMT) since the original synoptic/hourly data are reported
and based on GMT. Further additions and enhancements to these data
will be made in the future.

The record length is 132, with a block length of 7920 for data
provided on magnetic tape. The data can also be provided on diskette
or paper copy. The data are strictly ASCII, with a mixture of
character data, real values, and integer values.

Geographic Coverage

N: 90.0

S: -90.0

E: 180.0

W: -180.0

Temporal Coverage

Start Date: 1930-01-01

Location Keywords

GEOGRAPHIC REGION > GLOBAL

ISO Topic Category

CLIMATOLOGY/METEOROLOGY/ATMOSPHERE
ENVIRONMENT
GEOSCIENTIFIC INFORMATION
INLAND WATERS

Platform

GROUND STATIONS [Information]

Project

ESIP >Earth Science Information Partners Program [Information]

Keywords

AIR WEATHER SERVICE

DAILY DATA

DEW POINT

FOG

FTP

FUNNEL CLOUD

GLOBALSOD

HAIL

HOURLY DATA

MAXIMUM TEMPERATURE

MINIMUM TEMPERATURE

RAIN

SEA LEVEL PRESSURE

SEVERE WEATHER

SNOW DEPTH

STATION PRESSURE

STATISTICS

SURFACE

THUNDER

TORNADO

WEATHER

WIND GUST

WIND SPEED

TEMS

GTOS

G3OS

Originating Center

NOAA/NESDIS/NCDC

Data Center

National Climatic Data Center, NESDIS, NOAA, U.S. Department of Commerce [Information]
Data Center URL: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/
Dataset ID: GLOBALSOD

Data Center Personnel

Name: SAM MCCOWN
Phone: (828) 271-4800
Fax: (828) 271-4876
Email: ncdc.info at noaa.gov
Contact Address:
Climate Services Branch
National Climatic Data Center
Room 468
151 Patton Avenue
City: Asheville
Province or State: North Carolina
Postal Code: 28801-5001
Country: USA

Distribution

Distribution_Media: On-line

Personnel

SCOTT A. RITZ
Role: DIF AUTHOR
Phone: 301-614-5126
Fax: 301-614-5268
Email: Scott.A.Ritz at nasa.gov
Contact Address:
NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
Global Change Master Directory
City: Greenbelt
Province or State: Maryland
Postal Code: 20771
Country: USA

THOMAS ROSS
Role: TECHNICAL CONTACT
Phone: (704) 271-4994
Fax: (704) 271-4876
Email: TROSS at NCDC.NOAA.GOV
Email: orders at ncdc.noaa.gov
Contact Address:
National Climatic Data Center
Research Customer Service Group
Federal Building
151 Patton Avenue
City: Asheville
Province or State: NC
Postal Code: 28801-5001

Creation and Review Dates

SERF Creation Date: 2003-02-04
SERF Last Revision Date: 2013-03-21

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