The Argo Array of Autonomous Profiling Floats

Argo is the largest in situ ocean climate monitoring system in the world. It is an array of over 3,500 free-drifting floats that collects real-time data on ocean temperature and salinity, providing valuable information on changes to the Earth's climate and hydrological cycle. Argo data are publicly available for free. The Argo array was deployed primarily for the purpose of ocean interior data assimilation in ocean model, in the context of GODAE (Global Ocean Data Assimilation Experiment). With an average float lifetime of about five years, the Argo program needed to develop methods for detection calibration drifts of pressure, temperature, salinity. Detecting and properly correcting such calibration drifts remains an important technical challenge.