Raw Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT) casts collected during the 2022 Marion Relief Voyage on the SA Agulhas II Voyage 051, May 2022

Here we present 49 raw Expendable Bathythermograph (XBT) casts collected in the South West Indian Ridge area and along the Crossroads Transect, between 18 May 2022 and 21 May 2022, during the 2022 Marion Relief Voyage on the SA Agulhas II Voyage 051. The South African component of the international South Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation project (SAMOC-SA) aims to characterise the time-mean and time-varying components of the SAMOC in the South Atlantic Ocean and monitor the variability of the main Southern Ocean frontal systems associated with the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC), south of Africa. The Crossroads monitoring line, directly under the altimetry track N198, is sampled annually during the Marion Relief voyages, using a combination of Conductivity, Temperature, Depth (CTD) stations and XBT casts, where the XBT casts are done, at set intervals, between CTD stations to complement the CTD data. The 2022 Marion Relief Voyage 051 offered the 10th opportunity to conduct multi-disciplinary, ship-based oceanographic research on board the SA Agulhas II en route to, from, and around, the sub-Antarctic Prince Edward Islands (PEI’s).