Sea Surface Temperature
HYCOM's forecast of surface temperature, up to a week out. A simulation rather than a satellite picture, so there are no cloud gaps and it will not match your gauge — read the pattern.
Updates daily; forecast in 3-hour steps
More detail
The forecast comes from HYCOM (U.S. Navy model), nudged toward available observations, and RipIQ puts the result on the map.
Use it to look ahead. Step the time slider forward to see where a break is expected to sit tomorrow or in three days, and whether warm water is moving toward your grounds or away from them.
Each value covers a square about 5 nautical miles across over three hours, so a narrow break is smoothed out. The difference from your gauge is larger inshore, in a river plume or on a calm sunny afternoon. For the number at one spot, use the crosshair readout. The layer covers the Gulf of America, the East Coast and Baja.
How fresh it is. The model starts one new run a day, and the newest run normally started between one and four days ago. There are eight frames a day, three hours apart, and the days after the run date are forecast, up to 7 days ahead.
How it relates to the other temperature layers. SST (MUR 1 km), SST (ACSPO 2km) and the GOES-19 layers (SST (L3 Composite), SST (L2), SST (2hr Composite), SST (5min raw)) are satellite measurements. The breaks usually have the same shape in all of them, but the values and the exact position differ. Use the satellite layers to see what the water has done, and this layer to see what it is expected to do next, or to fill in when cloud has hidden the water for days. All of them share one color scale. SST Front Intensity and SST Front Edges are worked out from this layer and show only its breaks. For temperature below the surface, use Water Temperature at Depth, which comes from the same forecast.
If the colors look wrong after you change settings, reset the range in Layer Settings. The default is 41.9 °F to 91.4 °F.
The numbers
| How often it updates | Once a day, as 8 frames, three hours apart |
| How fresh it usually is | The newest frame is from a run started between one and four days ago |
| How detailed it is | About 5 nautical miles per grid cell |
| Where it covers | Gulf of America, East Coast and Baja. Outside the regions the map shows the chart alone; the layers stop at the region's edge. |
| How far back you can look | 8 days back |
| How far forward you can look | Up to 7 days ahead, as a forecast |
| Observed or modeled | Modeled. It never goes blank for cloud |
| What you see on screen | Fahrenheit by default, Celsius if you switch |
Source: the HYCOM model.