Earth ID: 1204

TOMS Ozone at the South Pole: August 1, 2000 to October 2, 2000

Visualizations by Greg Shirah Released on October 3, 2000

The year 2000's Antarctic ozone hole is the largest ever observed. Scientists continue to investigate the phenomenon, and are somewhat surprised by its scale. Using data from NASA's Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) instrument onboard the Earth Probe satellite, researchers can evaluate and compare current conditions over the south pole to readings taken by other instruments in years past. Continued monitoring of polar ozone levels helps researchers gain a better understanding of how the planet's climate may be changing. This animation shows a huge section of the atmosphere around the south pole that's comparatively devoid of ozone. The gap reached a record size of 28.3 million kilometers squared on September 3, 2000. The previous record was 27.2 million square kilometers squared recorded on Sept. 19, 1998. Although current measurements of the ozone hole show that it has stabilized, low value points in the interior continue to decline. The lowest values are typically observed in the late September or early October.

Total ozone over the South Pole from August 1, 2000 through October 2, 2000 as measured by Earth Probe TOMS. Dark blue represents regions of very low ozone concentration in the stratosphere.

Visualization Credits

Greg Shirah (NASA/GSFC): Lead Animator
Paul Newman (NASA/GSFC): Scientist

Please give credit for this item to:
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

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https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/1204

Data Used:

Earth Probe/TOMS/Total Ozone

2000/08/01-2000/10/02

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Note: While we identify the data sets used in these visualizations, we do not store any further details nor the data sets themselves on our site.

Dates of Data Used:
2000/08/01-2000/10/02

This item is part of this series:
Stratospheric Ozone

Goddard TV Tape:
G2000-082A

Keywords:
SVS >> Antarctic
DLESE >> Atmospheric science
GCMD >> Earth Science >> Atmosphere >> Atmospheric Chemistry/Oxygen Compounds >> Ozone
GCMD >> Location >> Stratosphere
NASA Science >> Earth

GCMD keywords can be found on the Internet with the following citation: Olsen, L.M., G. Major, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, S. Ritz, T. Stevens, M. Morahan, A. Aleman, R. Vogel, S. Leicester, H. Weir, M. Meaux, S. Grebas, C.Solomon, M. Holland, T. Northcutt, R. A. Restrepo, R. Bilodeau, 2013. NASA/Global Change Master Directory (GCMD) Earth Science Keywords. Version 8.0.0.0.0

Places you might have seen this:
Dr. Jeffrey Masters: http://www.wunderground.com/education/ozone_skeptics.asp