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Abstract

In recent years, an extensive network of Remotely Operated Multi-Parameter Stations (ROMPS) has been installed in different countries and climatic zones. The stations were developed by GFZ for various applications and set up together with the corresponding partners in the particular regions. In this sense, the general station with its core functionality (querying and storing of sensor data, transmission of data to a central storage unit, providing sufficient energy for the station) is referred as ROMPS. Various sensor systems to account for different application requirements can be connected to these stations. The ROMPS can then be, e.g., a tide gauge station, a buoy or a hydrometeorological (HyMet) station. This document provides the description of the data records from the meteorological system of the ROMPS. In the years after the first development of the data format for the German-Indonesian Tsunami Early Warning System GITEWS (tide gauge stations and buoys), the system was also used for other projects like the Global Change Observatory GCO and Advanced Remote Sensing – Ground-truth Demo and Test Facilities ACROSS (hydrometeorological stations). This resulted in a further development or adaptation of the system, so that different versions of the original data format were created. The versions differ primarily in the data representation (binary or ASCII) and the number and storage of metadata. The meteorological parameters have remained the same since the type of sensor has not changed. All data from the sensor is requested by the meteod software program according to a pre-selected sampling rate and stored in files on the station's computer. These files will be transmitted to a central data storage using file-oriented TCP/IP services (scp, ncftp). The scope of this document is to describe the data format and content which is available at the remote ROMPS. The data format description section is divided into subsections to account for the different format versions of the tide gauges, buoys and HyMet stations. This document is also the basis for further handling of the data, e.g. processing of data within the central data storage or warning center.