Data Sources

This package supports six S3-hosted data sources from the NOAA National Bathymetric Source (NBS) project that can be fetched by name.

S3 sources

These sources are fetched from NOAA’s public S3 bucket. Pass the source key as the data_source argument.

Source	Format	Bands	Min GDAL	RAT	Description
`bluetopo`	GeoTIFF	Elevation, Uncertainty, Contributor	3.4	Yes	National bathymetric compilation (public)
`modeling`	GeoTIFF	Elevation, Uncertainty, Contributor	3.4	Yes	Bathymetric compilation for modeling (low water datum)
`bag`	BAG (.bag)	Elevation, Uncertainty	3.4	No	Bathymetric Attributed Grid
`s102v21`	S-102 HDF5 (.h5)	Elevation, Uncertainty	3.9	No	IHO S-102 v2.1 bathymetric surface
`s102v22`	S-102 HDF5 (.h5)	Elevation, Uncertainty + QualityOfSurvey	3.9	Yes	IHO S-102 v2.2 with quality subdataset
`s102v30`	S-102 HDF5 (.h5)	Elevation, Uncertainty + QualityOfBathymetryCoverage	3.9	Yes	IHO S-102 v3.0 with quality subdataset

BlueTopo is a compilation of the best available public bathymetric data of U.S. waters. Created by NOAA Office of Coast Survey’s National Bathymetric Source project, it provides depth information nationwide with the vertical uncertainty tied to that depth estimate as well as information on the survey source.

It is the default and most commonly used data source.

Source key: bluetopo

File slots:

Slot	Geopackage field	File type
`geotiff`	`GeoTIFF_Link`	`.tiff`
`rat`	`RAT_Link`	`.tiff.aux.xml`

Bands: Elevation, Uncertainty, Contributor

RAT fields (on band 3 — Contributor):

Field	Type	Description
`value`	int	Contributor class value
`count`	int	Pixel count for this class
`data_assessment`	int	Data quality assessment code
`feature_least_depth`	float	Least depth of feature
`significant_features`	float	Significant feature indicator
`feature_size`	float	Feature size
`coverage`	int	Coverage flag
`bathy_coverage`	int	Bathymetric coverage flag
`horizontal_uncert_fixed`	float	Fixed horizontal uncertainty
`horizontal_uncert_var`	float	Variable horizontal uncertainty
`vertical_uncert_fixed`	float	Fixed vertical uncertainty
`vertical_uncert_var`	float	Variable vertical uncertainty
`license_name`	str	Source data license name
`license_url`	str	Source data license URL
`source_survey_id`	str	Source survey identifier
`source_institution`	str	Source institution name
`survey_date_start`	str	Survey start date
`survey_date_end`	str	Survey end date

Modeling

Test-and-evaluation bathymetric compilation for coastal and ocean modeling. Uses the same file structure as BlueTopo, but data is on a low water datum instead of NAVD88/mean sea level.

Source key: modeling

File slots: Same as BlueTopo (GeoTIFF + RAT auxiliary file)

Bands: Elevation, Uncertainty, Contributor

RAT fields: Same as BlueTopo

BAG

Bathymetric Attributed Grid — a single-file format with elevation and uncertainty bands.

Source key: bag

Required GDAL drivers: BAG

File slots:

Slot	Geopackage field	File type
`file`	`BAG`	`.bag`

Bands: Elevation, Uncertainty

RAT: None

Note: BAG files require GDAL built with HDF5 support. Install libgdal-hdf5 via conda if the BAG driver is not available.

Note: The S-102 data available through this package are for test and evaluation and should not be used for navigation. For official S-102 data, see the data available from Precision Marine Navigation.

S102 v2.1

IHO S-102 bathymetric surface, version 2.1. Single-file HDF5 format with two bands.

Source key: s102v21

Required GDAL drivers: S102

Min GDAL version: 3.9

File slots:

Slot	Geopackage field	File type
`file`	`S102V21`	`.h5`

Bands: Elevation, Uncertainty

RAT: None

Requires a CATALOG.XML file downloaded from S3 (handled automatically by fetch_tiles).

S102 v2.2

IHO S-102 v2.2 with dual subdatasets: bathymetry coverage and a quality-of-survey layer. The mosaic build produces separate subdataset VRTs plus a combined VRT.

Source key: s102v22

Required GDAL drivers: S102

Min GDAL version: 3.9

File slots:

Slot	Geopackage field	File type
`file`	`S102V22`	`.h5`

Subdatasets:

Subdataset	Bands	VRT suffix
BathymetryCoverage	Elevation, Uncertainty	`_BathymetryCoverage`
QualityOfSurvey	QualityOfSurvey	`_QualityOfSurvey`

A combined VRT is also created with all three bands (Elevation, Uncertainty, QualityOfSurvey).

RAT fields (on band 3 of the combined VRT):

Field	Type	Description
`value`	int	Quality class value
`data_assessment`	int	Data quality assessment code
`feature_least_depth`	float	Least depth of feature
`significant_features`	float	Significant feature indicator
`feature_size`	float	Feature size
`feature_size_var`	int	Feature size variance (set to 0 in mosaic)
`coverage`	int	Coverage flag
`bathy_coverage`	int	Bathymetric coverage flag
`horizontal_uncert_fixed`	float	Fixed horizontal uncertainty
`horizontal_uncert_var`	float	Variable horizontal uncertainty
`survey_date_start`	str	Survey start date
`survey_date_end`	str	Survey end date
`source_survey_id`	str	Source survey identifier
`source_institution`	str	Source institution name
`bathymetric_uncertainty_type`	int	Uncertainty type classification (set to 0 in mosaic)

Note: feature_size_var and bathymetric_uncertainty_type are unsupported fields and are set to 0 in mosaics.

S102 v3.0

IHO S-102 v3.0 — similar to v2.2, but with a renamed quality subdataset.

Source key: s102v30

Required GDAL drivers: S102

Min GDAL version: 3.9

File slots:

Slot	Geopackage field	File type
`file`	`S102V30`	`.h5`

Subdatasets:

Subdataset	Bands	VRT suffix
BathymetryCoverage	Elevation, Uncertainty	`_BathymetryCoverage`
QualityOfBathymetryCoverage	QualityOfBathymetryCoverage	`_QualityOfBathymetryCoverage`

A combined VRT is also created with all three bands.

RAT fields (on band 3 of the combined VRT):

Field	Type	Description
`value`	int	Quality class value
`data_assessment`	int	Data quality assessment code
`feature_least_depth`	float	Least depth of feature
`significant_features`	float	Significant feature indicator
`feature_size`	float	Feature size
`feature_size_var`	int	Feature size variance (set to 0 in mosaic)
`coverage`	int	Coverage flag
`bathy_coverage`	int	Bathymetric coverage flag
`horizontal_uncert_fixed`	float	Fixed horizontal uncertainty
`horizontal_uncert_var`	float	Variable horizontal uncertainty
`survey_date_start`	str	Survey start date
`survey_date_end`	str	Survey end date
`source_survey_id`	str	Source survey identifier
`source_institution`	str	Source institution name
`type_of_bathymetric_estimation_uncertainty`	int	Uncertainty type classification (set to 0 in mosaic)

Note: feature_size_var and type_of_bathymetric_estimation_uncertainty are unsupported fields and are set to 0 in mosaics.

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