Skip to content

Coastal water levels

noaa:coops-water-levels · Released · Included since usdata 0.10.

CO-OPS Observed Water Levels.

At a glance

  • Files: CSV
  • Selection: Six-minute observations for one station and datum; at most 28 days
  • Required inputs: Station, datum, and both minute-aligned timestamps
  • Open locally: usdata[pandas] · Reader guide
  • Examples: coastal water levels

Usage and limitations

Available since v0.10.0 as noaa:coops-water-levels. The initial adapter fetches six-minute observed water levels for one explicit station. NOAA returns preliminary or verified observations according to availability. Predictions, currents, station discovery, and automatic request chunking are not included.

Require a seven-digit string station, an explicit uppercase datum, and both timestamps. units is metric (default, meters) or english (feet). Supported datum codes follow the Data API documentation: CRD, IGLD, LWD, MHHW, MHW, MTL, MSL, MLW, MLLW, NAVD, and STND. Availability of a datum depends on the station; the service rejects unsupported combinations. Unknown parameters, geographic/text selectors, and variables are rejected.

Offsets are normalized to UTC and the API request fixes time_zone=gmt. Bounds are inclusive, must have zero seconds/microseconds, and span at most 28 days, conservatively within NOAA's one-month limit. Date-only bounds remain midnight. The adapter constructs one stable CSV request; it checks availability on fetch.

uv run usdata fetch noaa:coops-water-levels \
  --start 2024-05-06T00:00Z --end 2024-05-06T00:12Z \
  -p station=8518750 -p datum=MLLW -p units=metric

The raw CSV retains original header spacing, observations, and quality flags. Use the ordinary CSV reader and rename columns locally if desired; station, datum, units, and timezone remain explicit in the provenance source URL. The small manifest example shows this. Quality p and v mean preliminary and verified; preserve the quality field alongside the flags because their interpretation changes. See the response definitions.

See the service research notes for dated upstream probes.

All NOAA datasets.

Catalog reference.

Catalog reference

  • Availability: since 0.10
  • Domain: Sea level and tides
  • Coverage: not specified in the catalog
  • Coverage varies by station, product, and date; the range above does not guarantee observations.
  • Upstream documentation
  • License: US Government Work (public domain)
  • Transport: http
  • Adapter: usdata.providers.noaa.coops:CoopsWaterLevels

All NOAA datasets.