taking the temperature

The scientific drilling vessel JOIDES Resolution (JR) collects more than continuous cores from the deep ocean. Air and seawater temperatures are reported daily. On the JR, air temperature is determined from manually reading the temperatures from wet bulb and dry bulb thermometers located behind the JR bridge outside in a vented box. Seawater temperature is recorded by the ship’s engineering system in the water intake, located 3-4 meters below the ocean surface.

This quilt is a data visualization of the final 32 days at sea for IODP Expedition 390. The top half of the quilt shows the daily air temperature, starting in the upper left on the first row (April 29), moving across to the right and down each row until the dataset ends on the far right of the fourth row (May 30). This layout is repeated in the bottom half of the quilt for the same time period, but for the seawater temperature. The scale for the air temperature ranges from 16 degrees C through 25 degrees C (no values were recorded at 17 degrees C, which is why there is a gap in the color scale). Seawater temperature measurements ranged from 19 degrees C through 23 degrees C.

Important to note is the location of the ship when the temperature measurements were recorded. May 23 is the date the JR began its transit east in the South Atlantic Ocean back to Cape Town, South Africa, for the conclusion of the expedition. On the quilt, May 23 is the first data point (far left side) in the bottom row in the air and seawater sections. The coldest seawater temperatures at the end of the expedition were due to the colder, northward-flowing waters of the Benguela Current along with the upwelling of cold, nutrient-rich water off the west coast of South Africa. Not only does the Benguela Current have a cooling effect on the temperature of seawater, the air immediately above the current becomes cooled as well, which is recorded in the quilt with the coldest air temperatures also from May 23 until the ship docks in Cape Town.

Red/pink/orange batiks are used to represent air temperatures, and batiks in shades of blue are for seawater temperatures. The binding fabric is orange and blue to bring together the two color schemes. The white fabric for the background is a Da Gama Textile (3 Cats Shweshwe) manufactured in South Africa. Longarm quilting services provided by The Old Country Store Fabrics in Intercourse, PA.

Quilt measures 52 inches tall by 46 inches wide and was completed on July 31, 2023.