Geomagnetic secular variation in the Indian Ocean

Abstract

Annual repeat stations in Australia and in South Africa show that secular variation may change rapidly and over short geographical distances in the Indian Ocean area. Satellite models show large secular variations in the center of the Indian Ocean where there are few island geomagnetic observatories. This paper investigates marine geomagnetic measurements to see if they give more information about secular variations in this area. Between 1960 and 1988 there were more than 70 port-to-port cruises with ships towing proton precession magnetometers in the Indian Ocean. Change in field intensity from one cruise to another provides new information about the secular variation in this part of the world. Several methods were investigated to determine this change from the ship’s data. Observing the change on closely parallel or crossing tracks provides an estimate of this change. These results indicate that there are short time and distance scales of secular variation in the Indian Ocean which have not been accounted for in geomagnetic field models.