ESSO - Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services

Argo Information Center

The Argo Information Centre (AIC), established in Toulouse, France, is responsible for the international technical coordination of Argo, under the general supervision of the Chairman of the Argo Science Team (http://www-Argo.ucsd.edu/), acting in close collaboration with the Secretary of IOC and the Secretary General of WMO.

The AIC acts to resolve any issues arising between float operators, manufacturers, data telecommunication providers, data assimilation Centres, quality control and archiving agencies, WMO and IOC, encourages the participation of new countries, and assists as appropriate in the implementation of a global network.

The AIC website (http://Argo.jcommops.org/) gives general information on the Argo project (participating countries, contacts, real-time status of the network, status of DACs developments, maps, news, etc.) and proposes a float monitoring system which particularly permit to inform the states on the status of floats entering their Exclusive Economic Zones. The application is also used for deployment strategy.

The AIC, which doesn't distribute nor archive data, guides the users to the Argo GDACs and regional products.