We haveusedtheHydrobaseclimatologytomakeacompar-
ison toArgoat sy=25.5(Fig. 9) andfindasimilarspatialpattern
consisting ofabasin-widedecreasewithmaximumintensityin
the northeast.Asdiscussedearlier,mostofthedatainthe
Hydrobase climatologywerecollectedfromtheearly1970sto
the late1980s.AlthoughtheWOCEdataareincludedinthe
Hydrobase climatology,theyonlyaccountforabout3%ofthetotal
number ofprofilesinthedatabase.Itisthusreasonabletoview
the comparisonofArgowithWOCEandHydrobaseastwonearly
independent analysesthatleadtosimilarconclusions