Database of Southern Alaska Killer Whale Surveys and Encounters, 2001 to 2016, Gulf Watch Alaska Pelagic Component

These data are part of the Gulf Watch Alaska (GWA), Pelagic Component of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council, project numbers 12120114-M, 13120114-M, 14120114-M, 15120114-M and 16120114-M. Gulf Watch Alaska is the long-term ecosystem monitoring program of the Exxon Valdez Oil Spill Trustee Council for the marine ecosystem affected by the 1989 oil spill. The project is a continuation of annual monitoring of AB pod and the AT1 population killer whales in Prince William Sound-Kenai Fjords. These groups of whales suffered significant losses at the time of the oil spill and have not recovered at projected rates. Monitoring of all the major pods and their current movements, range, feeding habits, and contaminant levels will help determine their vulnerability to future perturbations, including oil spills. This dataset is a database containing information from the killer whale surveys conducted from 2001 to 2016 in Prince William Sound and the Gulf of Alaska. The native file format is a Microsoft Office Access 2007 database (12.0 6735.5000), components of which have been separated and stored in Orcadatabase_CSV_tables.zip as .csv files to ensure that the information contained within the Access database file is openly accessible to data customers. Details of killer whale surveys, and subsequent encounters are stored in the file. Stored information includes the date, time, observers, behavioral observations, samples taken, location, pods present, number of whales present, name of survey vessel, and other pertinent information.

本数据集为阿拉斯加海湾观测计划（Gulf Watch Alaska, GWA）的组成部分，该计划隶属于埃克森瓦尔迪兹溢油信托委员会远洋项目组，对应项目编号为12120114-M、13120114-M、14120114-M、15120114-M及16120114-M。
阿拉斯加海湾观测计划是埃克森瓦尔迪兹溢油信托委员会针对1989年溢油影响海域开展的长期生态系统监测项目。本项目是对威廉王子湾-基奈峡湾区域AB群与AT1种群虎鲸年度监测工作的延续。该类鲸群在溢油事件中遭受了严重种群损失，且未达到预期恢复速率。对所有主要鲸群的当前活动、活动范围、摄食习性及污染物水平开展监测，将有助于评估其在未来扰动（包括溢油事件）下的脆弱性。
本数据集收录了2001至2016年在威廉王子湾与阿拉斯加湾开展的虎鲸调查相关信息。其原始文件格式为Microsoft Office Access 2007数据库（版本号12.0 6735.5000），为确保数据使用者可公开获取该Access数据库中的全部内容，其组成部分已被拆分并以CSV格式文件存储于Orcadatabase_CSV_tables.zip压缩包内。该文件存储了虎鲸调查及后续鲸群目击记录的详细信息，所涵盖的内容包括调查日期、观测时间、参与观测人员、行为观测记录、采集样本信息、地理位置、在场鲸群、现存鲸只数量、调查船名称及其他相关信息。