Cosmic Ray Latitude Survey: 1995-1996

During the 1995-96 austral summer, a period of solar minimum, we operated a neutron monitor on board the ship Italica of the Italian Antarctic Programme to record cosmic ray neutron intensities in seas from Italy to Antarctica and back. This survey provided a full coverage of cut-off rigidities and the possibility of repeating the measurements at least twice at the same cut-offs. In spite of some problems encountered, mainly due to the unstable AC voltage supplied by the ship, it was possible to get a preliminary latitude curve of the cosmic ray nucleonic intensity . Data corrections for efficiency changes, pressure variations and small primary cosmic ray variations were applied to the raw data recorded along the survey.