# NEMO5 - Xios3 does not produce the right time\_counter in grid\_U/V files

**URL:** <https://nemo-ocean.discourse.group/t/nemo5-xios3-does-not-produce-the-right-time-counter-in-grid-u-v-files/1050>\
**Category:** Versions\
**Tags:** XIOS\
**Created:** [13 October 2026 09:20 UTC](https://nemo-ocean.discourse.group/t/nemo5-xios3-does-not-produce-the-right-time-counter-in-grid-u-v-files/1050 "2026-10-13T09:20:29Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![gdenoordhout](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bbe5ce/32.png) [@gdenoordhout](https://nemo-ocean.discourse.group/u/gdenoordhout)\
**Post date:** [13 October 2026 09:20 UTC](https://nemo-ocean.discourse.group/t/nemo5-xios3-does-not-produce-the-right-time-counter-in-grid-u-v-files/1050/1 "2026-10-13T09:20:29Z")

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Hi NEMO users,

We are now using Nemo5 with XIos3 for our regional configuration. The model runs well and produces the right output but the produced NetCDF files have a weird behavior for the grid\_U/V files. It seems that the `time_counter` values are filled with NetCDF missing values. See this Python code for example :

```auto
>>> import xarray as xr
>>> import glob
>>> files = glob.glob("out/BS_1m **grid_U**.nc")
>>> ds=xr.open_dataset(files[0], decode_times=False)
>>> ds["time_counter"]
<xarray.DataArray 'time_counter' (time_counter: 12)> Size: 96B
array([9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36,
       9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36,
       9.96921e+36, 9.96921e+36])
Coordinates:
    time_instant (time_counter) float64 96B ...
  * time_counter (time_counter) float64 96B 9.969e+36 9.969e+36 ... 9.969e+36
    time_centered (time_counter) float64 96B ...
Attributes:
    axis: T
    standard_name: time
    long_name: Time axis
    calendar: gregorian
    units: seconds since 1900-01-01 00:00:00
    time_origin: 1900-01-01 00:00:00
    bounds: time_counter_bounds
>>> files = glob.glob("out/BS_1m **grid_T**.nc")
>>> ds=xr.open_dataset(files[0], decode_times=False)
>>> ds["time_counter"]
<xarray.DataArray 'time_counter' (time_counter: 12)> Size: 96B
array([1.705406e+09, 1.707955e+09, 1.710504e+09, 1.713139e+09, 1.715774e+09,
       1.718410e+09, 1.721045e+09, 1.723723e+09, 1.726358e+09, 1.728994e+09,
       1.731629e+09, 1.734264e+09])
Coordinates:
    time_centered (time_counter) float64 96B ...
  * time_counter (time_counter) float64 96B 1.705e+09 1.708e+09 ... 1.734e+09
    time_instant (time_counter) float64 96B ...
Attributes:
    axis: T
    standard_name: time
    long_name: Time axis
    calendar: gregorian
    units: seconds since 1900-01-01 00:00:00
    time_origin: 1900-01-01 00:00:00
    bounds: time_counter_bounds

```

Have anyone encoutered this issue ?

Kind regards,

Guillaume