The performance of CryoSat-2 as an ocean altimeter
Abstract
Two years after the launch of CryoSat-2, oceanographic uses of the CryoSat-2 data have well taken off, after several institutes, NOAA included, have spent a dedicated effort to upgrade the official CryoSat-2 data products to a level that is suitable for monitoring of mesoscale phenomena, as well as wind speed and wave height. But in the coastal areas, this is much less the case. This is mostly the result of the fact that CryoSat-2 is running in SAR or InSAR mode in many of the focus areas, like the Mediterranean Sea. We have shown, however, that the CryoSat data is intrinsically of high quality and for over a year now have been producing "IGDR" type data through FTP and through RADS. These steps include: ● Combine final (LRM) and fast-delivery (FDM) products and split the segmented files into pass files. ● Divide the 369-day repeat cycle into subcycles of 29 or 27 days. ● Retrack the conventional low-rate data to determine range, significant wave height, backscatter (and off-nadir angle). ● Add or replace the usual corrections for ionospheric and atmospheric delays, tides, dynamic atmospheric correction, sea state bias, mean sea surface. ● Update orbits and corrections whenever they become available. This way NOAA produces an "IGDR" product from the fast-delivery FDM and the CNES MOE orbit in about 2 days after real time, and a "GDR" product from the final LRM data and the CNES POE orbit with a delay of about 1 month. In order to extend the data products to the coastal regime, we have developed a process in which the SAR data are first combined to "Pseudo-LRM" or "reduced SAR" wave forms, that are similar to the conventional low-rate wave forms. After this the reduced SAR data are retracked and combined with the conventional data to form a harmonised product. Although this sounds relatively straightforward, many steps were needed to get this done: ● Combine the SAR wave forms to conventional wave forms, without loss of information. ● Reconstruct backscatter and significant wave height in a meaningful way, consistent with low-rate data. ● Cross-calibrate the conventional and SAR mode data. ● Validate the data quality of conventional and SAR mode data through crossovers and collinear track analyses. In this presentation we will demonstrate how the CryoSat-2 data quality compares to other altimeters (Envisat, Jason-1 and Jason-2) by means of data distribution maps, histograms and crossover comparisons.
- Publication:
-
AGU Fall Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2012
- Bibcode:
- 2012AGUFM.C54A..05S
- Keywords:
-
- 0758 CRYOSPHERE / Remote sensing;
- 1241 GEODESY AND GRAVITY / Satellite geodesy: technical issues;
- 4262 OCEANOGRAPHY: GENERAL / Ocean observing systems;
- 4556 OCEANOGRAPHY: PHYSICAL / Sea level: variations and mean