Using Operation IceBridge data to construct a consistent record of sea ice thickness from ICESat, CryoSat-2, and ICESat-2

The expected launch of ICESat-2 in September 2018 will bring a vast new global laser altimetry data set potentially capable of year-round measurements of sea ice freeboard with exceptionally high spatial resolution. When combined with snow depth data, this has the potential to yield sea ice thickness at an unprecedented scale. However, data are first needed to provide for algorithm calibration and validation purposes, and to ensure consistency between other records of sea ice thickness such as those from ICESat and CryoSat-2. The long-running Operation IceBridge airborne mission will play a key role as the available combination of laser, radar, visible and infrared imagery data sets provides the necessary tools for such a process. In this talk we will discuss how IceBridge data will be used to evaluate surface elevation and freeboard retrievals from ICESat-2, and when combined with snow depth information from new model results, how this will be used to retrieve the sea ice thickness distribution at the full spatial resolution of ICESat-2 using an empirical snow distribution function developed from 10 years of Operation IceBridge data.