COWVR/TEMPEST Multisensor Satellite-Based Surface State Parameter Retrievals

Abstract

Accurate estimates of essential climate variables, including ocean surface specific humidity (qa) and air temperature (Ta), at the air–sea interface are critical in understanding many atmospheric and oceanic processes and impacts and can be used to inform data-assimilative forecast systems about the coupled atmosphere-ocean state. To aid in addressing this scientific community need, the data processing component of the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Ocean Surface Flux System (NFLUX) uses multiple polynomial regression algorithms to produce single-sensor satellite-based swath-level estimates of surface state parameters and heat fluxes over the global ocean. This study extends the current NFLUX processing to include data processing from multiple sensors onboard the same platform. Specifically, we are combining satellite brightness temperature data from the Compact Ocean Wind Vector Radiometer (COWVR) and the Temporal Experiment for Storms and Tropical Systems (TEMPEST) to produce qa and Ta estimates. These combined surface estimates have error statistics comparable to current NFLUX satellite-based swath-level estimates from single sensors.

Keywords

• Compact Ocean Wind Vector Radiometer (COWVR)
• Naval Research Laboratory Ocean Surface Flux System (NFLUX)
• satellite retrievals
• surface air temperature
• surface specific humidity
• Temporal Experiment for Storms and Tropical Systems (TEMPEST)