Wind Direction Estimates from Synthetic Aperture Radar Imagery of the Sea Surface

Abstract

We will investigate the range of near-surface mean wind directions with respect to the orientation of common marine atmospheric boundary layer (MABL) quasi-two dimensional phenomena seen in synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery of the sea surface. In doing so, we will provide empirically derived guidelines on how to distinguish the SAR-signature of one feature from another. We will provide the impact of position errors in numerical weather model-analyzed synoptic scale storms and fronts on the wind-direction dependent retrieval of wind speed from SAR. This will be accomplished via a thorough error analysis of CMOD-4 with an emphasis on wind direction errors at varying incidence angles, and varying locations along the upwind/downwind/cross-wind quadrants.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Sep 30, 2003
Accession Number
ADA629930

Entities

People

  • Todd D. Sikora

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Boundary Layer
  • Detection
  • Error Analysis
  • Errors
  • Fluid Mechanics
  • Gravity Waves
  • Marine Meteorology
  • Oceans
  • Orientation (Direction)
  • Physics
  • Physics Laboratories
  • Radar
  • Synthetic Aperture Radar
  • Two Dimensional
  • United States Naval Academy
  • Wind
  • Wind Direction

Fields of Study

  • Environmental science

Readers

  • Atmospheric Science/Meteorology
  • Ocean-Atmosphere Mesoscale Modeling, Data Assimilation, and Flux Boundary Layers
  • Radar Systems Engineering.