Validation of Sentinel-3A SRAL Coastal Sea Level Data at High Posting Rate: 80 Hz

Abstract

Altimetry data of two and a half years (June 2016–November 2018) of Sentinel-3A SRAL (S3A-SRAL) were validated at the sampling frequency of 80 Hz. The data were obtained from the European Space Agency (ESA) Grid Processing On Demand (GPOD) service over three coastal sites in Spain: Huelva (HU) (Gulf of Cádiz), Barcelona (BA) (Western Mediterranean Sea), and Bilbao (BI) (Bay of Biscay). Two tracks were selected in each site: one ascending and one descending. Data were validated using in situ tide gauge (TG) data provided by the Spanish Puertos del Estado. The altimetry sea level anomaly time series were obtained using the corrections available in GPOD with the exception of the sea state bias (SSB) correction, not available at 80 Hz. Hence, the SSB was approximated to 5% of the significant wave height (SWH). The validation was performed using two statistical parameters, the Pearson correlation coefficient (r) and the root mean square error (rmse). In the 5–20-km segment with respect to the coastline, the results were 6–8 cm (rmse) and 0.7–0.8 (r) for all the tracks. The 0–5-km segment was also analyzed in detail to study the land effect on the altimetry data quality. The results showed that the track orientation, the angle of intersection with the coast, and the land topography concur to determine the nearest distance to the coast at which the data retain a similar level of accuracy than in the 5–20-km segment. This “distance of good quality” to shore reaches a minimum of 3 km for the tracks at HU and the descending track at BA.