SEA ICE RADAR ALTIMETER SIGNATURE MODELLING EXPERIMENTS

• Main Authors: Rasmus Tonboe, Søren Andersen, Leif Toudal Pedersen
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Sea ice
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.535.2169; http://ocean.dmi.dk/staff/rtt/sea_ice_model.pdf

Scattering at the large horizontal dielectric contrasts of the snow/sea ice system i.e. the snow and ice surface dominate the altimeter total backscatter coefficient. To investigate the temporal and seasonal altimeter backscatter signature variability a forward model is coupled to a thermodynamic and mass model for the snow and sea-ice temperature profile, accumulation, growth, melt and metamorphosis. The thermodynamic and mass model uses an initial snow and ice profile and meteorological data input. In situ data collected during the 2003 CRYOVEX joint Danish-German-ESA campaign and the 2004 GreenIce ice camp are used. Our results show that the snow cover is not only important for the microwave signature of sea ice but also the buoyant balance of ice floes as well as the heat-budget. These considerations are included in the discussion. 1