Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters
The pathways and fate of freshwater in the East Greenland Coastal Current (EGCC) are crucial to the climate system. The EGCC transports large amounts of freshwater in close proximity to sites of deep open-ocean convection in the Labrador and Irminger seas. Many studies have attempted to analyze this...
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2023
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ftdoajarticles:oai:doaj.org/article:04ec259e18f14fa18b384162d2fb333d 2023-10-09T21:51:07+02:00 Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters A. Coquereau N. P. Foukal 2023-09-01T00:00:00Z https://doi.org/10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 https://doaj.org/article/04ec259e18f14fa18b384162d2fb333d EN eng Copernicus Publications https://os.copernicus.org/articles/19/1393/2023/os-19-1393-2023.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1812-0784 https://doaj.org/toc/1812-0792 doi:10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 1812-0784 1812-0792 https://doaj.org/article/04ec259e18f14fa18b384162d2fb333d Ocean Science, Vol 19, Pp 1393-1411 (2023) Geography. Anthropology. Recreation G Environmental sciences GE1-350 article 2023 ftdoajarticles https://doi.org/10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 2023-09-24T00:37:17Z The pathways and fate of freshwater in the East Greenland Coastal Current (EGCC) are crucial to the climate system. The EGCC transports large amounts of freshwater in close proximity to sites of deep open-ocean convection in the Labrador and Irminger seas. Many studies have attempted to analyze this system from models and various observational platforms, but the modeling results largely disagree with one another, and observations are limited due to the harsh conditions typical of the region. Altimetry-derived surface currents, constructed from remote-sensing observations and applying geostrophic equations, provide a continuous observational data set beginning in 1993. However, these products have historically encountered difficulties in coastal regions, and thus their validity must be checked. In this work, we use a comprehensive methodology to compare these Eulerian data to a Lagrangian data set of 34 surface drifter trajectories and demonstrate that the altimetry-derived surface currents are surprisingly capable of recovering the spatial structure of the flow field on the south Greenland shelf and can mimic the Lagrangian nature of the flow as observed from surface drifters. Article in Journal/Newspaper East Greenland Greenland Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles Greenland Ocean Science 19 5 1393 1411 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
Directory of Open Access Journals: DOAJ Articles |
op_collection_id |
ftdoajarticles |
language |
English |
topic |
Geography. Anthropology. Recreation G Environmental sciences GE1-350 |
spellingShingle |
Geography. Anthropology. Recreation G Environmental sciences GE1-350 A. Coquereau N. P. Foukal Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
topic_facet |
Geography. Anthropology. Recreation G Environmental sciences GE1-350 |
description |
The pathways and fate of freshwater in the East Greenland Coastal Current (EGCC) are crucial to the climate system. The EGCC transports large amounts of freshwater in close proximity to sites of deep open-ocean convection in the Labrador and Irminger seas. Many studies have attempted to analyze this system from models and various observational platforms, but the modeling results largely disagree with one another, and observations are limited due to the harsh conditions typical of the region. Altimetry-derived surface currents, constructed from remote-sensing observations and applying geostrophic equations, provide a continuous observational data set beginning in 1993. However, these products have historically encountered difficulties in coastal regions, and thus their validity must be checked. In this work, we use a comprehensive methodology to compare these Eulerian data to a Lagrangian data set of 34 surface drifter trajectories and demonstrate that the altimetry-derived surface currents are surprisingly capable of recovering the spatial structure of the flow field on the south Greenland shelf and can mimic the Lagrangian nature of the flow as observed from surface drifters. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
A. Coquereau N. P. Foukal |
author_facet |
A. Coquereau N. P. Foukal |
author_sort |
A. Coquereau |
title |
Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
title_short |
Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
title_full |
Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
title_fullStr |
Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
title_full_unstemmed |
Evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south Greenland shelf with surface drifters |
title_sort |
evaluating altimetry-derived surface currents on the south greenland shelf with surface drifters |
publisher |
Copernicus Publications |
publishDate |
2023 |
url |
https://doi.org/10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 https://doaj.org/article/04ec259e18f14fa18b384162d2fb333d |
geographic |
Greenland |
geographic_facet |
Greenland |
genre |
East Greenland Greenland |
genre_facet |
East Greenland Greenland |
op_source |
Ocean Science, Vol 19, Pp 1393-1411 (2023) |
op_relation |
https://os.copernicus.org/articles/19/1393/2023/os-19-1393-2023.pdf https://doaj.org/toc/1812-0784 https://doaj.org/toc/1812-0792 doi:10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 1812-0784 1812-0792 https://doaj.org/article/04ec259e18f14fa18b384162d2fb333d |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.5194/os-19-1393-2023 |
container_title |
Ocean Science |
container_volume |
19 |
container_issue |
5 |
container_start_page |
1393 |
op_container_end_page |
1411 |
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1779314203144749056 |