Open AccessEvaluation of AMSR‐E snow depth product over East Antarctic sea ice using in situ measurements and aerial photography
Author(s) -
Worby Anthony P.,
Markus Thorsten,
Steer Adam D.,
Lytle Victoria I.,
Massom Robert A.
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
journal of geophysical research: oceans
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.67
H-Index - 298
eISSN - 2156-2202
pISSN - 0148-0227
DOI - 10.1029/2007jc004181
Subject(s) - snow , remote sensing , sea ice , satellite , geology , radiometer , environmental science , sea ice thickness , cryosphere , climatology , meteorology , geography , geomorphology , aerospace engineering , engineering
The Antarctic Remote Ice Sensing Experiment (ARISE) was conducted in the East Antarctic sea ice zone during September–October 2003. A key objective of this program was the acquisition of in situ measurements suitable for evaluating the EOS Aqua Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR‐E) snow depth product. A strategy is presented for comparing snow thickness measurements over spatial scales ranging from point measurements to satellite pixels. In situ measurements of snow thickness were taken across eight Lagrangian grid cells defined and tracked using an array of drifting buoys. These data are coupled with ice‐type analyses from digital aerial photographs to calculate area‐averaged snow thicknesses that are compared with the AMSR‐E derived snow thickness product. The results show considerable underestimates of the AMSR‐E snow depths for rough sea ice by a factor of 2.3. We investigate the impact of underlying sea ice roughness on snow depth retrievals and conclude that in situ measurements of snow thickness underrepresent snow depth over rough ice, which is then not adequately accounted for in the development of the algorithm coefficients.