European tidal gravity: An improved agreement between observations and models

Tidal gravity observations were made at 5 sites in Europe using improved LaCoste and Romberg ET gravimeters. Special attention was paid to improving the accuracy of determining both the amplitude and phase in tidal gravity measurements. The measuring screws of the gravimeters were calibrated on the well established short range vertical gravity calibration lines at Hannover, FRG. For M 2 and O 1 , it is shown that there is a very significant improvement in the agreement between observations and models compared to previous European tidal gravity measurements. For O 1 , the ocean tide loading and attraction is very small in Europe and our observations verify that the Dehant‐Wahr anelastic body tide gravimetric factor is accurate to within 0.2%. There is no dependence upon lateral changes of Earth structure, at least within the accuracy of our measurements.