Wind Field Estimation Using ERS-1 SAR Data: The Initial Report

SAR has provided weather independent images on land and sea surface, which can be used for extracting various useful informations. Recently attempts to estimate wind field parameters from SAR images over the oceans have been made by various groups over the world. Although scatterometer loaded in ERS-1 and ERS-2 observes the global wind vector field at spatial resolution of 50 Km with accuracies of $\pm$2m/s in speed, the spatial resolution may not be good enough for applications in coastal regions. It is weil known the sea surface roughness is closely correlated to the wind field, but the wind retrieval algorithms from SAR images are yet in developing stage. Since the radar backscattering properties of the SAR images are principally the same as that of scatterometer, some previous studies conducted by other groups report the success in mesoscale coastal wind field retrievals using ERS SAR images. We have tested SWA (SAR Wind Algorithm) and CMOD4 model for estimation of wind speed using an ERS-1 SAR image acquired near Cheju Island, Korea, in October 11, 1994. The precise estimation of sigma nought and the direction of wind are required for applying the CMOD4 model to estimate wind speed. The wind speed in the test sub-image is estimated to be about 10.5m/s, which relatively well agrees to the observed wind speed about 9.0m/s at Seoguipo station. The wind speed estimation through the SWA is slightly higher than that of CMOD4 model. The sea surface condition may be favorable to SWA on the specific date. Since the CMOD4 model requires either wind direction or wind speed to retrieve the wind field, we should estimate the wind speed first using other algorithm including SWA. So far, it is not conclusive if the SWA can be used to provide input wind speed data for CMOD4 model or not. Since it is only initial stage of implementing the wind field retrieval algorithms and no in-situ observed data is currently avaliable, we are not able to evaluate the accuracy of the results at the moment. Therefore verification studies should be followed in the future to extract reliable wind field information in the coastal region using ERS SAR images.