• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
• /
• v.9 no.3
• /
• pp.15-21
• /
• 2018

The ocean drifter is a device for observing the ocean weather by floating off the sea surface. The data observed through the drifter is utilized in the ocean weather prediction and oil spill. Observed data may contain incorrect or missing data at the time of observation, and accuracy may be lowered when we use the data. In this paper, we propose a data correction model using recurrent neural networks. We corrected data collected from 7 drifters in 2015 and 8 drifters in 2016, and conducted experiments of drifter moving prediction to reflect the correction results. Experimental results showed that observed data are corrected by 13.9% and improved the performance of the prediction model by 1.4%.

• Ocean Science Journal
• /
• v.41 no.2
• /
• pp.121-124
• /
• 2006

Argo drifters provide information of the vertical structure in the water column and have a potential for the improvement of understanding phytoplankton primary production and biogeochemical cycles in combination with ocean color satellite data, which can obtain the horizontal distribution of phytoplankton biomass in the surface layer. Our examples show that using Argo drifters with satellite-measured horizontal distribution of phytoplankton biomass at the sea surface allow an improved understanding of the development of the spring bloom. The other possible uses of Argo drifter are discussed.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.35 no.3
• /
• pp.193-203
• /
• 2013

A GPS-drifter was newly designed to observe the sea surface skin current and to estimate the direct wind effect on the sea surface. After conducting a test to establish and verify the accuracy of the GPS itself in the laboratory, in-situ experimental campaigns at Saemangeum in Gunsan city and Haeundae in Busan city, Korea, were carried out to ascertain the drifter track and to estimate the velocity data set on Oct. 3, 15, 23, 27 and Nov. 25, 2011. The current meters, RCM9 and ADCP, were moored together to remove the background current field, and the wind data were obtained from several marine stations such as towers and buoys in these areas. The drifter-observed velocity show good agreement with the flow obtained by the HF radar in the Saemangeum area. The direction of the wind-driven current extracted from the drifter-observed velocity was completely deflected to the right, however the degree of the angle was different according to the drift types. The average speed of the wind-driven current matched with 2.19~2.81% of the wind speed and the deflection angle was about $8.0{\sim}10.9^{\circ}$ without adjustment for the land-sea effect, and about 2.19~2.84% and $4.1{\sim}6.0^{\circ}$ with the adjustment for the land-sea effect.

• Journal of the korean society of oceanography
• /
• v.35 no.2
• /
• pp.65-77
• /
• 2000

A simple but effective method has been developed for estimating diurnal and semi-diurnal tidal currents from trajectories of satellite-tracked drifters. The estimation method consists of separation of tidal current signals contained in the drifter trajectories, computation of undulations by diurnal and semi-diurnal currents, and correction of dominant diurnal and semi-diurnal tidal constituents. M$_2$ tidal currents estimated from drifter trajectories in the Yellow Sea are well consistent with those observed by moored current meters and this supports the validity of this method. We have constructed M$_2$ tidal current chart in the Yellow Sea by applying this method to available drifter trajectories collected during 1994-1998. According to this chart, M$_2$ current in the Yellow Sea rotates in the clockwise direction south of 35$^{\circ}$ 30'N but in the counterclockwise one to the north. Also it is found that the M$_2$ current is strong in the bank area northeast of the Changjiang River mouth and in the Korean coastal area, while it is weak in the deep central trough.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.40 no.3
• /
• pp.99-114
• /
• 2018

In the present study, we assess the GloSea5 (Global Seasonal Forecasting System version 5) near-surface ocean current forecasts using globally observed surface drifter dataset. Annual mean surface current fields at 0-day forecast lead time are quite consistent with drifter-derived velocity fields, and low values of root mean square (RMS) errors distributes in global oceans, except for regions of high variability, such as the Antarctic Circumpolar Current, Kuroshio, and Gulf Stream. Moreover a comparison with the global high-resolution forecasting system, HYCOM (Hybrid Coordinate Ocean Model), signifies that GloSea5 performs well in terms of short-range surface-current forecasts. Predictions from 0-day to 4-week lead time are also validated for the global ocean and regions covering the main ocean basins. In general, the Indian Ocean and tropical regions yield relatively high RMS errors against all forecast lead times, whilst the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans show low values. RMS errors against forecast lead time ranging from 0-day to 4-week reveal the largest increase rate between 0-day and 1-week lead time in all regions. Correlation against forecast lead time also reveals similar results. In addition, a strong westward bias of about $0.2m\;s^{-1}$ is found along the Equator in the western Pacific on the initial forecast day, and it extends toward the Equator of the eastern Pacific as the lead time increases.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.23 no.2
• /
• pp.133-139
• /
• 2001

Ocean currents estimated from sea height anomalies derived from inter-calibrated TP/ERS are compared with daily mean currents measured with satellite-tracked drifters. The correlation coefficient between the geostrophic current from TP/ERS and surface current at 15 m depth from drifter tracks was found to be about 0.5. Due to the limitation of satellite ground tracks, small scale eddies less than 80 km are poorly resolved from TP/ERS. One of the interesting results of this study is that coastal currents along the eastern coast of Korea were well reproduced from sea height anomalies when the coastal currents were developed in association with eddies near the South Korean coast. The eddy kinetic energy (EKE) estimated from drifters, TP/ERS, and a numerical model are also compared. The EKE estimated from drifters was about 22 % higher than EKE calculated from TP/ERS. The pattern of low EKE level in the northern basin and high EKE level in the southern East Sea is shown in the EKE estimates derived from both the drifters and TP/ERS.

• Journal of the Korea Convergence Society
• /
• v.8 no.10
• /
• pp.45-52
• /
• 2017

Drifter is an equipment for observing the characteristics of seawater in the ocean, and it can be used to predict effluent oil diffusion and to observe ocean currents. In this paper, we design models or the prediction of drifter trajectory using machine learning. We propose methods for estimating the trajectory of drifter using support vector regression, radial basis function network, Gaussian process, multilayer perceptron, and recurrent neural network. When the propose mothods were compared with the existing MOHID numerical model, performance was improve on three of the four cases. In particular, LSTM, the best performed method, showed the imporvement by 47.59% Future work will improve the accuracy by weighting using bagging and boosting.

• Ocean and Polar Research
• /
• v.39 no.3
• /
• pp.169-179
• /
• 2017

The "GeoDrifter" is a newly-developed surface drifter with high temporal resolution. It is the first time that high-frequency drifters have been deployed in the East/Japan Sea. The purpose of this study is to introduce the phenomena experienced by these drifters flowing along with the Tsushima Current across the East/Japan Sea, focusing on high-frequency variability, and to discuss them in comparison with previous observations. The observed basin-scale circulation of the Tsushima Current generally coincides well with the known schematic circulation. The GeoDrifter trajectories also show inertial oscillations almost everywhere in the oceanic regions of the East/Japan Sea, strong semi-diurnal tidal currents in the western part of Korea Strait, diurnal currents much stronger than semi-diurnal currents in the upstream region of the Nearshore Branch off the Japanese coast, and many warm eddies in the Yamato Basin, all comparable to the observational results reported in the previous studies. An interesting point is that the semi-diurnal tidal currents undergo a great spatial variation in the western part of the Korea Strait. The observed features that cannot be explained are, among others, strong counter-clockwise motions with oscillating period about 51 hours appearing in the upstream region of the Nearshore Branch off the Japanese coast and the different tidal behaviors between upstream and downstream regions of the latter.

• Journal of Ocean Engineering and Technology
• /
• v.37 no.4
• /
• pp.145-157
• /
• 2023

Due to a recent increase in maritime activities in South Korea, the frequency of maritime distress is escalating and poses a significant threat to lives and property. The aim of this study was to validate a drift trajectory prediction technique to help mitigate the damages caused by maritime distress incidents. In this study, OpenDrift was verified using satellite drifter data from the Korea Hydrographic and Oceanographic Agency. OpenDrift is a Monte-Carlo-based Lagrangian trajectory modeling framework that allows for considering leeway, an important factor in predicting the movement of floating marine objects. The simulation results showed no significant differences in the performance of drift trajectory prediction when considering leeway using four evaluation methods (normalized cumulative Lagrangian separation, root mean squared error, mean absolute error, and Euclidean distance). However, leeway improved the performance in an analysis of location prediction conformance for maritime search and rescue operations. Therefore, the findings of this study suggest that it is important to consider leeway in drift trajectory prediction for effective maritime search and rescue operations. The results could help with future research on drift trajectory prediction of various floating objects, including marine debris, satellite drifters, and sea ice.

• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
• /
• v.16 no.3
• /
• pp.211-220
• /
• 2000

Even though recurring eddies at the terminal end of the East Korean Warm Current have been identified in the thermal infrared imagery from the NOAA/AVHRR sensor and ocean color data from Orbview-2/SeaWiFS sensor, it is difficult to make observation in the field regarding recurring eddies located around the Wonsan coastal area in North Korea. But we could get in situ data related to an eddy from an ARGOS satellite tracking drifter trapped in the eddy on January 4th, 1999. An ARGOS drifter, a NOAA satellite tracked buoy was trapped by the eddy during January 4th.March 18, 1999. The ARGOS drifter rotated 10 times per 72 days on the edge of the eddy located at $39^{\circ}N$, $129^{\circ}E$. The diameter of the eddy was about 100 km. The horizontal rotation velocity of the recurring cold-core anti-cyclonic eddy was 1.53 km/h(42 cm/sec). The sea surface temperatures of the eddy varied from $14.7^{\circ}C$ on January 5, 1999 to $9.6^{\circ}C$ on March 18,1999. To study the mechanism of the recurring eddy. we tried to find out the relationship between the vector of the drifter moving in the eddy and the wind vector in Sokcho and Ulleung Island located near the eddy in southern Korea, and the difference in sea level between Ulleung Island and Mukho. We hope the results of this study would be useful for calibration and validation data of simulation and numerical modeling studies of the recurring eddy.