Mean sea surface model over China seas and its adjacent ocean established with the 19-year moving average method from multi-satellite altimeter data

Abstract

A new mean sea surface (MSS) model (named Shandong University of Science and Technology (2018) (SUST2018) MSS model) with a grid of 1′ × 1′ over China seas and its adjacent ocean (0°N~41°N, 100°E~140°E) is established and validated. The SUST2018 model established with the 19-year moving average method is based on 26-year multi-satellite altimeter data covering the time period 1992–2018. The new altimetry data of HaiYang-2A (HY-2A), Jason-3 and Sentinel-3A have been used in establishing the SUST2018 model. The process of the establishment of the MSS model also have been presented, including collinear adjustment of exact repeat mission (ERM) data, removal of the temporal oceanic variability of geodetic mission (GM) data, crossover adjustment and gridding. The reliability and accuracy of SUST2018 are validated by comparing with the CLS15 and DTU18 MSS models as well as satellite altimeter data. By comparing SUST2018 and SUST(all)2018 (established with the traditional average method), it can be found that the accuracy of SUST2018 is higher than that of SUST(all)2018, which indicates that the 19-year moving average method can effectively improve the accuracy of an MSS model.