Study of Seasonal Variation of Sea Surface Salinity in Java Sea and its Surrounding Seas using SMAP Satellite

Abstract

This research was conducted in The Java Sea and Surrounding Seas. This study uses satellite data with the period in 2015 - 2017, which composed of the main data of sea surface salinity and supporting data of rainfall, evaporation, wind, and current. The entire data processed into monthly climatology data and analyzed by using Pearson correlation. The salinity of Java Sea is generally in the range of 30.0 to 35.0 ‰. However, we found some phenomena in four areas, that is the significant decrease of salinity reach up to 30.919 ‰ in April in south waters of Borneo. Those influenced by river run off from the high precipitation reach up to 0.689 mm/hr in Borneo land. In south waters of Sulawesi, there is the highest increase of salinity in October to November reach up to 34.45 ‰ which affected by Banda Sea’s water mass entering the area. Salinity fluctuation in Natuna Sea is inversely proportional to other study areas, influenced by the geographical condition in the Northern Hemisphere which was crossed east monsoon and by the minimum salinity of water mass from the Java Sea which moved by the current which has correlation around of -0.717 between salinity and current. Negative of the high value shown big inverse relation. While the phenomenon of decreasing salinity is occurring in West Sulawesi waters in June, it is influenced by mass input from Banda Sea that depresses Java Sea waters and ARLINDO (Indonesia cross flow) which had minimum salinity from the west season.