Mid-Atlantic Regional Association Coastal Ocean Observing System Research Articles

Real-time quality assurance and quality control for a high frequency radar network

This paper recommends end to end quality assurance methods and quality control tests for High Frequency Radar Networks. We focus on the network that is operated by the Mid Atlantic Regional Association Coastal Ocean Observing System (MARACOOS). The network currently consists of 38 radars making real-time measurements of the surface currents over the continental shelf for a variety of applications including search and rescue planning, oil spill trajectory modelling and providing a transport context for marine biodiversity observing networks. MARACOOS has been delivering surface current measurements to the United States Coast Guard (USCG) since May 2009. Data quality is important for all applications; however, since the USCG uses this surface current information to plan life-saving missions, delivery of the best quality data is crucial. We have mapped the components of the HF radar data processing chain onto the data levels presented in the NASA Earth Science Reference Handbook and have applied quality assurance and quality control techniques at each data level to achieve the highest quality data. There are approximately 400 High Frequency radars (HFRs) deployed globally and the presented techniques can provide a foundation for data quality checks and standardization of the data collected by the large number of systems operating today.

An operational ocean circulation prediction system for the western North Atlantic: Hindcasting during July–September of 2006

A real-time ocean prediction system for the western North Atlantic (WNA) has been implemented operationally for the Mid-Atlantic Regional Association Coastal Ocean Observing System (MARACOOS). Based on the physical circulation model component of the Harvard Ocean Prediction System (HOPS), this system is built to capture the mesoscale dynamics of the Gulf Stream (GS), its meanders and rings, and its interaction with the shelf circulation, the mid-Atlantic shelf (MAS), and the buoyancy-driven circulation in the Gulf of Maine (GOM). To accomplish this, the multiscale velocity-based feature models for the GS region are melded with the water-mass-based feature model for the GOM and with shelf climatology across the shelf-slope front for a multiscale synoptic initialization. A ring and front analysis is fed into the feature modeling scheme for generating a three-dimensional initial field. The initialization field is dynamically adjusted with wind-forcing and used in an Sea Surface Temperature (SST)-assimilative forecast mode. For this study, 8 weekly forecasts are compared with GS paths and drifter trajectories during the 2006 Shallow Water Experiment (SW06) conducted during the months of July and September. GS path and ring formation/absorption events were compared and presented by Taylor diagrams (TD). For all of 8 weeks, the forecast skills were comparable or higher than that of the persistence. The model shows reasonable skill in simulating drifter trajectories, especially over days 1–3 of simulation.