Updates on CYGNSS Ocean Surface Wind Validation in the Tropics

Abstract

Global Navigation Satellite System Reflectometry (GNSS-R)-based wind retrieval techniques use the global positioning system (GPS) signals scattered from the ocean surface in the forward direction, and can potentially work in all weather conditions. An overview of recent progress made in the Cyclone Global Navigation Satellite System (CYGNSS) level-2 surface wind products is given. To this end, four publicly released CYGNSS surface wind products—Science Data Record (SDR) v2.1, SDR v3.0, Climate Data Record (CDR) v1.1, and science wind speed product NOAA v1.1—are validated quantitatively against high-quality data from tropical buoy arrays. The latest released CYGNSS wind products (e.g., CDR v1.1, SDR v3.0, NOAA v1.1), as compared with these tropical buoy data, significantly outperform the SDR v2.1. Moreover, the uncertainty among these products is found to be less than 2 m s