QuikSCAT Level 2B Ocean Wind Vectors in 12.5km Slice Composites Version 4.0

QuikSCAT Level 2B Ocean Wind Vectors in 12.5km Slice Composites Version 4.0
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DOI10.5067/QSX12-L2B40
Short NameQSCAT_LEVEL_2B_OWV_COMP_12_KUSST_LCRES_4.0
DescriptionThis dataset contains the latest reprocessed version 4.0 of the Level 2B science-quality ocean surface wind vector retrievals from the QuikSCAT scatterometer. The retrievals are provided on a non-uniform grid within the swath at 12.5 km pixel resolution. Higher resolution is achieved through a slice composite technique in which high resolution slice measurements from L1B data are composited into a 12.5 km wind vector cell. Each L2B file corresponds to a specific orbital revolution (rev) number, which begins at the southernmost point of the ascending orbit. This is an official dataset produced by the NASA QuikSCAT Project through the SeaWinds Processing and Analysis Center (SeaPAC). Version 4.0 processing begins with the same L1B (time-ordered backscatter) data as used in the previous Version 3.1 processing. The new version has three important improvements over the previous version 3.1. First, a sea-surface temperature (SST) dependent geophysical model function (GMF) developed by Lucrezia Ricciardulli of Remote Sensing Systems is used in wind retrieval in order to fix persistent speed biases in Ku-band data over cold ocean. Second, near coastal winds are retrieved using the Land Contamination Ratio with Expected Sigma-0 (LCRES) technique which retrieves winds significantly closer to the coast than has been done before. Third, flagging is simplified and extra flags are provided. All of the legacy quality flags are preserved with the same meaning. A new single bit wind_retrieval_likely_corrupted_flag is established for conditions in which approximately 3% (or greater) of the data comprising a wind vector cell (WVC) exhibits suboptimal performance due to rain, ice, or a few other rare anomalous cases. Another bit wind_retrieval_possibly_corrupted_flag is established for conditions in which approximately 15% of the data comprising a WVC near rain, ice, or a coastal boundary is thought to be high quality but may not match up well with numerical wind models due to either remaining rain/ice/land contamination or variability in the winds near ice, rain, and coasts that are not reflected in the numerical weather prediction (NWP) matchups. In addition to these two new bits, copious quality information is provided in the flags and eflags variables to allow users to tailor flags to meet their own needs. New and legacy flag bits are described in more detail in the user guide.
Version4.0
Dataset TypeOPEN
MeasurementOCEANS > OCEAN WINDS > SURFACE WINDS > Ocean Surface Wind Vectors
Processing Level2
CoverageRegion: Global
Northernmost Latitude: 90 degrees
Southernmost Latitude: -90 degrees
Westernmost Longitude: 0 degrees
Easternmost Longitude: 360 degrees
Time Span: 1999-Oct-27 to 2009-Nov-22
ResolutionSpatial Resolution: 12.5 km (Along) x 12.5 km (Across)
ProjectionType: Swath
Detail: Along-track Grid
Ellipsoid: WGS 84
Latency hours
Swath Width1800000 m
Sample Frequency-
Temporal Repeat (Nominal)12 Hour
Temporal Repeat (Min)1.7 Hour
Temporal Repeat (Max)4 Day
Platform/Sensor
QUIKSCAT
Platform
Name: QUIKSCAT (QUIKSCAT)
Orbit Period: 100.93 minutes
Inclination Angle: 98.6 degrees
Ascending Node: 1999-Jul-19 06:04:49
/
SEAWINDS
SENSOR
Name: SeaWinds Scatterometer (SEAWINDS)
Swath Width: 1800 km
Description: SeaWinds is a Ku-band (13.4 GHz) Scatterometer which features a single circular scanning dish antenna to provide pencil-beam measurements, as opposed to the common fan beam design as seen with other spaceborne scatterometers. The pencil-beam design has several key advantages over the more common fan beam design: higher signal-to-noise ratio, smaller size, and superior coverage. The SeaWinds single antenna utilizes twin offset feeds, thus providing two pencil-beam footprint paths with an elliptical sampling footprint of approximately 25 km (in azimuth) by 37 km (in look/range direction); these pencil beams have opposing polarizations (i.e., vertical and horizontal), thus achieving dual-polarization. The SeaWinds instrument provides a full 1800 km-wide swath coverage (including the nadir region), which allows for a nominal daily measurement coverage of 90% over the ice-free oceans.

ProjectQuick Scatterometer (QUIKSCAT)
Data ProviderCreator: SeaPAC
Release Place: PO.DAAC
Release Date: 2018-Mar-29
Resource: https://podaac-tools.jpl.nasa.gov/drive/files/allData/quikscat/L2B12/docs/
Keyword(s)wind data, wind, ocean wind, wind speed, vector, vectors, ocean wind vector, ocean wind vectors, seawinds, quikscat, scatterometer, l2b, version 4.0, v4.0, level 2, level 2b, version 4, v4
Persistent IDPODAAC-QSX12-L2B40
Questions related to this dataset? Contact podaac@podaac.jpl.nasa.gov
User's Guide
QuikSCAT L2B User Guidehttps://podaac-tools.jpl.nasa.gov/drive/files/allData/quikscat/L2B12/docs/qscat_l2b_user_guide_v4.pdf
Dataset User Guide
Project Materials
QuikSCAT Mission Pagehttp://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/QuikSCAT
Historical Overview of the QuikSCAT Mission
Known Issues
QuikSCAT Known Problems and Issueshttp://podaac.jpl.nasa.gov/OceanWind/QuikSCAT/SeaWinds-QuikSCAT_KnownProblems
Web Page Consisting of Known Problems, Issues, and Data Gaps
Citation SeaPAC. 2018. QuikSCAT Level 2B Ocean Wind Vectors in 12.5km Slice Composites Version 4.0. Ver. 4.0. PO.DAAC, CA, USA. Dataset accessed [YYYY-MM-DD] at https://doi.org/10.5067/QSX12-L2B40.

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