MODIS SST product

[febryanto25]

MODIS Aqua provides night and daytime SST products then if we want to take daily SST, which product should we select? night or daytime? or can we just consider an average of night and daytime SST products as the daily SST?

Looking forward to any possible answer.

[edward.m.armstrong]

Hello:

The easiest answer answer is that you can average the daytime and nighttime MODIS observations to get more complete coverage. Mask with at least a QL>=4 (QL 4 and 5 are the best data).

However you must balance that approach with the fact that you may be introducing daytime diurnal SST warming into average if the wind speed is so low that the upper water column is not well mixed but heavily stratified. So if that is a concern its better to just use nighttime skin-SST temperature.

Hope this answer helps.

Ed Armstrong
PO.DAAC Data Engineer

[febryanto25]

Thank you for your answer. Following your answer, MODIS Aqua SST products have 'qual_flag' within it. This parameter is used for what? How to use it?