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Annual cycle in coastal sea level from tide gauges and altimetry
Sergey V. Vinogradov1 and Rui M. Ponte1
Received 28 August 2009; revised 17 November 2009; accepted 4 December 2009; published 24 April 2010.
[1] Tide gauges provide a unique data set extending many decades back in time, but
coverage is restricted to continental boundaries and a few oceanic islands and the extent
to which the tide gauge records can be used to infer lowfrequency, largescale sea level
behavior remains unclear. Since 1992, satellite altimetry provides nearglobal coverage
of sea level variability, including coastal regions. We compare variability at 345
continental and island tide gauge coastal locations and adjacent shallow and deep oceans,
as inferred from altimetry. Initial focus is on the dominant annual cycle. On average,
annual amplitudes in tide gauges are comparable to but larger than those in the nearby
shallow ocean (<200 m). Substantial differences are found in areas adjacent to strong river
outflows and narrow coastal currents. The annual cycle in shallow areas is usually
enhanced relative to the open ocean, apart from areas with strong western boundary
currents offshore. Differences of 12 months in annual phases for coastal, shallow, and
deep ocean are typical. Our analysis points to the presence of considerable spatial
variability in the annual cycle across deep, shallow, and coastal regions, and to the
importance of both tide gauge and altimeter measurements for proper resolution and
interpretation of such variability.
Citation: Vinogradov, S. V., and R. M. Ponte (2010), Annual cycle in coastal sea level from tide gauges and altimetry, J.
Geophys. Res., 115, C04021, doi:10.1029/2009JC005767.
1. Introduction
[2] Given its direct importance to coastal populations, sea
level variability has been observed and documented over
decadal and even centennial time scales at many coastal and
island locations [e.g., Douglas, 1992], generally associated
with major sea ports and shipping routes. These records
provide an opportunity to study the lowfrequency variability in sea level, including the prominent seasonal cycle,
an important climate signal representing a dominant fraction
of the nontidal total sea level variance. The factors contributing to the sea level variability include density changes
due to temperature (thermosteric) and salinity (halosteric)
variations of the water column, along with mass changes
due to oceanic mass redistribution and mass input from
precipitation, evaporation and river runoff. In contrast to the
deep ocean, mass changes in coastal regions become significant as compared to steric contributions [e.g., Ponte,
1999; Vinogradova et al., 2007]. Wind and wave setup,
windinduced upwelling/downwelling, complex bathymetry, forcing by rivers and atmospheric pressure, and other
factors can be important for nearshore ocean dynamics.
[3] Pattullo et al. [1955] first described the sea level
seasonal variability on the global scale using tide gauge
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dealiasing corrections, promise to deliver cleaner coastal altimeter products in the near future. Here we assess present
standard products, which can provide a baseline for analysis
of forthcoming improved coastal data sets.
[7] Mean annual amplitudes and phases were computed
for monthly averaged altimetric sea level time series at every
point along the track in a way similar to the tide gauges
annual fit. All suitable T/P alongtrack data were collected
in the proximity of every tide gauge (TG). The selected
spatial radius for this work was 134 km for every TG, a
somewhat optimal coverage to include enough nearby
altimetry tracks. The collected T/P data were split into
shallow and deep groups relative to the 200 m isobath, a
typical outer limit of the continental shelf (Figure 2). Along
track annual cycles within each T/P group were averaged as
a sum of sine waves to produce mean shallow and deep
annual cycles. As a result, annual cycle estimates of coastal
(either continental or island TG), shallow, and deep sea level
have been computed and collected in the vicinity of every
TG.
3. Analysis
[8] The scatter plots in Figures 36 show the amplitudes
and phases of the annual cycle in both TG and corresponding
shallow and deep T/P locations. The range associated with
each T/P value in Figures 36 denotes its respective standard
deviation and provides a measure of how spatially variable
the annual cycle is along track. The correlation coefficients
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Figure 3. Scatter plots of the mean annual sea level amplitudes in TG (x axis) versus average (a) shallow
and (b) deep ocean annual cycles in T/P (y axis). Range plotted for each T/P value represents 1 standard
deviation of the alongtrack T/P shallow and deep values and can be interpreted as a measure of the respective spatial variability of the annual cycle as observed by T/P. The 1:1 line is also plotted.
inferred from the amplitude and phase scatter plots are summarized in Table 1.
3.1. Annual Amplitudes
[9] Tide gauges annual amplitudes are comparable with
nearby shallow altimetry data with correlation coefficient
R = 0.85 (Figure 3a). The observed amplitudes generally
range from just a few mm to 0.2 m, with some TG signals
reaching 0.40.5 m. The mean T/P annual amplitudes do not
exceed 0.26 m. The standard deviation of the estimated
mean T/P values may reach 60 mm but is usually smaller
than 50 mm.
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Figure 4. Annual amplitudes in T/P observations over the shelf and nearby open ocean. Range bars are
plotted as in Figure 3, depicting spatial variability associated with shallow and deep T/P values.
the open ocean. Some TG stations in Singapore (the southernmost tip of Malaysia Peninsula) observe 140 mm amplitudes whereas nearby altimetry measures only 6070 mm
annual signal in Malacca/Singapore Strait. There is a noticeable latitudinal change of the difference between coastal
and continental shelf annual amplitudes along the US East
Coast, associated with Gulf Stream moving further offshore;
TG amplitudes exceed nearby shallow T/P annual signal in
most TG stations in Florida, but this difference reverses
starting from Fort Pulaski, GA, and northward. Other areas
where offshore sea level has noticeably larger annual amplitudes relative to TG records are found at some stations in the
Gulf of Mexico, where persistent coastal jets separate relatively stable nearshore environments from the significant
mesoscale seasonal variability.
[11] Most island TG stations are located in the open
ocean, and they do not have a shallow T/P counterpart for
this analysis, because the ocean in proximity is mostly
deeper than 200 m. Those island locations that have shallow
T/P data in their vicinity are plotted as blue dots in
Figure 3a. Annual amplitudes do not exceed 150 mm. With
a few exceptions, shallow T/P annual mean amplitudes near
island TG stations have standard deviations smaller than
those near most continental TG; however the statistics for
the former are less significant due to a smaller number of
alongtrack points that constitute the shallow T/P groups
near island TG.
[12] Comparison of TG amplitudes with T/P data degrades
with increase in depth (R = 0.53). As expected, continental
TG have much smaller correlation (0.36) with deep than with
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Table 1. Correlations in Annual Amplitudes and Phases Between Tide Gauges and Nearby Altimetry
Shallow T/P Versus TG
TG
No.
Amplitudes
Phases
No.
Amplitudes
Phases
No.
Amplitudes
Phases
Continental
Island
All
152
42
194
0.84
0.82
0.85
0.92
0.94
0.92
114
113
227
0.36
0.79
0.53
0.88
0.93
0.91
89
41
130
0.58
0.85
0.64
0.90
0.97
0.92
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Figure 7. California, Oregon, and Washington coast: (a) annual amplitudes (mm) and (b) time of annual
maximum in TG and T/P. Isobaths shown are 200 m (gray curve) and 1000 m (black curve).
improve corrections and dealiasing models and techniques
promises to deliver in the near future better altimetric estimates in the nearcoastal waters.
[22] Taking the uncertainty in the mean annual cycle
estimates from TG and altimeter data to be 12 cm, much
of the differences seen in Figures 36 are hard to explain
simply in terms of data noise and represent to some degree
the true spatial variability of the annual cycle in the coastal
ocean. We notice also that, in most of the areas studied, the
standard deviation of T/P mean amplitudes exceeds 23 cm.
Thus, the spatial variability sensed by the altimeter instru-
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References
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