These two disks (sat_mwf1 and sat_mwf2 folders on the WOCE DVD) contain sea-surface winds measured by four satellite microwave scatterometers (AMI-WInd onboard ERS-1 and ERS-2, NSCAT onboard ADEOS-1 and SeaWinds onboard QuikSCAT), objectively analyzed into weekly and monthly fields, as well as monthly 9-year climatological averages. Data from all satellites were processed with the same objective mapping parameters.

The following fields are provided: wind speed and components, wind stress and components, wind velocity divergence and wind stress curl, and their respective mapping errors, analyzed on global 0.5 degree resolution -SeaWinds- and 1 degree resolution -AMI-Wind, NSCAT- grids. When two satellites are operational simultaneously, separate gridded fields are provided for each satellite to allow comparisons to be made. All fields are provided in WOCE Version 3.0 NetCDF format. Quicklook pictures of each grid can also be browsed.

The Woce period runs from Jan 01 1990 to Dec 31 1998, but this product contains more recent data, provided as additionnal data.

These disks are a product of the WOCE Data Assembly Center (DAC) for satellite winds. The data are maintained by the CERSAT (french ERS processing and archiving center), at the IFREMER (French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea). A short overview of CERSAT activities is available on this disk. Morover, more recent wind and ocean related data, as well as further information on its ocean remote sensing activities can be obtained from CERSAT through its web site at http://www.ifremer.fr/cersat

The mean wind fields are provided as netCDF files, compressed with zip. Each file contains all the wind-related parameter fields computed from the raw data of a given scatterometer on a given period, a week or a month depending on the time resolution (or averaging period).

The product comes with some general issues regarding the data :

• An overview section, providing a brief introduction to the satellite gridded mean wind fields, some details about the content of these disks, the improvements since last version (v2.0), a short overview of CERSAT activities and a credits/conditions section.
• A data section, including an inventory of the provided dataset, a browser section to visualize quicklook pictures of all fields, and a discussion on how to retrieve new data and update this dataset.
• A help section, providing on-line description of the data format, a netCDF tutorial if you are not familiar with this fomat, access to the user manuals, and useful links for more information.

We would like to hear from you! If you have any comments or questions about this CDROM, please let us know.

This CD-ROM should be referenced as "WOCE Data Products Committee. 2002.  WOCE Global Data, Version 3.0, WOCE International Project Office, WOCE Report No. 180/02, Southampton, UK.

If you are interested in other WOCE datasets you will find summaries and information on the Data Information Unit disk within this DVD.