Impact of seawinds scatterometer data on ocean surface analysis and weather prediction

Scatterometer observations of the ocean surface wind speed and direction improve the depiction and prediction of storms at sea. These data are especially valuable where observations are otherwise sparse-mostly in the Southern Hemisphere and tropics, but also on occasion in the North Atlantic and North Pacific. The Sea Winds scatterometer on the QuikScat satellite was launched in June 1999 and it represents a dramatic departure in design from the other scatterometer instruments launched during the past decade (ERS-1,2 and NSCAT). This paper will be limited to results from the SeaWinds scatterometer on Quikscat. This presentation shows the influence of QuikScat data in data assimilation systems both from the NASA Data Assimilation Office (GEOS-3) and from NCEP (GDAS). The strategy for assessing the impact of SeaWinds in NWP was largely described and parallels the approach used for the geophysical validation of NSCAT data.