C028-0001
Sea ice retrieval algorithm updates for CryoSat-2 and ICESat-2 show better reconciling of the Arctic sea ice thickness and volume time series

Thursday, 10 December 2020
Poster
Nathan T Kurtz1, Marco Bagnardi2, Steven Fons1, Ron Kwok3, Alek Petty4 and Rachel Tilling1, (1)NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (2)Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, United States, (3)Applied Physics Laboratory University of Washington, Polar Science Center, Seattle, United States, (4)Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, COLLEGE PARK, MD, United States
Abstract:
NASA’s ICESat-2 laser altimeter mission launched in September 2018 providing a new data source of sea ice freeboard measurements across the Arctic. ESA’s CryoSat-2 mission launched in 2010 and has provided a near-continuous source of radar altimetry measurements. We analyze the period of overlap between the two satellites from October 2018 to April 2019 and combine both data sets with snow depth and density from the NASA Eulerian Snow on Sea Ice (NESOSIM) model to retrieve sea ice thickness. We demonstrate how improvements to the freeboard retrieval methods from both satellites allow for consistent agreement between the monthly mean sea ice thickness values to within 0.2 m. For ICESat-2, improvements discussed include more accurate lead classification in the rel003 ICESat-2 freeboard products. For CryoSat-2, we discuss the need to account for range gating in the retrieval of sea surface height as well as the treatment of snow depth and a lognormal surface roughness distribution within the NASA GSFC waveform fitting retrieval method.
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