A Feasibility Demonstration Of Ocean Model Eddy Resolving Nowcast Forecast Skill Using Satellite Altimeter Data

A 1/16 deg Pacific Ocean model north of 20 deg S and a 1/4 deg global ocean model are used to assimilate satellite altimeter data and then to perform month-long forecasts initialized from the data assimilative states. The results constitute a feasibility demonstration of ocean model eddy-resolving nowcast/forecast skill using altimeter data. In particular they demonstrate: (1) that satellite altimetry is an effective observing system for mesoscale oceanic features, (2) that an ocean model with high enough resolution can be a skillful dynamical interpolator for satellite altimeter data in depicting mesoscale oceanic variability, and (3) that the high resolution ocean model can provide skillful forecasts of mesoscale variability for at least a month, when model assimilation of the altimeter data is used to define the initial state.