Validation of gridded data set of global surface wind/wind-stress vector field

Abstract

Gridded data of global surface wind/wind-stress vectors, called J-OFURO v2, were obtained from satellite scatterometer (QuikSCAT/SeaWinds) data for the decade from August 1999 to July 2009. The data were validated by comparing with (1) in situ measurements from moored buoy observations, (2) a data product from the same scatterometer using a different gridding procedure (IFREMER), and (3) data products based on numerical models (NCEP-1 and NCEP-2). The results on averaging all buoy data revealed lower mean differences, lower root-mean-square (RMS) differences, and higher correlations for the wind/wind-stress components for the J-OFURO v2 product than the other data products. The statistical values calculated for each buoy station showed tendencies of decreasing reliability with increasing latitude in the mid-latitude region, while the reliabilities in the equatorial areas were low. We performed intercomparisons between the J-OFURO v2 data and the other data sets to clarify discrepancies among different wind products in open ocean regions with few moored buoys. We determined that the meridional wind components from the NCEP products exhibited poleward deviations compared to data from the J-OFURO v2 product. Relatively high mean differences, high RMS differences, and low correlations were found in the equatorial ocean for the NCEP products. Striped features were spatially correlated with buoy locations in the equatorial Pacific, which suggested that the reliability of the NCEP products was governed by buoy locations in this region.