Error propagation for the Molodensky G 1 term

Abstract

Molodensky G terms are used in the computation of the quasigeoid. We derive error propagation formulas that take into account uncertainties in both the free air gravity anomaly and a digital elevation model. These are applied to generate G1 terms and their errors on a 1″ × 1″ grid over Australia. We use these to produce Molodensky gravity anomaly and accompanying uncertainty grids. These uncertainties have average value of 2 mGal with maximum of 54 mGal. We further calculate a gravimetric quasigeoid model by the remove–compute–restore technique. These Molodensky gravity anomaly uncertainties lead to quasigeoid uncertainties with a mean of 4 mm and maximum of 80 mm when propagated through a deterministically modified Stokes’s integral over an integration cap radius of 0.5°.