An Adaptability for Arctic Sea Ice Drift Retrieval from Spaceborne SAR Data

Abstract

As an increasing trend of sea ice drift in the Arctic, the interaction between sea ice drift and ocean dynamics is drawing great attentions. To support polar navigations and scientific researches, we applied an efficient algorithm, a combination of feature tracking and pattern matching, to retrieve sea ice drift by spaceborne SAR data. For N on-Marginal Ice Zone, the 24-hour interval SAR scenes result in a satisfactory accuracy, with the relative error fielding 4.45%. In Marginal Ice Zone, although it is achievable to a 50-mintue interval by the twin SAR, the relative error reaches 10.9%. Such a different adaptability suggests the demonstrations for various temporal and spatial scales of sea ice drift, especially the short temporal scale, which is a tremendous challenge for both SAR observation missions and sea ice dynamics.