COASTAL WIND-FIELD RETRIEVALS FROM ERS SYNTHETIC-APERTURE RADAR IMAGES

A unique series of European Remote Sensing Satellite (ERS) 1 and 2 C b and synthetic aperture radar (SAR) images was obtained off the souther n coast of Norway during the Coast Watch'95 experiment in September 19 95. In this paper we carry out a systematic analysis of the mesoscale coastal wind field conditions expressed in the SAR images. Four differ ent categories of phenomena including windrows, fetch-limited seas, wi nd fronts, and oceanographic fronts are examined and discussed. The qu antitative retrievals of the wind field are based on examination of bo th the SAR image backscatter characteristics and the spectral properti es. Results are compared and validated against coincident ship and buo y data, providing complementary and independent observations of the oc eanographic and meteorological conditions.