On the measurement of the dispersion relation by a radar and the implication on the current retrieval

The work analyses the error in current retrievals from images of marine radars. The study is based on simulations of waves interacting with a shear current. The measured dispersion is related to the underlying wavenumber-dependent effective current. The highest tested radar antenna (H=45 m) with vertical polarization performed the best. For that case the root mean square error was at most 0.05 m/s above the one for the simulated wave field without imaging mechanism. The observation time of 20 minutes was compared to shorter windows. Depending on the needed accuracy, the time may be reduced to five minutes, associated with an loss of accuracy below 12%. The study shows the error of the current reconstruction depends on the shape of the profile and varies considerably from realization to realizatio

The deconvolution as a method to deal with gaps in ocean wave measurements

This work introduces the deconvolution as a technique to reconstruct missing information in data. While the method was originally developed for ocean waves, it will be useful in a wider range of applications where gaps in data may alter the statistics or spikes have to be eliminated without removing extreme values. For the application to ocean waves, it is estimated that gaps as long as half of the peak period may be reconstructed well. It is possible to reconstruct data of longer gaps, however, in total the amount of missing points should be less than 50% of all points and the missing data should not be clustered

Extreme wave statistics of counter-propagating, irregular, long-crested sea states

Extreme wave statistics of unidirectional and counter-propagating seas are investigated, for the special case of long-crested irregular waves, with laboratory experiments and with numerical simulations using the higher order spectral method. Both the kurtosis of the surface elevation and the exceedance probability of the crest height are larger in unidirectional seas than in counter-propagating seas. Numerical simulations show that even a small amount of wave energy travelling against an essentially unidirectional wave system can significantly reduce the kurtosis of the surface elevation. This research was originally published in Physics of Fluids. © 2018 AIP Publishin

Consistency between sea surface reconstructions from nautical X-band radar Doppler and amplitude measurements

This study comprises the analysis and the interpretation of the coherent and the noncoherent parts of a coherent-on-receive microwave radar at grazing incidence conditions. The Doppler measurement is an extension of standard civil marine radar technology. While intensity images require interpretation based on understanding the underlying imaging mechanism, the Doppler signal measures the motion of an area of sea surface and is therefore closely related to the wave physics. Both the measured Doppler signal and the backscatter intensity signal are suitable for surface inversion and give almost identical surface elevations. A statistical comparison with a nearby buoy showed good correlation for the significant wave height and the peak period. By comparing the Doppler signal and the amplitude in the backscatter, the study amends the understanding of imaging mechanisms in marine radars at grazing incidence. This research was originally published in Journal of Atmospheric and Oceanic Technology. © 2018 American Meteorological Societ

Extreme Wave Statistics in Combined and Partitioned Windsea and Swell

Abstract We investigate how the extreme wave statistics of a combined windsea and swell appears to be different from the extreme wave statistics of the corresponding windsea and swell partitions. We consider the situation of following long-crested windsea and swell in laboratory experiments and in simulations using a high-order spectral method (HOSM). We also consider the situation of short-crested windsea and swell crossing at nearly right angle, corresponding to the sea state when the Prestige accident happened, in hindcast simulations combined with HOSM. For cases when the two wave systems do not interact much, the combined wave system appears to be more Gaussian than the corresponding partitioned wave systems, consistent with the central limit theorem. This result is found for kurtosis and exceedance probability of envelope and crest height