• Simonsen, Sebastian Bjerregaard
• Sørensen, Louise Sandberg
• Langley, Kirsty
• Forsberg, René
• Martinez, Bernat
• Gourmelen, Noel
• Shepherd, Andrew
• Helm, Veit
• Nienow, Peter
• Schrama, Ernst
• Csatho, Bea
• Baker, Steven
• Davidson, Malcolm

Abstract

The main objective of the ESA funded CryoVal-LI project has been to identify and quantify the error sources for the CryoSat-2 mission over land ice. This has been undertaken through the careful documentation of the possible error sources, the identification of suitable validation sites and the creation of a public database containing validation data for these areas from recent ground and airborne field campaigns.These sites also offer considerable potential as sites on which to focus future validation efforts.<br/>Through the utilization of these observational datasets, an extensive comparative analysis has been carried out in which Cryosat-2 data has been evaluated against airborne and in-situ data. A number of different Cryosat-2 data sets have been included in this analysis with the goal of testing the performance of different processing and retracking algorithms. A similar, but smaller validation analysis has also been carried out for ICESat data.<br/>Here, we present the results of these analyses and outline the conclusions reached. Based on the findings from the project, a set of recommendations for the design of future land-ice/satellite validation campaigns will be given.Furthermore, the outcome of the re-tracker inter-comparison will be used to advocate a set of optimal re-tracking algorithms for Cryosat-2 in the next generation of L2 products.

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