CoAuthors

Antoine Soloy (jet propulsion laboratory, USA); Frédéric Frappart (Observatoire Midi Pyrénées, France); Imen Turki (Morphodynamique Continentale et Côtière (M2C), France); Benoit Laignel (Morphodynamique Continentale et Côtière (M2C), France)

Coastal systems are highly dynamic environments affected by large variations in water levels. The complex variability of coastal hydrodynamic is due to the interaction between different physical processes like tides, waves, storm surges, sea level rise, and streamflows. Despite the limitations of satellite altimetry near the coasts due to land contamination in the footprint, recent improvements in processing techniques extended the capabilities of altimeters in coastal areas. Furthermore, a new high-resolution wide-swath altimetry mission (Surface Water and Ocean Topography - SWOT) envisaged for 2021 will enable better coastal observations. This study investigates the efficiency of different satellite altimetry missions (e.g., ENVISAT, SARAL, Jason-2, etc.) to reproduce the coastal hydrodynamic variability (water levels) in different tidal contexts (i.e., micro-, meso, and macro-tidal; Gironde, Seine, Mississippi, Saint Lawrence, San Francisco, and the Chesapeake Bay)). A focus is made on the impact of satellite orbit (i.e., revisit time) on reproducing this temporal variability. Water levels variations obtained by conventional altimeters are then compared to SWOT synthetic data (obtained by sampling measurements based on the mission orbit specifications and in-situ observations) in order to estimate the potential of SWOT to reproduce water levels variability in coastal areas.