CoAuthors

Tao Qin (University of Stuttgart, Institute of Geodesy, Germany); Angelica Tarpanelli (Hydrology Research Group @ CNR IRPI, Perugia, Italy); Luca Brocca (Hydrology Research Group @ CNR IRPI, Perugia, Italy); Tommaso Moramarco (Hydrology Research Group @ CNR IRPI, Perugia, Italy); Nico Sneeuw (University of Stuttgart, Institute of Geodesy, Germany)

Being a profiling method, satellite altimetry has a relatively poor spatial sampling that corresponds to the ground-track pattern, wherever it crosses hydrological objects (so-called virtual stations). The time resolution at the virtual stations is dictated by the repeat period of the satellite orbit, which is typically 10 days (TOPEX- and Jason-series) or 35 days (ERS- and Envisat-series, Altika). In this study we deal with the limitations of temporal and spatial resolution of satellite altimetry over Po River in Italy. Here, we follow a geodetic approach, by which all virtual stations of several satellite altimeters over Po River are connected hydraulically and statistically to each other and also to all available gauge stations. This specifically helps to improve the temporal resolution of altimetric water level time series. Moreover, our geodetic approach allows us to derive water level time series for a given location along the river between corresponding virtual stations. We validate our method against the extensive available in situ data sets over the Po River.