Evolution of errors in the altimetric bathymetry model used by Google Earth and GEBCO |
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Authors: | K M Marks W H F Smith D T Sandwell |
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Institution: | (1) NOAA Laboratory for Satellite Altimetry, Silver Spring, MD 20910, USA;(2) Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, CA 92093, USA |
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Abstract: | We analyze errors in the global bathymetry models of Smith and Sandwell that combine satellite altimetry with acoustic soundings
and shorelines to estimate depths. Versions of these models have been incorporated into Google Earth and the General Bathymetric
Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO). We use Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology (JAMSTEC) multibeam surveys not previously
incorporated into the models as “ground truth” to compare against model versions 7.2 through 12.1, defining vertical differences
as “errors.” Overall error statistics improve over time: 50th percentile errors declined from 57 to 55 to 49 m, and 90th percentile
errors declined from 257 to 235 to 219 m, in versions 8.2, 11.1 and 12.1. This improvement is partly due to an increasing
number of soundings incorporated into successive models, and partly to improvements in the satellite gravity model. Inspection
of specific sites reveals that changes in the algorithms used to interpolate across survey gaps with altimetry have affected
some errors. Versions 9.1 through 11.1 show a bias in the scaling from gravity in milliGals to topography in meters that affected
the 15–160 km wavelength band. Regionally averaged (>160 km wavelength) depths have accumulated error over successive versions
9 through 11. These problems have been mitigated in version 12.1, which shows no systematic variation of errors with depth.
Even so, version 12.1 is in some respects not as good as version 8.2, which employed a different algorithm. |
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