Reprint 904 Atmospheric Phenomena Observed over the South China Sea by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar Onboard the Envisat Satellite

Atmospheric phenomena often leave fingerprints on the sea surface, which are detectable by synthetic aperture radar (SAR). Here we present some representative examples of SAR images acquired by the Advanced Synthetic Aperture Radar (ASAR) onboard the Envisat satellite over the South China Sea (SCS) which show radar signatures of atmospheric gravity waves (AGWs) and of coastal wind fields. On SAR images of the SCS also often radar signatures of oceanic internal waves (OIWs) are visible which have similar spatial scales as the ones originating from AGWs. Therefore we first present criteria how to distinguish between them by analyzing the structure of the radar signatures. Then we present two examples of ASAR images which show radar signatures of AGWs over the SCS. Furthermore, we present a SAR image showing radar signatures of a northerly Winter Monsoon surge event over the coastal area south of Hong Kong and compare it with a cloud image and a weather radar image. From the ASAR image we retrieve the near-surface wind field and compare it with the wind field simulated by the AIR model of the Hong Kong Observatory. The comparison shows that the AIR model can simulate quite well the wind speed as well as the position and shape of the frontal line measured by ASAR.