MERCATOR OCEAN JOURNA: 
SEPTEMBER 2021 
1.1.5 Contribution to OSR and OMI atlas 
Since the first OSR (2016), In Situ TAC has contributed alone 
and in collaboration with MFCs and other TACs to several 
sections. This includes the study and better understanding of 
ocean circulation variability (e.g., north-Atlantic cold-fresh 
5lob anomaly, deep convection, mesoscale activity, circulation 
anomaly) and its impacts on the marine ecosystem variability. 
Another section of the report was dedicated to climate change 
‚mpacts (e.g., cyclones, extreme waves, decreasing oxygen, 
water mass changes) on marine ecosystem and ocean 
circulation to which In Situ TAC contributed too. A specific 
section proposed developed and implemented operational 
applications and services (e.g., pollution risk, marine 
emergency and search-and-rescue, storm forecasts and 
alerts) where in situ data were used as well. Finally, In Situ 
TAC has participated in the CMEMS Ocean Monitoring 
Indicators reporting and on-line atlas. This catalogue gathers 
scientific indicators of ocean health and climate change (e.g., 
temperature, salinity, ocean heat content, water mass and 
heat exchanges), regularly updated to provide operational 
support for stakeholders and public information. 
1.2 Main improvement in the product catalogue 
1.2.1 Temperature and Salinity 
The strategy of the In Situ TAC concerning temperature and 
salinity datasets is built on three complementary axes. First, 
afforts have been made to improve products quality. New 
validation methods performed through scientific assessment 
nave been developed and applied on the REP CORA product 
‘global reprocessing T&S product). When such methods had 
proven their efficiency on the delayed time mode dataset, they 
were deployed on the NRT one (e.g., the minmax method first 
deployed in the delayed time mode dataset in 2017 and then 
successfully deployed in the NRT dataset in 2019, see 
Gourrion et al., 2020 and Szekely et al., 2020). Since the project 
started, an internal NRT product and an internal REP product 
dedicated to assimilation into ocean models have been 
delivered for which additional validation tests and sub- 
sampling of raw datasets were performed. Other validation 
tests are also exploited to alert the In Situ TAC Production Unit 
about any anomalies detected. 
Then, the focus has been to enhance the spatial and temporal 
coverage of the REP CORA product, with additional data from 
‘he EN4 British MetOffice dataset (period covered: 1950- 
1990) and to enhance assessment procedures. For poorly 
sampled areas, additional data have been integrated such 
as Arctic profiles from the UDASH Arctic and Subaretic 
database (1980-2015) and the ship-based data instruments 
extracted from the EMODnet-Chemistry data and the World 
Ocean Database collections (2020-2021). Moreover, since 
2019. EasvCORA, an extraction of CORA with only the best 
Juality measurements with a vertical and tempora 
subsetting, has also been provided more specifically to the 
9cean reanalysis community. 
Finally, 3D gridded (easy to use for some user communities) 
temperature and salinity products using objective analysis 
methods were developed, both in real time and delayed 
time modes. The development enables the extension of 
timeseries of the REP product with the most recent months 
of the NRT one, a design adopted specifically to facilitate 
the production of OMIs-based in situ gridded products. 
1.2.2 Current 
Since 2015, a real effort has been made by In Situ TAC to: 
make oceanic currents (UV) datasets more visible in 
the Copernicus catalogue, 
- increase the types and number of observations 
delivered. 
Outputs from the INCREASE project (CMEMS Service 
Evolution 2016-2018) paved the way for the integration of 
High Frequency Radar (HFR}) datasets. Moreover, a 
zollaboration with the C-RAID (Copernicus Reprocessing and 
Access Improvement for Drifter data) European Environment 
Agency (EEA) initiative has also been led on the period 2019- 
2022. Its objective is to clean-up the entire data archive from 
the past deployed buoys and to reprocess Argos data and 
positions, focusing on “SVP” (surface) type buoys. Products 
have finally been archived on the Global Data Assembly 
Center (GDAC) and distributed in Copernicus Marine Service. 
The evolution of the UV product from 2015 to 2021 in the 
Copernicus Marine Service catalogue can be summed up as: 
-in the REP product, users access to surface (when 
drogue lost) and 15-m depth (when drogue on) drifters 
velocities (SVP drifters data collected). The quality control 
and distribution have been ensured by the AOML Data 
Assembly Centre (DAC) with, in addition, a wind-slippage 
correction calculated by the In Situ TAC (CLS, Rio 2012). 
Users also access to HFR total and radial velocities and 
VM-ADCP (Vessel Mounted Acoustic Doppler Current 
Profiler) velocities. HFRs provide surface velocities within 
an integration depth ranging from tens of centimetres to 
1-2 meters depending on the operating central frequency. 
Ihe ADCP data consist of three-dimensional water 
current velocities over a depth range along a vesse 
underway trajectory. This has been a great enhancement 
asthe initial REP dataset contained only current velocities 
measured on research vessels, 
-In the NRT product, users access to raw drifter velocities 
at 15-m depth that are pre-processed by the Marine 
meteorological Centre of Meteo-France (CMM), 3-day 
filtered drifters velocities, HFR total and radial velocities 
and velocities from Argo floats. More than 15,000 Argo 
floats are distributed by the GDAC, which allow calculating 
deep ocean current from floats drift at parking depth and 
surface current from float surface drift.