• The Sea:JOURNAL OF THE KOREAN SOCIETY OF OCEANOGRAPHY
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• v.5 no.4
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• pp.267-275
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• 2000

In an effort to assess the reliability of satellite altimeter system, we conducted a comparative analysis of sea level data that were collected using the TOPEX/POSEIDON (T/P) altimeter and the 10 tide gauge (TG) stations in the satellite passing track. The analysis was made using data sets collected from marginal sea regions surrounding the Korean Peninsula at T/P cycles of 2 to 230, which correspond to October 1992 to December 1998. Because of strong tidal activity in the study area, treatment of tidal errors is a very critical step in data processing. Hence in the computation of dynamic heights from the Tn data, we adapted the procedures of Park and Gamberoni (1995) to reduce errors associated with it. When these T/P data were treated, the alias periods of M$_2$, S$_2$, and K$_1$ constitutions were found at 62.1, 58.7, and 173 days. The compatibility of the T/P and TG data sets were examined at various filtering periods. The results indicate that the low-frequency signal of Tn data can be interpreted more safely with longer filtering periods (such as up to the maximum selected values of 200 days). When RMS errors for 200-day low-pass filter period was compared among the whole 10 tidal stations, the values spanned in the range of 2.8 to 6.7 cm. The results of correlation analysis at this filtering period also showed a strong agreement between the Tn and TG data sets over the whole stations investigated (e.g., P values consistently less than 0.0001). According to our analysis, we conclude that the analysis of surface sea level using satellite altimeter data can be made safely and reasonably long filtering periods such as 200 days.