6 December 2023: GHRSST Talk with Marisol Garcia-Reyes on MISST3: continuing the GHRSST partnership and improving Arctic data

The third and current phase of the Multi-sensor Improved Sea Surface Temperature project (MISST3) has two main objectives: i) continuing the partnership and participation in GHRSST, and ii)  improvement of satellite-derived SST data in the Arctic through comparison with in situ data. The MISST3 project builds upon previous phases that were part of the GHRSST since its inception, and since then, the MISST group has actively participated in providing standardized SST data that can be easily accessed and used in weather and climate applications. Previous work undertaken by MISST had a goal to understand biases in SST in “challenging areas.”  This phase focuses on the Arctic Ocean and the Marginal Ice Zones. We conducted three field campaigns to collect in situ data during summer months using uncrewed, robotic vehicles called Saildrones, which collect data in the atmospheric boundary layer, at the air-sea interface and in the uppermost 2 m of the sea. These campaigns have provided a valuable data set to validate and understand biases in SST satellite retrievals at high latitudes, and in particular near ice-covered areas. Subsurface thermistors on the Saildrones have revealed large amplitude and sometimes persistent diurnal heating, and the radiometers used in the 2019 cruises have quantified the behavior of the thermal skin layer.  With the project entering its last year, we will provide a summary of past and current activities, and of our key results.