SWOT L2 LR SSH: Unsmoothed Sea Surface Height

SWOT launched December 16, 2022 to measure global ocean topography using Ka-band radar interferometry. This Level 2 product provides sea surface height, anomaly, wind speed, and wave height on a 250x250 meter 'native' grid with minimal smoothing. Data is distributed as one netCDF-4 file per satellite pass, covering a swath 10-60km wide on each side of the nadir track.

Use Cases

• Monitoring sea level anomalies based on the sea surface height anomaly variable.
• Analyzing ocean wave energy and coastal impacts based on significant wave height measurements.
• Studying wind-driven ocean processes based on the included wind speed parameter.
• Mapping fine-scale ocean surface topography based on the 250-meter resolution unsmoothed grid.

Strengths

• Provides high-resolution (250x250 meter) sea surface height data with minimal smoothing.
• Contains multiple related oceanographic parameters (height, anomaly, wind speed, wave height) in a single file.
• Data collection spans a defined mission science phase from August 2023 through 2025.

Limitations

• Column names are unknown across all platform entries, limiting precise variable identification.
• Dataset size and row counts are not provided, obscuring the data volume.
• License information is inconsistently reported, with some sources stating 'other-license-specified' and others 'None'.

Provenance

Source

Surface Water Oceanography Topography (SWOT) mission, likely processed by NASA/JPL PO.DAAC.

Collection Method

Derived from low rate (LR) measurements from the Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn) on the SWOT satellite.

Time Range

Calibration phase from launch (Dec 2022) to July 2023; science phase from August 2023 through 2025.

Freshness

2026-04-09 21:52:33.004295

Geography

Global coverage from satellite orbit.