IMPROVING WIND FORCING WITH SCATTEROMETER OBSERVATIONS FOR OPERATIONAL STORM SURGE FORECASTING IN THE ADRIATIC SEA

The Adriatic Sea is among the regional seas of the Mediterranean basin experiencing the highest tidal excursions, particularly in its northern side, the Gulf of Venice, where storm surge predictions are therefore of great importance. Unfortunately, sea surface wind forecasts in the Adriatic Sea are known to be underestimated. A numerical method aiming at reducing the bias between scatterometer wind observations and atmospheric model winds, has been developed. The method is called "wind bias mitigation" and uses the scatterometer observations to reduce the bias between scatterometer observations and the modeled sea surface wind, in this case that supplied by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) global atmospheric model.