Satellite derived Sea Surface Temperature Variability in the Taiwan Strait

• Main Authors: Yeh Ching Dong, 葉景棟
• Other Authors: 李明安
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/74123626355588236079

碩士 === 國立海洋大學 === 漁業科學系碩士在職專班 === 91 === With an increasing availability of satellite sea surface temperature (SST) and ocean color data, it has become possible to improve greatly from the very limited spatial data offered by ship observation. Empirical orthogonal function (EOF) analysis was used to study a time-series of the advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) imageries from the waters of Taiwan Strait to examine the temporal and spatial characteristics and to determine the dominant pattern of sea surface temperature (SST) variability for 72 months from January 1996 to December 2001. The temporal monthly variance was ranged from 16.5 (February 1996) to 29.7 (August 2001) in this period. The spatial variance was consistent with a quasi-permanent front at the Chang-Yuen Ridge in winter and associated with strong temperature contrast to the Kuroshio branch or the South China Sea Warm Current. It also displayed a cool water plume extending from the Peng-Hu Islands to Taiwan Banks in summer. The EOF patterns and the eigenvalues in time and space were similar to each other. The dominant EOF mode, which resembled the mean of all images, showed a crescentic-shaped front near the Chang-Yuen Ridge where a cool tongue extending from China Coastal Waters was distinguishable from the warm current. The second mode revealed that the South China Sea Warm Current and the Taiwan Warm Current were over the Peng-Hu Channel following the 60- to 100-m isobaths. These two spatial modes accounted for 69.51% and 8.78% of the SST variance, respectively. From these images, we also discussed the characteristics of the SST variance in relation to the environments in winter.