Wind Wave Model - Reanalyses

Reanalyses

A retrospective analysis, or reanalysis, combines all available observations with a physical model to describe the state of a system over a time period of decades. Wind waves are a part of both the NCEP Reanalysis and the ERA-40 from the ECMWF. Such resources permit the creation of monthly wave climatologies, and can track the variation of wave activity on interannual and multi-decadal time scales. During the northern hemisphere winter, the most intense wave activity is located in the central North Pacific south of the Aleutians, and in the central North Atlantic south of Iceland. During the southern hemisphere winter, intense wave activity circumscribes the pole at around 50°S, with 5 m significant wave heights typical in the southern Indian Ocean.