Assessing Shelf Sea Tides in Global HYCOM

Tides in global HYCOM have been assessed and validated in the global ocean but this assessment has concentrated mostly on deeper waters and not on the performance of the tides in shelf seas. Accurate reproduction of shelf tides requires both accurate tides at the shelf edge and a good representation of complex shallow water tidal processes, including topography, influencing the propagation and superposition of tidal waves within the shallow shelf seas. We provide a first order assessment of shelf sea tides in global HYCOM by comparing sea surface tidal heights in shelf seas on a global scale to the accurate altimeter-constrained model TPXO and a regional model (NEMO) of the North-West European shelf. We also compare the sea surface temperatures and the position of mixing fronts on the North-West European shelf in HYCOM with those computed from the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) database, the World Ocean Atlas, and to NEMO. On a global scale we investigate the ability of global HYCOM to identify tidal mixing fronts in other shelf seas by a comparison to the World Ocean Atlas.