Sea surface height variations in the South China Sea from satellite altimetry

Abstract Sea surface elevation in the South China Sea is examined in the Topex/Poseidon altimeter data from 1992 to 1995. Sea level anomalies are smoothed along satellite tracks and in time with tidal errors reduced by harmonic analysis. The smoothed data are sampled every ten days with an along-track separation of about 40 km. The data reveal significant annual variations in sea level. In winter, low sea level is over the entire deep basin with two local lows centred off Luzon and the Sunda Shelf. In summer, sea level is high off Luzon and off the Sunda Shelf, and a low off Vietnam separates the two highs. The boundary between the Vietnam low and Sunda high coincides with the location of a jet leaving the coast of Vietnam described in earlier studies. Principal component analysis shows that the sea level variation consists mainly of two modes, corresponding well to the first two modes of the wind stress curl. Mode 1 represents the oscillation in the southern basin and shows little inter-annual variation. The mode 2 oscillation is weak in the southern basin and is strongest off central Vietnam. During the winters of 1992–1993 and 1994–1995 and the following summers, the wind stress curl is weak, and the mode 2 sea level variation in the northern basin is reduced, resulting in weaker winter and summer gyres. Weakening of the Vietnam low in summer implies diminishing of the eastward jet leaving the coast of Vietnam. The results are consistent with model simulations.

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