In spite of continuous improvements of ocean wave models in the last decades, large errors still remain in particular under strongly forced conditions, often encountered in the Southern Ocean, where strong westerly winds generate some of the fiercest waves on Earth in almost unlimited fetch conditions. The newly launched China‐France Oceanography SATellite (CFOSAT) provides directional spectra of ocean waves for both wind seas and swells. Compared to Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), it can resolve shorter wavelengths in all directions, which dominate in non‐fully developed wind waves. Here, the assimilation of these CFOSAT wavenumber components is proved to bring more accurate predictions of wave growth compared to the assimilation of significant wave height alone. A notable reduction of model bias is found in the Southern Ocean, especially in the Pacific Ocean sector. Results further exhibit a downward shift of the wave age, consistent with theoretical wave growth curves.

中文翻译：

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新的定向波卫星观测：旨在改善南大洋的波预报和气候描述

尽管最近几十年来海浪模型不断改进，但在强力条件下仍然存在较大的误差，这在南大洋经常会遇到，那里强西风在几乎无限的获取条件下在地球上产生了一些最猛烈的海浪。新近启动的中法海洋卫星卫星（CFOSAT）为风浪和海浪提供了海浪的定向光谱。与合成孔径雷达（SAR）相比，它可以分辨所有方向上较短的波长，这在未充分发展的风波中占主导地位。在这里，与仅吸收显着波高相比，这些CFOSAT波数分量的同化被证明带来了更精确的波增长预测。在南大洋，模型偏差明显减少，特别是在太平洋地区。结果进一步显示出波浪年龄的下移，与理论波浪生长曲线一致。