data availability for the Black Sea region

[irgan]

Hello,
I was thinking on using the Ocean Data Lab - the Ocean Virtual Laboratory in particular - for my research as it would save me a lot of processing and visualization time, however I stumbled upon data availability problem.
My area of interest is the Black Sea and as I started exploring the tool I realized that it is barely covered. I am especially interested in comparing radar and optical data for the Bulgarian, Romanian and Georgian coastal zones, however from what I've seen, only the eastern part of the Adriatic Sea is covered. Actually for the Black Sea I couldn't visualize even the the geostrophic currents.
Is it so that only particular areas are well covered with data and is it planned to extend the data availability to the Black Sea region? Or am I missing some features of the visualization tool?
Thanks a lot in advance!

[Lucile Gaultier]

Hi,
The availability of data depends on the geophysical variable and the Level of processing. For example, you will have L2 sst and chlorophyll-a data available for this area (from Sentinel-3 SLSTR and OLCI) as they are quite direct measurement of the ocean. L3 and L4 SST and chlorophyll-a are also available as they are interpolated from the various available sensors (as you can see in Odyssea L4 global and regional Mediterranean sea products). The geostrophic current (from GlobCurrent) is more difficult to retrieve as it is an indirect measurement of the current. First it implies mapping of along track altimetric data to fill the holes between tracks, which can in addition contain more errors near the coast, . Then it computes only the part of the current in geostrophic balance, which is insufficient for some regions. This explains why no current is computed in the Black sea.
I hope this answers your question.

[irgan]

Hi,
thanks a lot for your explanation, it makes sense for the geostrophic current and now I understand why certain ocean products are available and others not.
What I am more interested in is the availability of Sentinel 1 and 2 images for direct visualization of the sea surface roughness from radar and visibility of certain surface features from optical data. For these products you wouldn't need a lot of processing, however I don't see any coverage for the Black Sea.
Thanks in advance!

[Lucile Gaultier]

We don't process Sentinel1 and Sentinel2 data everywhere as these data are heavy (to download, store and process). You can access Sentinel2 data using Sinergise (https://www.sinergise.com/).
Note that you can also view them in the OVL portal by selecting the products True Color Sentinel2 (ESA, Sinergise) or Color Infra-Red Sentinel2 (ESA, Sinergise). To my knowledge, there is no easy way to visualize sentinel1 data yet.