the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 14 Jan 2025
Sea Ice Screening Ability in Ku Band and C Band Wind Scatterometry
Abstract. Ocean surface sea ice screening is important for a wide variety of research and applications. While the normalized radar cross-sections (NRCS) have been long applied in sea ice classifications and quantifications, the beam-filling problem still exists. Besides, for the melting ice cover, the NRCS are not providing accurate links to sea ice. However, if considering the NRCS within the traditional wind retrieval unit, despite the existence of fractal sea ice and the different mixing quantities of ice and sea water, there will be signatures in both the derivations from wind retrieval model and the extend of heterogeneity within the unit. The former has been well researched and together with the ice model from scatteroemters, applied now in ice labelling for scatterometer operational wind products in the indicator MLE. In this research, we uncover the properties of the later due to sea ice, in terms of the indicator Joss. The sea ice and iceberg concentration from products derived in AMSR-2 and Sentinel-1 are applied as references. The scatterometer data are from collocations of C- and Ku-band scatterometer products from ASCAT-A, ASCAT-B, OSCAT-2 and HSCAT. The ice screening ability in combination of MLE and Joss are concluded. Finally, the iceberg identification potential is discussed along with the application of the joint observations of C- and Ku-band scatteroemter observations.
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Status: closed
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RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-3840', Anonymous Referee #1, 26 May 2025
While the research topic is relevant and potentially valuable to the scatterometry and remote sensing community, in terms of using wind speed retrieval QC parameters to infer sea ice information, I find the current manuscript suffers from significant issues that affect its readability and overall scientific communication.
1. Language and Writing Quality:
The manuscript urgently needs thorough language editing. There are frequent grammatical errors, awkward phrasing, and unclear sentences throughout the paper. These issues severely hinder comprehension of the technical content. For example, the abstract and introduction contain several convoluted expressions that obscure the main scientific message.2. Presentation Quality:
The clarity and coherence of the figures and their integration with the main text require major improvement. As one notable example, the text refers to a "red circle" in Figure 1(a), yet no such circle is visible in the actual figure. This inconsistency is not only confusing but also undermines the credibility of the visual interpretation. Similar issues are present in other figures as well, where labeling and legends are not intuitive or adequately explained.3. Structural and Conceptual Flow:
The manuscript attempts to present complex concepts such as MLE and Joss indicators, but the explanations are often fragmented or repetitive, and key methodological steps are not sufficiently clear or well-structured. This impairs the reader’s ability to follow the rationale of the study and assess the validity of the results.4. Scientific Rigor and Validation:
Although the authors make use of multiple satellite data sources and reference products, the methodology lacks clarity in how quantitative conclusions are drawn from the data collocations. In several sections, the analysis appears more descriptive than analytical, and the support for conclusions could be more robustly presented.Given these issues, the manuscript should be thoroughly revised with the help of a fluent English speaker or a professional language editing service, and the figures and text must be carefully checked for consistency and clarity. Only after these fundamental problems are addressed can the technical merit and contributions of the work be properly evaluated.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3840-RC1 -
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-3840', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Jul 2025
Xu and Stoffelen (2025) Sea Ice Screening Ability in Ku Band and C Band Wind Scatterometry
Overall, the paper analyzes two different parameters and its effectiveness for sea ice screening. I think the paper addresses a critical research gap and adds to the current literature a potentially unique dimension. However, the results and conclusions are not clear and often not quantitatively backed up which to me is the biggest issue. I also think further investigations need to be conducted in order to quantitatively back the conclusions made in this paper. Therefore, I believe this paper should be considered for publication after major revisions which addresses the following concerns:
Major comments:
- Several grammatical slips and errors noticed in the paper
- The paper is not well structured and is difficult to follow
- The uniqueness of the paper is not well established
- The quality of the figures need to be significantly improved along with the captions
- The results are often based on interpretations from the Figures and not quantitatively backed up.
Line-specific comments:
Abstract: I believe the abstract needs to be re-written to reflect more of the unique findings from the paper
Line 10: The beam-filling problem comes a bit abruptly here and needs a bit more context
Line 14: MLE full form hasn’t been introduced yet
Line 15: Not sure if using term ‘Joss’ is sufficient here by itself and therefore needs to be atleast explained a bit here
Line 19: What are the conclusions?
Lines15-20: Reads more like a methodology text rather than a summary of the unique results from the paper which is a vital part of the abstract section
Line 39-40- I believe this is a vital line but the sentence structure makes it very difficult for the reader to understand the key point here. Also, I would expand on this more
Line 56- I believe this claim needs to be substantiated further. Having a cursory look at the literature: The relationship between MLE and SIC has been previously investigated qualitatively and through Bayesian methods for sea ice detection (Belmonte Rivas et al., 2012, 2018; Otosaka et al., 2018). However, explicit quantitative mappings between MLE and SIC or IBC remain limited in the literature.
Line 60- Use either cm or centimeter not both
Line 64- In-text reference style error
Figure 1: The figure quality needs to be improved along with a more comprehensive caption.
Line 68: This is a vital line but has several run-on sentence errors and therefore needs to be revised
Line 70: Are these results from the paper? If so, I don’t believe you should explicitly state results in the introduction section
Line 73: This is a very important line which is aimed at establishing the uniqueness of the paper. However, this line is written in a very confusing manner. I don’t understand what is meant by a ‘potential way’? Please state explicitly your proposed novelty or alternative workflow here.
Introduction: Can you define what you exactly are referring to by ‘sea ice screening ability’?
Line 78: Which scatterometer?. You need to mention which data you are using before going into the processing.
Line 80-83- Very confusingly written.
Line 117: ‘Discriminating’ or other synonyms?
Line 130: Can you provide the full form or refer to further details about the KNMI Processor here?
Figure 4: A caption needs to be rewritten with further details
Methods Section: The study area information seems to be missing also the time span of the measurements for each data product needs to be clearIBC: I believe the term “IBC” was not introduced.
Line 160- Maintain consistency in writing Joss
Line 162-165- You need to refrain from using vague terms and try to provide a quantitative representation. What do you mean by “quite independent”, “good ice screening ability”?
Line 168- What is the ‘certain value’?
Results section: Since you have provided a separate “Conclusion and Discussion” section in Section 5, Section 4 should only focus on results and not include discussion points i.e. explanations of the results. These should be shifted to Section 5.
Line 221: Maintain font consistency
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3840-RC2
Status: closed
-
RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-3840', Anonymous Referee #1, 26 May 2025
While the research topic is relevant and potentially valuable to the scatterometry and remote sensing community, in terms of using wind speed retrieval QC parameters to infer sea ice information, I find the current manuscript suffers from significant issues that affect its readability and overall scientific communication.
1. Language and Writing Quality:
The manuscript urgently needs thorough language editing. There are frequent grammatical errors, awkward phrasing, and unclear sentences throughout the paper. These issues severely hinder comprehension of the technical content. For example, the abstract and introduction contain several convoluted expressions that obscure the main scientific message.2. Presentation Quality:
The clarity and coherence of the figures and their integration with the main text require major improvement. As one notable example, the text refers to a "red circle" in Figure 1(a), yet no such circle is visible in the actual figure. This inconsistency is not only confusing but also undermines the credibility of the visual interpretation. Similar issues are present in other figures as well, where labeling and legends are not intuitive or adequately explained.3. Structural and Conceptual Flow:
The manuscript attempts to present complex concepts such as MLE and Joss indicators, but the explanations are often fragmented or repetitive, and key methodological steps are not sufficiently clear or well-structured. This impairs the reader’s ability to follow the rationale of the study and assess the validity of the results.4. Scientific Rigor and Validation:
Although the authors make use of multiple satellite data sources and reference products, the methodology lacks clarity in how quantitative conclusions are drawn from the data collocations. In several sections, the analysis appears more descriptive than analytical, and the support for conclusions could be more robustly presented.Given these issues, the manuscript should be thoroughly revised with the help of a fluent English speaker or a professional language editing service, and the figures and text must be carefully checked for consistency and clarity. Only after these fundamental problems are addressed can the technical merit and contributions of the work be properly evaluated.
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3840-RC1 -
RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-3840', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Jul 2025
Xu and Stoffelen (2025) Sea Ice Screening Ability in Ku Band and C Band Wind Scatterometry
Overall, the paper analyzes two different parameters and its effectiveness for sea ice screening. I think the paper addresses a critical research gap and adds to the current literature a potentially unique dimension. However, the results and conclusions are not clear and often not quantitatively backed up which to me is the biggest issue. I also think further investigations need to be conducted in order to quantitatively back the conclusions made in this paper. Therefore, I believe this paper should be considered for publication after major revisions which addresses the following concerns:
Major comments:
- Several grammatical slips and errors noticed in the paper
- The paper is not well structured and is difficult to follow
- The uniqueness of the paper is not well established
- The quality of the figures need to be significantly improved along with the captions
- The results are often based on interpretations from the Figures and not quantitatively backed up.
Line-specific comments:
Abstract: I believe the abstract needs to be re-written to reflect more of the unique findings from the paper
Line 10: The beam-filling problem comes a bit abruptly here and needs a bit more context
Line 14: MLE full form hasn’t been introduced yet
Line 15: Not sure if using term ‘Joss’ is sufficient here by itself and therefore needs to be atleast explained a bit here
Line 19: What are the conclusions?
Lines15-20: Reads more like a methodology text rather than a summary of the unique results from the paper which is a vital part of the abstract section
Line 39-40- I believe this is a vital line but the sentence structure makes it very difficult for the reader to understand the key point here. Also, I would expand on this more
Line 56- I believe this claim needs to be substantiated further. Having a cursory look at the literature: The relationship between MLE and SIC has been previously investigated qualitatively and through Bayesian methods for sea ice detection (Belmonte Rivas et al., 2012, 2018; Otosaka et al., 2018). However, explicit quantitative mappings between MLE and SIC or IBC remain limited in the literature.
Line 60- Use either cm or centimeter not both
Line 64- In-text reference style error
Figure 1: The figure quality needs to be improved along with a more comprehensive caption.
Line 68: This is a vital line but has several run-on sentence errors and therefore needs to be revised
Line 70: Are these results from the paper? If so, I don’t believe you should explicitly state results in the introduction section
Line 73: This is a very important line which is aimed at establishing the uniqueness of the paper. However, this line is written in a very confusing manner. I don’t understand what is meant by a ‘potential way’? Please state explicitly your proposed novelty or alternative workflow here.
Introduction: Can you define what you exactly are referring to by ‘sea ice screening ability’?
Line 78: Which scatterometer?. You need to mention which data you are using before going into the processing.
Line 80-83- Very confusingly written.
Line 117: ‘Discriminating’ or other synonyms?
Line 130: Can you provide the full form or refer to further details about the KNMI Processor here?
Figure 4: A caption needs to be rewritten with further details
Methods Section: The study area information seems to be missing also the time span of the measurements for each data product needs to be clearIBC: I believe the term “IBC” was not introduced.
Line 160- Maintain consistency in writing Joss
Line 162-165- You need to refrain from using vague terms and try to provide a quantitative representation. What do you mean by “quite independent”, “good ice screening ability”?
Line 168- What is the ‘certain value’?
Results section: Since you have provided a separate “Conclusion and Discussion” section in Section 5, Section 4 should only focus on results and not include discussion points i.e. explanations of the results. These should be shifted to Section 5.
Line 221: Maintain font consistency
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-3840-RC2
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