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Full catalog/MWOW_L3_HIGHRES_EPI_V0.1
MWOW_L3_HIGHRES_EPI_V0.1·v0.1·dataset

Ocean surface wind, extra inputs, high-resolution (6-hourly)

MWOW 6-Hourly High Resolution Global Ocean Wind with Expanded Platform Inputs Level 3 Version 0.1
ocean NASA POCLOUD Level 3 active netCDF-4
In plain English

What it measures. Ocean surface wind speed and direction worldwide, every 6 hours at very fine resolution. Observations from different instruments are kept separate rather than blended into one map.

How it's made. Combines radar wind retrievals from the SWOT satellite's KaRIn instrument with interpolated data from five scatterometers and one radiometer, gridded into 6-hour files.

How & where you'd use it. Meant mainly for comparing wind measurements across instruments. This is an early version (0.1) intended for stakeholder assessment rather than a polished, finalized product.

What's measured

OCEANS › OCEAN WINDS › SURFACE WINDS › WIND DIRECTIONOCEANS › OCEAN WINDS › SURFACE WINDS › WIND SPEED

Coverage & cadence

  • Time span2023-01-01 → ongoing
  • Measured byMETOP-B (ASCAT) · METOP-C (ASCAT) · IRS E06 (SCAT-3) · SMAP (SMAP L-BAND RADIOMETER) · SWOT (KaRIn) · HY2-B (SCATTEROMETERS) · HY2-C (SCATTEROMETERS)
  • Processing levelLevel 3
  • Spatial extent-180, -90, 180, 90
  • FormatsnetCDF-4
  • StatusACTIVE

What you can do with it

  • Watch sea-surface temperature and marine heatwaves
  • Spot algal blooms and ocean-colour shifts
  • Support fisheries and coastal monitoring
Official description

This data set contains 6-hourly, global gridded wind speed and direction at 1/64th degree horizontal resolution from the MWOW (Multi-sensor Worldwide Ocean Winds) Project. It is a harmonized wind product combining retrievals from the KaRIn satellite-based SAR (synthetic aperture radar) with interpolated data from five scatterometers and one radiometer for comparison where SAR data is available. Data are available in netCDF format, with one file for each 6-hour timestep. Note that data from the instruments are not aggregated together to create a composite wind map for each timestep. Rather, observations from each instrument are kept separate, split over the “time” dimension. Further, any observations from the same instrument that overlap spatially in the 6-hour window are also reported as separate observations along this time dimension. This “Expanded Platform Input” product is similar to the MWOW_L3_HIRES_V0.1 product (DOI 10.5067/MWOW-6HHR-V01) with additional data inputs from scatterometers aboard the Hai Yang 2B and 2C satellites. Version 0 of these data include an initial bulk ingest of data in January 2026 with forward streaming planned for later in the year. Version 0 is primarily meant for assessment by stakeholders, with future versions likely to incorporate feedback from the stakeholders. No User Guide is planned for this version, although the data are considered science quality. Interested users looking for more information are encouraged to contact the data producer. The MWOW Project is funded by NASA’s Satellite Needs Working Group (SNWG) which provides data products developed to meet the needs of stakeholders from US government agencies.

Get the data

mwow_l3_highres_epi_v0.1_access.py
import earthaccess
earthaccess.login(strategy="netrc")          # free Earthdata Login

results = earthaccess.search_data(
    short_name="MWOW_L3_HIGHRES_EPI_V0.1",
    version="0.1",
    bounding_box=(-122.5, 37.2, -121.8, 37.9),  # your area (W,S,E,N)
    temporal=("2024-01-01", "2024-12-31"),       # your dates
)
files = earthaccess.open(results)   # stream straight from POCLOUD
Browsing CMR needs no login. Downloading or streaming bytes needs a free Earthdata Login + the earthaccess package.