Implementation and Validation of the ISMAR High-Frequency Coastal Radar Network in the Gulf of Manfredonia (Mediterranean Sea)

In this paper, a high-frequency (HF) coastal radar network is described, which is established and maintained by the Institute of Marine Sciences (ISMAR) of the National Research Council of Italy (CNR) for the measurement of surface current velocities in the Gulf of Manfredonia, located in the semienclosed Adriatic Sea (Mediterranean Sea), during 2013–2015. The network consisted of four HF radars (HFRs) that provided hourly sea surface velocity data in real-time mode in a netCDF format compliant to the Climate and Forecast Metadata Conventions CF-1.6 and the INSPIRE directive. The hourly netCDF files are disseminated via a Thematic Real-time Environmental Distributed Data Services catalog supporting OGC compliant distributions and protocols for data visualization, metadata interrogation, and data download. HFR velocity data were compared with in situ velocity measurements by Global Positioning System tracked surface drifters deployed within the radar footprint. The results show a good agreement, with the root mean square (rms) of the difference between radial velocities from HFR and drifters ranging between $20\%$ and $50\%$ of the drifter velocity rms. The HFR data have also been compared with subsurface velocity profiles from an upward looking acoustic Doppler current profiler (ADCP) during winter 2015, to gain information on the correlation between surface and water column velocities. This information is especially relevant for fishery and coastal management applications, where transport of larvae, sediments, and pollutants in the water column are considered. Results show that, at least in the considered period, the velocity in the water column is well correlated, and there is a good agreement between surface HFR and ADCP data (correlations between 0.95 and 0.75). The Gulf of Manfredonia network has been instrumental to the set up of a core of quality control practices and interoperable data and metadata formats that have been subsequently adopted within the Italian RITMARE network and that are presently discussed and refined at the European level through the projects Jerico-NEXT and INCREASE.