Introduction

Since 1979, buoys are moored on ice each year in the framework of the IABP, providing continuous local measurements. Since the 1990's, sea ice drift measurements are estimated from satellites data, which enable daily and global coverage of the polar oceans, providing an unique monitoring capability of sea ice dynamics over Arctic and Antarctic. Available geophysical parameters are sea ice concentration, extent, type and sea ice drift.

This paper deals with the sea ice drifts estimate from satellite using several sensors. SeaWinds/QuikSCAT scatterometer data have been combined with SSM/I radiometer data to provide sea ice drift. This product, called ?Merged?, is validated with buoys data (§II). In a second part, AMSR-E radiometer measurements are validated with buoys and compared with the Merged product (§III). The advantages and shortcomings of these measurements are discussed in the conclusion (§IV).