The performance of two operational forecasting systems implemented for the North Atlantic area is compared. One forecast system runs the WAM model and the other using the WaveWatchIII model, both driven by GFS wind fields and with the same resolutions for time and space.
The GFS wind fields used to drive the models have a spatial resolution of 0.5° by 0.5° and a time resolution of 3h. Regarding the geographical grids implemented, they cover the North Atlantic from the longitude of 90° West to 33° East and from the latitude of 80° North to 2° South, with a fine grid resolution of 0.5 by 0.5 degrees. The wave spectrum is discretized using 30 frequencies, being the lowest frequency equal to 0.0418 Hz, and 36 directions. A 4-days warm up was implemented and a 4-days forecast was calculated.
In general both models performed well, as forecasting systems, presenting the same behavior and magnitude of values, when compared to the in-situ measurements.
