Ice thickness and snow depth sampling at Elson Lagoon, Alaska USA during the AMSRIce03 campaign. Image courtesy of AMSRIce03, the AMSR-E Science Team's Web site.

The AMSRIce03 campaign, headed by Don Cavalieri, was conducted over a three-week period in March 2003. Joint ground and aircraft measurements were taken in the Chukchi and Beaufort Seas in the Arctic Ocean, and in Elson Lagoon, off the northern coast of Alaska, USA. The objectives of the experiment were to compare field, airborne, and other satellite data in order to validate and improve existing sea ice retrieval algorithms for the AMSR-E instrument.