It is necessary to subtracting the tidal height from the observed depth to derived real depth while conduct hydrographic survey. The tidal data can be collected by conventional tide gauge or by using real time kinematics (RTK) GPS survey in the near shore region. However, when setting up tidal instruments in the offshore areas, many restricts still remained due to many factors such as topography, weather, and sea state. On contrary, the RTK GPS survey method has the limitation on the radio transmitting range. Therefore, the tidal zone method integrates the tidal station data to calculate the offshore tide data which can solve these problems. Generally, the tidal zone is constructed by using real tidal station data around the narrow channel. But the tide data is not possible to integrate on both side of the Taiwan Strait due to the vertical datum is not identical due to current political separation. To overcome this problem, this study proposed tidal zone method based on the tidal height derived from a tide numerical model. The tidal zone method is consequently applied to improve the accuracy of the offshore hydrographic survey. After processing the tide data derived from the model output and performing harmonic analysis, this study utilized the analysis result to draw a co-tidal chart to demonstrate the tidal characteristics for the purpose of establishing the tidal zone of the Taiwan Strait. This study also accomplished correspondent tidal zones for all the tide stations of Taiwan west coast within 12 miles territorial waters. This study further proposed a virtual station method for offshore hydrographic survey tide correction which applied the analysis result of each numerical model grid point as a virtual tidal station to derive the offshore tide correction values with spatial continuous characteristics. This study selected three experiment areas based on the multi-beam echo sounder survey data acquired offshore Ma-Liuo tide station. The direct tide station correction, tidal zone correction, and virtual station correction methods are applied to the hydrographic survey data to evaluate the performance of the tidal zone and virtual station correction methods. According to the experiment results, the tidal zone and virtual station correction method improve 20 and 16 cm respectively over the direct tide station correction method in the offshore area with the distance 25 km to the Ma-Liuo tide station. It indicates that the feasibility of the tidal zone method and it can improve the hydrographic survey results significant while the tide characteristics are different. Tidal zone can provide the required information to decide a proper reference tide station according to the tidal characteristics for the hydrographic survey data post-processing.

In recent year, tidal gauge has progressed in temporal resolution or measurement accuracy, so that the quality of observational data tends to stable and reliable. However, setting up tidal gauge in the offshore areas restricts may apply due to many factors such as seabed topography, weather, sea state and leveling survey from land to gauge. Good tidal correction is one of key factors to the accuracy of bathymetric survey and to the area where tidal range is large. This study tried to use tide prediction data derived from the Yu(1993)¡¦s tide numerical model and verified with actual observed tide data, and further establishing a tidal zone of Taiwan Strait by tidal characteristic. Using Taichung and Mailiao tide stations as a reference tidal station, the direct tide station correction, tidal zone correction, nearest model grid correction, and virtual station correction methods were applied to evaluate the accuracy of tide calculating value by amplitude ratio and tidal phase difference. The tidal zone correction is not totally depending on the spatial distance from reference tidal station, and it is found that correction result of this approach is one of the best. However, further improvement in tide correction may need to explore due to different spatial resolution applied in different numerical models. In addition, the boundary condition of a harbor for tidal model is very complicated. This is why it is hard to make a numerical model for a harbor. In this study, two additional high accuracy radar tidal gauge were installed in Kaohsiung harbor and first-class leveling survey was performed in order to maintain tidal measurement accuracy, also to avoid the effect of errors propagation. According to the results from experiment, average tidal phase of second entrance of the Kaohsiung harbor is earlier than that of first entrance about 6 minutes, and average difference of tidal height is approximately 2-3cm. For this reason, we should pay attention to decide a proper reference tide station for tidal correction for dredging hydrographic surveying. And any possible tidal observation errors, such as meteorological tide. If two additional tidal gauges of this study are removed in the future, we still can predict tide height from fixed tidal gauge.