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The 9 longest tide‐gauge records in the Mediterranean Sea are compared with the output of a barotropic model forced by atmospheric pressure and wind. Between 1958 and 2001 the tide‐gauges indicate sea level trends of −0.4 to 0.7 mm/yr. During the same period the model shows sea level reduction of −0.4 to −0.7 mm/yr linked with the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). After the removal of the meteorological influence from the sea level records the resulting trends are ∼0.3 ± 0.4 mm/yr at the western Mediterranean and ∼1.3 ± 0.4 mm/yr at the eastern Mediterranean. The eastern basin is strongly affected by rapid sea level rise in the period 1993–2001 with rates of 5–10 mm/yr which are probably related to the Eastern Mediterranean Transient (EMT).

[1] Sea-level time series recorded at three stations of the northern Spanish coast (Santander, Coruña, and Vigo) are examined with the aim of obtaining reliable interdecadal trends. The records are about 6 decades long, and their consistency is checked by means of an Empirical Orthogonal Function (EOF) analysis. Major benefits of the analysis are the detection of undocumented changes of sea-level reference and the filling of data gaps. For the last decade, the consistency of the trends is also checked against shorter, collocated and nearby records. Results indicate that during the second half of the twentieth century, sea level has been rising at a rate of 2.12, 2.51, and 2.91 mm/yr in Santander, Coruña, and Vigo, respectively. Meteorologically induced trends are evaluated from the output of a sea-level numerical model forced by a re-analysis of 44 years of atmospheric data. Results are À0.44, À0.27, and À0.21 mm/yr, respectively, indicating that in the study region the meteorological forcing acts in the sense of slightly slowing the sea-level rise. On the other hand, sea-level records and the North Atlantic mean temperature exhibit a similar interannual evolution, which points to the thermosteric effect as responsible for the positive trends. Regarding the difference between stations, about a third of it can be attributed to spatial differences in the meteorological forcing. The remaining contribution is attributed to spatial differences in the increase of the ocean heat contents, as suggested by the analysis of SST series during the last decade.

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