Summary
By expanding sea level data from 6 Swedish observation stations inte empirical orthogonal functions a very simple picture of the response of the Baltic to atmospheric forcing is obtained. It is found that not less than 65.5 per cent of the total variance is due to a general rise or lowering of the whole surface.The time scale corresponds to the time scale of large scale atmospheric disturbances. This inderdependence has been used in order to establish a regression equation between surface pressure fields and sea level variations which is used for prediction. In the statistical treatment extensive use is made of the empirical orthogonal function technique.