Impact of atmospheric propagation in a Ka-band SAR: models and statistics

The paper discusses the impact of radiowave propagation, due to water vapor, clouds, rain and ice on a Ka-band Synthetic Aperture RADAR, aimed at both high resolution imaging and interferometry. The target system has a narrow swath, say 20 km, and incidence angle close to 35°. In that configuration, statistics on extra attenuation as a function of percentage of availability all over Europe are first provided. Then, the impact of cloud coverage is evaluated in the case of stratiform and convective rain by exploiting a three-layers simulator modeling cloud, bright band, and rain. Finally, the case of ice clouds (thin cirrus) is considered. For each of these cases, attenuation and clutter from rain and ice are evaluated and compared with results that would be achieved in X-band.