An experimental study of a sea clutter model

Abstract

A model for the radar cross section (RCS) of the sea has been developed in parallel efforts by scientists in both the United States and the Soviet Union, which is based upon the concept of a composite surface, i.e., one in which a slightly rough surface in the sense of Rice is superimposed on a larger swell structure. For angles off the normal, the model predicts the variation of the RCS with frequency, polarization, and incident angle of the illumination and further predicts an upper bound (saturation value) of the RCS with increasing roughness. The model has been collated with data collected by the Naval Research Laboratory four-frequency radar system in sea states ranging from 0 to 7. The results of the comparison have shown that the upper bound for the RCS exists and is closely approached in windspeeds in excess of 5 m/s. In addition, the data have confirmed the variation of RCS with frequency (UHF to X-band), grazing angle, and with polarization (H, V), provided that the tilting of the scattering surface by swell is taken into account in the region of shallow grazing angles.