Testing Polygon for Simulated Vertical Displacement Measurements based on Co-located InSAR Corner Reflector and GNSS Station

Juraj Struhár,Milan Lazecký,Petr Rapant,Michal Kačmařík,Ivana Hlaváčová

doi:10.35180/gse-2021-0061

Abstract

With the growing availability of accurate and long-term measurements of displacements of technical infrastructure elements, there is a growing interest in the automated processing of acquired data. Various methods can be used for monitoring; however, radar interferometry and Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) measurements are among the best for long-term monitoring. GNSS allows for continuous monitoring of individual points, while radar interferometry allows only periodic data collection but with an areal coverage. Radar interferometry can also reach a better precision under certain conditions; therefore, it appears to be more appropriate. Automated systems are being developed that allow not only to process radar data but also to detect anomalies in vertical displacement. It is advisable to have a testing polygon for their verification, enabling the comparison of the automated processing of radar interferometry with an independent GNSS measurement. In autumn 2019, a testing polygon was built at the Department of Geoinformatics, HGF VSB – Technical University of Ostrava, consisting of three corner reflectors. Two are fixed, but one, complemented by a GNSS receiver, has an adjustable height. The article describes its construction and presents the first results of comparing automated radar interferometry processing with GNSS measurements. Keywords: Corner reflector; Corner reflector and GNSS receiver co-location; Displacement monitoring; GNSS; InSAR; PS-InSAR; Sentinel-1; Testing polygon; Vertical displacement.

Highlights

With the growing availability of data for highly accurate measurements of the movement of ground structures, there is a growing interest in long-term automated monitoring of the movement of technical infrastructure features and issuing alerts in the event of a sudden change in the long-term trend of movement of a particular infrastructure object
A testing polygon was built in the area of the VSB-Technical University of Ostrava (VSB-TUO) university campus to make a simulation of vertical displacements and their estimation using two independent technologies: satellite radar interferometry utilizing Sentinel-1 imagery and Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) measurements
The polygon mainly consists of an adjustable device that allows for vertical displacements simulation while holding a corner reflector and a GNSS antenna

Summary

Introduction

With the growing availability of data for highly accurate measurements of the movement of ground structures, there is a growing interest in long-term automated monitoring of the movement of technical infrastructure features and issuing alerts in the event of a sudden change in the long-term trend of movement of a particular infrastructure object In principle, such monitoring can be based either on standard geodetic methods like precise levelling [1], [2, 3], geotechnical monitoring [4, 5], GNSS measurements [6, 7, 8] or radar satellite data and their processing by one of the methods based on radar interferometry [9, 10, 11].

Methods

Results

Conclusion