Attenuation correction for a high-resolution polarimetric x-band weather radar

Journal article (2010)

Authors

T. Otto Microwave Technology and Systems for Radar

H.W.J. Russchenberg Microwave Technology and Systems for Radar

Research Group

Microwave Technology and Systems for Radar

Other publications

To reference this document use:

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:67161c23-b704-41d0-a0f6-c291063bae02

More Info

expand_more

Published Date

2010

Language

English

Reuse Rights

Other than for strictly personal use, it is not permitted to download, forward or distribute the text or part of it, without the consent of the author(s) and/or copyright holder(s), unless the work is under an open content license such as Creative Commons.

Research Group

Microwave Technology and Systems for Radar

Abstract

In 2007, IRCTR (Delft University of Technology) installed a new polarimetric X-band LFMCW radar (IDRA) at the meteorological observation site of Cabauw, The Netherlands. It provides plan position indicators (PPI) at a fixed elevation with a high range resolution of either 3 m or 30 m at a maximum observation range of 1.5 km and 15 km, respectively. IDRA aims to monitor precipitation events for the long-term analysis of the hydrological cycle. Due to the specifications of IDRA, the spatial and temporal variability of a large range of rainfall intensities (from drizzle to heavy convective rain) can be studied.
Even though the usual observation range of IDRA is limited to 15 km, attenuation due to precipitation can be large enough to seriously affect the measurements. In this contribution we evaluate the application of a combined method to correct for the specific and the differential attenuation, and in the same vein estimate the parameters of the raindrop-size distribution. The estimated attenuations are compared to a phase constraint attenuation correction method.