Fig.1. Operational Antarctic
ERS, J-ERS and RADARSAT
receiving stations, together with
their data acquisition masks
8.2.1.3
RADARSAT SAR
M.R. DRINKWATER
The Canadian RADARSAT satellite, launched by NASA on November 4, 1995, carries a
C-band hh-polarized SAR. The expected life span of the satellite is 5 years. Presently,
the Canadian Space Agency's (CSA) RADARSAT 1 SAR is the only satellite radar offering more than simply 100 x 100 km images. It offers a wide variety of flexible beam
modes of which the most unique, the SCANSAR mode, is the only source of wide-swath
(500 km), high-resolution (approximately 100 m) ice cover information for the Southern Ocean. However, the only CSA-approved Antarctic receiving station operational and
equipped to downlink and record RADARSAT data is McMurdo. RADARSAT also has
on-board tape recorders which will allow a limited amount of data (wide-swath "narrow" mode) to be recorded and downlinked elsewhere, other than simply at the Antarctic receiving stations. This, in principle, allows data access in any planned location in
the Southern Ocean. Until now, no data have been acquired for approved Antarctic investigators. Further information on the RADARSAT mission and its operating modes can
be found at the RADARSAT URL (http://radarsat.space.gc.ca).
8.2.1.4
ERS SAR Backscatter Calibration Accuracy
SAR data products received and processed by the German Processing and Archiving
Facility (D-PAF) must be treated differently than most US processed ERS data, since they
1 At time of writing RADARSAT is in orbit undergoing commissioning. Data are expected to come online
in mid 1997.