A GLOBAL SEARCH AND RESCUE CONCEPT USING SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR AND PASSIVE USER TARGETS

摘要

A terrestrial search and rescue concept is defined embodying the use of passive radio-frequency (RF) reflectors in conjunction with an orbiting synthetic aperture radar to detect, identify, and locate users. An airborne radar test was conducted to evaluate the basic concept. In this test simple corner-reflector targets were successfully imaged. Results from this in¬vestigation were positive and indicate that the concept can be used to investigate new approaches focused on the development of a global search and rescue system.