Ocean Applications

Abstract

In this chapter, the most promising techniques to observe oil slicks and to detect metallic targets at sea using polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (SAR) data are reviewed and critically analysed. The detection of oil slicks in SAR data is made difficult not only by the presence of speckle but also by the presence of, e.g. biogenic films, low-wind areas, rain cells, currents, etc., which increase the false alarm probability. The use of polarimetric features has been shown to both observe oil slicks and distinguish them from weak-damping look-alikes but also to extract some of their properties. Similarly to oil slicks, the same factors can hamper the detection of metallic targets at sea. The radiometric information provided by traditional single-channel SAR is not generally sufficient to unambiguously detect man-made metallic targets over the sea surface. This shortcoming is overcome by employing polarimetry, which allows to fully characterize the scattering mechanism of such targets.