Measurement of Wind Speed on the Antarctic Peninsula Using ERS-SAR Tandem Interferometry

• Main Authors: F. Rau, O. Lang, A. Hofmann, G. Kothe, Oberpfaffenhofen D- Wessling
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Antarctic; Antarctic Peninsula; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Ice Sheet
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.20.6169; http://earth.esa.int/pub/ESA_DOC/gothenburg/476rabus.pdf

The relation between interferometric coherence and meteorological parameters at the snow surface is investigated for a study area on the Antarctic Peninsula. Five ERS tandem pairs have been processed to provide image sets of ERS-1/2 backscatter amplitudes and coherence. For the coastal portions of the ice sheet, backscatter shows large seasonal variations. On the contrary, backscatter variations further inland and on the high plateau are negligible both over 24 hour periods and seasonally. This demonstrates the absence of significant humidity and surface roughness changes over time in these areas. Here the substantial differences in coherence between the tandem pairs are therefore expected to stem from one main source only: wind drift. As meteorological parameters, appropriate for comparison, we calculate mean and maximum wind speeds during the 24 h periods between tandem acquisitions. We find a reasonable linear fit between coherence and mean wind speed.