Multifrequency polarimetric synthetic aperture radar observations of sea ice

The present study introduces a fully polarimetric airborne SAR data set of sea ice. Images were acquired in the Beaufort, Bering, and Chukchi seas in March 1988. Statistics of the magnitude, phase, and polarization of complex backscattered signals recorded by three-frequency SAR are examined for various scenes with different ice characteristics. Results indicate that combinations of frequency and polarization enhance current capability to distinguish ice of different properties using single-frequency fixed-polarization-microwave radar. A specific example is the polarimetric identification of new ice formation which may not be easily distinguished in ERS-1 5.3-GHz VV polarization of SAR data. Such findings are consistent with theoretical model simulations of scattering characteristics of sea ice.