Ground Clutter Suppression in Airborne Weather Radar via Terrain Visibility Analysis

A ground clutter elimination method based on terrain visible analysis is proposed for airborne weather radar that operates in weather mode. Visibility judgment is adopted to identify the range bins containing clutter. The view angles for all sampling points in digital terrain model are computed and its distributing rule is analyzed. The view angles and the depression angle of radar are compared. Those range bins with clutter are edited and rejected, so the suppression is directly implemented. Finally, the validity and effectivity of the method are illustrated by processing the simulation data and the measured airborne data.