Analysis of Bistatic Radar Sea Clutter Amplitude Distributions at Low Grazing Angles

Target detection in the maritime domain is best performed with radar due to its ability to surveil wide areas and operate in almost any weather condition or time of day. Many common detection schemes require an accurate model of the amplitude distribution of radar echoes backscattered by the ocean surface. The paper presents a quantitative evaluation of select amplitude distributions to determine their ability to represent real low grazing angle sea clutter collected by a ground-based bistatic radar system operating at S-band.