Technical aspects of a new W-band cloud radar

CETP has developed a 95 GHz pulsed Doppler radar (RASTA : Radar Aéroporté et Sol de Télédétection des propriétés nuAgeuses) to characterize the dynamic, radiative and microphysical properties of clouds. This radar had been mounted on the Institut Géographique National Fokker 27 aircraft (ARAT) and flew for two campaigns : CARL2000 (Brest, Nov. 2000) and CARL2001 (Brétigny, March 2001). As the ARAT definitely stopped its activities just after CARL2001 and as our next aircraft will be available in 2004, we have decided to operate our radar from the ground for the time being. In this paper attention is paid to the technical realization of the system and its modularity. Some measurements taken during CARL2000 are shown.