Overview of QuikSCAT mission-a quick deployment of a high resolution, wide swath scanning scatterometer for ocean wind measurement

Scatterometer instruments are active microwave sensors that transmit a series of microwave pulses and measure the returned echo power to allow determination of the normalized radar backscattering cross section (sigma-0) of the ocean surface and, subsequently, the ocean wind speed and direction. The NASA scatterometer (NSCAT) was launched on board of the ADEOS in August 1996 and returned 10 months of high quality data before the failure of the ADEOS spacecraft terminated the data stream in June, 1997. Since the next scheduled NASA scatterometer mission, SeaWinds on ADEOS II, will be launched in mid-2000, NASA has approved a NSCAT replacement mission, called SeaWinds on QuickSCAT (QSCAT), to be launched in November 1998. This paper provides a general description of the spacecraft system and the instrument design.