Drone detection with a multistatic C-band radar

The multistatic active surveillance radar system SAMURAI (Swiss African MUltistatic RAdar Initiative) was tested on its drone detection capabilities during two field campaigns in Switzerland. The C-band system, consisting of one transmit and two receive nodes, was geometrically and radiometrically calibrated with a specific multistatic target simulator. GPS trajectories of a DJI Phantom 4 drone were compared to the radar detections. It was found that the radar system's inherent pointing angle and range biases can be corrected in a straightforward manner by using the virtually generated radar targets as a reference. After the corrections were applied to the radar data, deviations between the drone's GPS position and the radar detections on the order of 5 m were found.