Skywave over-the-horizon radar track registration using earth surface and infrastructure backscatter

Skywave over-the-horizon radar exploits ionospheric propagation to detect and track targets at long range over vast areas. To achieve optimal performance in the dynamic propagation, clutter and noise environment cognitive radar techniques are used to inform waveform parameter selection and improve coordinate registration for localization of targets. In this paper we investigate the use of Earth surface and infrastructure backscatter to aid in coordinate registration. A transponder was placed in the vicinity of a window turbine farm and a mountain range producing strong backscatter. Terrain echoes are shown to provide similar azimuth-range-Doppler information to the transponder echo with similar temporal coverage. Wind turbine echoes are shown to provide azimuth-range information albeit with less temporal coverage than the transponder and terrain echoes.