Comparison of COSMO-SkyMed and RADARSAT-2 offset tracking results on David-Drygalski glacier (Antarctica) surface velocities

Abstract

This note is about the comparison of coregistration offset tracking velocities of a glacier obtained with SAR sensors characterized by different wavelengths and spatial resolutions: Cosmo-SkyMED (X band) and RADARSAT-2 (C band). The study area is represented by the initial part of the David Glacier, in Antarctica, which is the most important outlet glacier of Victoria Land. Particular attention has been devoted to understand the role of polarization and penetration depth of the incident wavelength, which represent key parameters in determining the effective incidence angle and so, for this reason, affecting also derived velocities. Further investigation is needed to complete this analysis, considering also geophysical data and tidal effects. In particular, we focused our attention on the initial portion of the David glacier, comprising the grounding line (which is the line where the glacier begins to be floating on the sea surface), represented in fig. 3 [1]. The processed dataset consists of four COSMO-SkyMed (in the following simply CSK) Stripmap scenes and two RADARSAT-2 scenes in quad polarization Wide Fine Beam mode, made available respectively by Italian and Canadian Spatial Agencies through the “COSMO-SkyMed/RADARSAT-2 Initiative Joint Announcement of Opportunity” (Proposal id 2873/5247).