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1.5 Scope of Thesis
The purpme of this thesis is twofold. The &-st objectwe is to validate the ability
of the Cape Rae radar to monitor the radial current 6eld. This system is the &st
of its kind in North America and it was not svbjsted to any previom validation
experiments in this area. Hence, the need for an investiffatin of this kind is imper-
ative to test and further promote the technique. The second objective is to examine
the passihility of using the radial data to estimate total nurent vectors. This has
not been prwiously attempted using a long-range -em. Therefore, an experiment
of this nature pmvide. a valuable dataset for testing algorithmme to promote this
capability.
In the -tor current method presented in this thesis, the radial components are
formulated as a system of linear equations which were derived directly from the
tem geometry. The u n l m in ~ this system are the current components which can
be determined from a closed-form solution using a simple re-on analysis. This
alleviates the errors introduced in linearizing the system of equations derived by the
method presented in Lipa and Barrick [17]. The end result is a much simpler proea
dure which can be esrily implemented as a real-time software module in a practical
radar sptem.
The general techaiques used to pro- the radar data are d-ibed in Chapter 2.
The elanrid technique used to spectrally analyze the radar data will be summarized,
with a description of the current estimation method med to yield the radial nurents.
This will be followed by the formulation of the vector current aigarithmn and its
soiution.
The experiment is discussed in Chapter 3. Normally, this would be dealt with as
an appendix. H-wr, since this is essentially an experimental thesis where the data
for mod4 validation was provided by the Northern Radar Cape Race facility from
October 20 to November 21, 1992, it is felt that a description of the same is deserving
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