Highly accurate and precise airborne single-pass interferometry for DEM generation over challenging terrain

Airborne single-pass SAR interferometry (InSAR) is a standard and operational technique for generating accurate and precise digital elevation models (DEM). But as DEM demand on fidelity and fast delivery grow over the years, the InSAR technology is challenged by the need of offering the same high-quality DEM over large areas on practically any type of surface and topography. The intent of this paper is to demonstrate the importance of the adoption of the topography- and aperture-dependent motion compensation (TAD-MoCo) for airborne single-pass InSAR in mountain areas. Furthermore, we present the DEM obtained using a TAD-MoCo and a multi-baseline (MB) interferometry framework for airborne single-pass InSAR. DEM over forested terrain in mountains with very strong height variations are generated free of residual motion errors and without need of phase unwrapping with the OrbiSAR system of Bradar.