C-Band SAR Based Estimation of Baltic Sea Ice Thickness Distributions

These level ice charts are automatically derived from man- made ice thickness charts using novel SAR information [1]. The aim of the present study has been to include some navigationally meaningful information about the degree of ice deformation into these level ice thickness charts. To this end, we propose a procedure where the SAR image is first segmented, and then an ice thickness distribution is assigned to each segment. For this purpose ice thickness measurements based on a helicopter-borne electromagnetic induction sensor (EM) have been made in the Baltic Sea. The critical phase in the proposed approach is to establish a statistical relationships between the C-band SAR measurements and the EM-based ice thickness measurements. This analysis is fundamentally complicated by the location inaccuracies between SAR and EM data sets.