A simple polarisation fading model for HF propagation in the ionosphere

A method of ray tracing to investigate the effects of Faraday rotation in the ionosphere is presented in the current paper. By applying analytical ray tracing, a polarisation fading model is developed for the HF signal propagating in a simple ionosphere. The scale of the ionospheric inhomogeneities being considered is large compared to the wavelength of the signal so that GO approximation remains applicable. Details on development of the model, results of the calculation and the effects of Faraday rotation on the signal are presented in subsequent sections. A comparison between the results ascertained from the simple model and a full 3D ray tracing package is included to verify the validity of the model.