Damage building analysis in TerraSAR-X new staring spotlight mode SAR imagery

In 2014, TerraSAR-X (TSX) mission were extended by implementing two new modes. One is Staring Spotlight (ST) mode. The ST mode increases the high geometric resolution of the standard High Resolution Spotlight product. By widening the azimuth beam steering angle range and therewith extending the synthetic aperture an azimuth resolution of 0.24 m can be achieved. In this paper, some types of damage buildings by earthquake in the new ST mode TSX image are analyzed. In particular, we investigate the characteristics of individual damaged buildings in the new high resolution image. The old Beichuan County is selected as the research area, where most of the damage buildings are preserved after the earthquake on 12 May, 2008. Moreover, buildings with different types of damages can be found in the study area. Features such as shape, strong scattering points, and texture features of the damage buildings in descending and ascending post-earthquake SAR images are analyzed. Based on the analysis, TSX ST mode images show good potential for damage building detection, for the resolution of the image is improved. However, some scattering features of the building are also not stable in such high resolution SAR images, when the imaging geometry is changed. So in order to obtain good detection results, the pre-event and post-event images are also expected for damage building detection in decimeter resolution SAR images.