Patent ID: 8159384

Claim:
A method for examining an ice region or dry region using radar echo sounding, wherein a radar sensor flying over the region to be examined emits radar transmission pulses in the direction of the nadir, illuminating the surface and the inner volume of the region, wherein the reflected radar pulse signals received in the radar sensor are processed and evaluated to obtain a radargram, and wherein measures are provided to suppress ambiguities, characterized in that the region to be examined is overflown by the radar sensor or by multiple compatible radar sensors of the same operating wavelength on multiple spatially separated adjacent or parallel paths and the radar signal data received on each path are recorded, that the radar signal data recorded for each of the different paths are summed coherently and using a weighting to form a radargram, wherein an adaptive complex-valued weighting for each of the individual paths is performed using a geometrical model which takes into account the topography of the environment of the region to be examined, and that the complex-valued weighting for every depth of the examined region is determined by solving a system of linear equations from which is calculated a synthetic antenna pattern which has zero points in the direction of the ambiguities.