Enhanced Radar Scattering From Water Inclusions In Ice

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Abstract
It is believed that water-filled cavities on the scale of decimetres are present in a number of glaciers in Spitsbergen. The evidence for this hypothesis comes from airborne radio echo-sounding records collected by the Scott Polar Research Institute in 1983. The size of these cavities prevents the use of Rayleigh scattering theory and requires a more general analysis. Mie scattering theory is used to investigate the scattered power providing some unexpected results, the most significant of which is that for water bodies greater than approximately 0.25 m in radius the returned power from the volume illuminated is greater than that from a perfectly reflecting plane boundary.