Correlation detector for HF surface wave radar

Using empirical oceanographic knowledge a new detector is proposed which uses the property that azimuth variation of received power for a Range Doppler (RD) cell including a target will be more correlated across the adjacent RD cells as compared to a RD cell without a target. Detection of target within the first and second order Bragg Sea clutter on measured data is shown. Encouraging agreement of the detected targets with Automatic Identification System (AIS) data is observed.