A new method for ionospheric clutter suppression in HFSWR

High frequency surface wave radar (HFSWR) is an effective early warning radar, but the detection performance is impacted by the ionospheric clutter seriously. In order to suppress the ionospheric clutter, a segment accumulation algorithm is proposed, based on the time-frequency characteristics of the ionospheric clutter. The time-domain data of radar echo is divided into several segments, and the frequency spectrum was estimated with amplitude and phase estimation (APES) in each subsegment. The amplitudes fluctuate fast and huge contains the most ionospheric clutter. The time-domain ionospheric clutter is reconstructed and subtracted from the original signal. By processing the measured data, it shows that the method can effectively improve the SNCR (signal to noise and clutter ratio) in the detection unit polluted by the ionospheric clutter.