On-Ground Testing of TerraSAR-X Instrument

The primary payload on TerraSAR-X is the Synthetic Aperture Radar using an active antenna operating in Xband. The SAR instrument architecture and its high performance have lead to refined approaches for verification. An outline is given herein together with examples for on-ground testing of primary instrument performance parameters. TerraSAR-X is financed, built, launched and operated on a national basis in the scope of a public-private partnership between the German Aerospace Centre (DLR) and EADS Astrium GmbH.