Combined Monitoring Remote Sensing Systems: Ground-Based SSR and Satellite-Based SAR
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Satellite-based Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) and ground-based Slope Stability Radar (SSR) are types of remote sensing instrumentation that use the microwave region of the electromagnetic spectrum. Both transmit a series of radar pulses towards natural and man-made landscapes and record the returned signal along the line of sight (LoS) which contains an amplitude and phase. By interpreting the phase difference between consecutively returned signals, interferograms showing spatio-temporal changes in displacements are produced. Both ground-based and satellite-based of SAR monitoring systems are available and each type presents a series of advantages and disadvantages. Wider spatial coverage is produced by satellite monitoring while near real-time monitoring is achieved by ground-based monitoring. Also the LoS view for satellite-based is different than for ground-based, which provides an advantage to combine the information from both. A combined ground-based and satellite-based monitoring system has been trialled at a remote mine site to investigate relative changes in displacement experienced by a tailings storage facility (TSF). The relative changes in displacements along the InSAR LoS were compared to the relative changes in displacement provided by the ground-based SSR LoS. Although the two LoS are different, the aim of this study was to investigate whether the trends in relative changes in displacement are similar between the two remote sensing technologies. Additionally, the study looked at the effectiveness of InSAR on capturing relatively shallow operational works undertook on the TSF slope.