Digital television based passive bistatic radar system for drone detection

Recently, the widespread availability of consumer grade drones is responsible for the new concerns of air traffic control. This paper investigates the feasibility of drone detection by passive bistatic radar (PBR) system. Wuhan University has successfully developed a digitally multichannel PBR system, which is dedicated for the drone detection. Two typical trials with a cooperative drone have been designed to examine the system's capability of small drone detection. The agreement between experimental results and ground truth indicate the effectiveness of sensing and processing method, which verifies the practicability and prospects of drone detection by this digitally multichannel PBR system.

I. Introduction

Due to low price and easy operation, the number of small Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs)‘, named drones in common, has largely increased in the past few years. However, these small drones are reported being misused to perform antisocial, unsafe, and even criminal actions, such as violation of privacy, terror acts, smuggling or espionage [1]. They may pose serious threats on public safety and air surveillance. Under this circumstance the corresponding countermeasures, such as drone detection, tracking and interception system, are gradually become a hot tonic.