Radar Cross Section of a Sea Kayak

It is very important to utilize radar effectively in order to avoid collisions between vessels and sea kayaks, as well as to be able to find wrecked sea kayaks promptly. To facilitate this, radar cross sections of sea kayaks were measured in the touring, wrecked (drifting) and overturned conditions. The results obtained in this study were as follows : 1. The radar cross section was 0.503m^2-0.017m^2 for a single sea kayak, and 0.725m^2-0.011m^2 for a tandem sea kayak. 2. The radar cross section was largest when the side of sea kayak faced the radar antenna, and was smallest when its bow or stern was towards the antenna. 3. The manned sea kayak gave larger radar cross section than the unmanned ; 6dB at single and 8dB at tandem. 4. The radar cross section and the geometric cross section for each azimuth aspect angle showed almost the same patterns