Judith J. Stephenson and T. M. Georges

Abstract: The report describes a series of computer routines for analyzing HF radio propagation in an arbitrary ionosphere - in particular, the echoes obtained in ionospherically propagated ground backscatter experiments. With the aid of a plotting routine that simulates backscatter intensity variations, the routines convert raypath data output from a three-dimensional ray-tracing program (Jones, 1966) into visual displays that simulate the appearance of various experimental backscatter display modes. Only the mechanics and sample outputs of the backscatter-simulation routines are given here; the theory and application to ionospheric problems are discussed in a paper by Georges and Stephenson (1969). Several supplementary programs, which concisely display information contained in a large number of raysets and which are helpful in interpreting ionospheric effects on backscatter, are also described in this report.

Keywords: backscatter; propagation modeling; ray tracing; ionospheric ground backscatter

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