Impulse response of a meteor burst communications channel determined by ray-tracing techniques

Ray-tracing techniques are used to derive the impulse response at VHF of a meteor burst communications channel. An approach to analyze the effects of multipath arising from wind shear is also presented and is applied to a simplified model of trail distortion. A single path with a spread of approximately 0.2 microsec adequately describes channel behavior within roughly half a second from trail formation. A multipath structure with several paths and a total multipath spread of approximately 2 microsec is typically associated with the channel at later times, when the wind shear substantially affects the trail shape.