A method to estimate statistics of rain depolarization

Depolarization caused by rain is studied by assuming that the drops are oblate spheroids with the canting angle distribution described by Saunders (1971). The depolarization, which interferes with microwave and millimeter wave propagation, is caused by the nonsphericity of the raindrops and the lack of uniformity of axis orientations. Depolarization is calculated for the case of a uniform precipitation rate, and then, to take into account the more realistic situation of variation in depolarization, the statistical distribution of depolarization is analyzed. The rain cell proposed by Misme and Fimbel (1975) is used to describe the rain model over a path. If the precipitation rate distribution is known at one point of the path, the depolarization distribution is obtained by assuming only one rain cell along the path since, over a long period of observation, the precipitation rate distribution for all points is the same.