Alaska

The paper reports on results of an experiment concerned with assessing the cartographic accuracy of an optically processed spaceborne synthetic aperture radar (SAR) image taken over a very hilly area in the Scottish Highlands. A number of mathematical algorithms were used to transform the image to the terrain co‐ordinate system. The results show that it is indeed possible to extract metric information from this type of imagery to suit the purposes of small‐scale reconnaissance‐type planimetric mapping at 1:250,000 and smaller. This is important for many developing countries where topographic coverage is either poor or completely absent.