China is in a very seismically active area and has had many catastrophic earthquakes during its history. A joint European-Chinese team is using satellite radar data to monitor ground deformation across major continental faults in China to understand better the seismic cycle and how faults behave.
Using Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite data and a technique known as SAR Interferometry (InSAR), along with GPS data, scientists participating in ESA’s Dragon 2 Programme have been able to measure the ground deformation that occurred during the Wenchuan earthquake that struck China’s Sichuan Province last May.
InSAR involves combining two or more radar images of the same ground location in such a way that very precise measurements – down to a scale of a few centimetres or even millimetres in some cases – can be made of any ground motion taking place between image acquisitions.
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