Error analyses of a multistatic meteor radar system to obtain a 3-dimensional spatial resolution distribution

Abstract. In recent years, the concept of multistatic meteor radar systems has attracted the attention of the atmospheric radar community, focusing on the mesosphere and lower thermosphere (MLT). Recently, there have been some notable experiments using multistatic meteor radar systems (Chau et al., 2019; Spargo et al., 2019; Stober and Chau, 2015; Stober et al., 2018). Good spatial resolution is vital for meteor radars because nearly all parameter inversion processes rely on the accurate location of the meteor trail reflecting points. It is timely then for a careful discussion focussed on the error distribution of multistatic meteor radar systems. In this study, we discuss the measurement errors that affect the spatial resolution and obtain the resolution distribution in 3-dimensional space for the first time. The spatial resolution distribution can both help design a multistatic meteor radar system and improve the performance of existing radar systems. Moreover, the spatial resolution distribution allows the accuracy of retrieved parameters such as the wind field to be determined.