Synthetic Aperture Radar is a well-known radar system used in various fields such as remote sensing, target detection, and environment monitoring. An SAR system commonly operates by transmitting a train of pulsed radio signals from a platform located on an airborne vehicle and then using the return signal reflected off a target object to derive detailed characteristics of the target object, such as its shape, displacement, distance, etc. In general, SAR provides better resolution, i.e., higher resolution images, than optical remote sensing systems since SAR does not have to resolve individual features of a target object. Furthermore, SAR has the ability to produce consistent images over a wide field of view. Unfortunately, SAR systems can be adversely affected by bad weather conditions such as rain, hail, fog, and other visibility-reducing conditions. The existence of bad weather affects the ability of the airborne platform to receive signals reflected from a target object and hence disrupts an SAR system's ability to provide useful target information. Further, airborne weather radar systems have been developed that are capable of measuring atmospheric conditions, such as visibility. While such airborne weather radar systems may be used to help determine a period of good visibility for the airborne platform, the weather information provided by the weather radar system alone does not provide detailed information regarding a particular target object that may be viewed by an SAR system. It would therefore be desirable to provide a technique that would allow SAR systems to accurately and consistently estimate a period of time that the target object may be visible. It would be further desirable to provide a technique that could provide the SAR system with detailed information about a target object's visibility to the SAR system. In addition, it would be desirable to provide a technique for deriving visibility information from a satellite based weather system. Furthermore, other desirable features and characteristics of the present invention will become apparent from the subsequent detailed description and the appended claims, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings and the foregoing technical field and background.