Due to the wavelength-resolution characteristics, wavelength-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is considered for the change detection application aiming to achieve high detection probability and low false alarm rate. However, wavelength-resolution SAR change detection suffers from the problems caused by specular reflection of the elongated structure in the SAR scene, the dependency of radar cross-section on incident angle of electromagnetic wave, the interference due to antenna backlobe and so forth. Hardware and software solutions are therefore desired to deal with these problems. The authors propose to change flight heading during passes as a natural solution. The proposed solution is tested with the CARABAS data using a typical SAR change detection method. The achieved change detection results show the good performance of the proposed solution, for example, the detection probability is up to 100% with the false alarm rate of 0.5 per square kilometre. © 2021 The Authors. IET Radar, Sonar & Navigation published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of The Institution of Engineering and Technology.