Air traffic control radar
Fixed radar stations that are used to monitor civil air traffic are referred to as air traffic control radar .
They are panoramic radar systems with large cylinder or parabolic antennas, which are usually erected on mountain tops and protected from the weather by a radome . The antennas have ranges of a few 100 kilometers and generally rotate. A. 6 times per minute. Such radar stations are required approximately every 300 km for area-wide air traffic control . In the mountains, however, there are blind spaces even when the station is denser.
The systems that used to be mostly operated as primary radar are now equipped with an additional secondary radar. This secondary radar sends inquiry pulses to the aircraft detected by the primary radar, which are actively responded to by means of transponders . As a result, in addition to the position of the air targets and the flight speed (which can be calculated from the movement of the radar echo) , the air traffic controllers also have the flight altitude and the identification of the aircraft at their disposal.
There are en-route radar , approach radar ( airport surveillance radar ) and ground radar for different control areas .
literature
- Albrecht K. Ludloff: Practical knowledge of radar and radar signal processing. 1st edition, Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden, Wiesbaden 1998, ISBN 978-3-663-12326-2 .
Web links
- Interface description for land radar systems of air navigation radio (accessed on September 21, 2015)
- Radar locations