Nordic Radar Solutions develops next-generation advanced radar-based systems for military and civilian aviation applications.
Passenger traffic has been growing over the last five years, with some regions doubling their passenger numbers. Despite the Covid-19 pandemic restricting travel, forecasts show that the crisis will only temporarily stall the growing trend. However, the challenges for airport authorities and airlines remain, with safety threats to passengers, crew and aircraft affected by:
- Foreign object debris (FOD) on runways and taxiways
- Bird-aircraft strike hazards (BASH)
- Growing number of drones around airports
Due to the significant impact accidents or incidents can have, best practices and technologies are continually being adopted to mitigate any risks to safety of flight (SOF). Airports now rely on vehicle patrols to carry out runway inspections, but they have their limitations, including poor visibility and inconsistency of personnel performance. Vehicle patrols also impose closure of the runway during inspection.
Alternatively, radar-based solutions are used at some airports but these can be expensive with limited features such as limited coverage without bird detection capabilities.
Advanced FOD and wildlife radar detection system for airports
Nordic Radar Solutions created the foreign object debris and bird-aircraft strike avoidance (FODBASA) system, developing it on a high-precision radar and one or more detection cameras across airports.
FODBASA is designed to supplement or replace existing procedures and systems used at airports worldwide to counter these risks. It is a multi-sensor system that can detect drones, FOD and wildlife that ranges from birds in-flight or on the ground, as well as any other animals that can threaten the safety of airport operations.
Accurate Ka-band radar system for airport runways and airfields
The ability to detect small FOD is a key requirement for airport safety applications but it can pose a challenge for a standard radar system. To provide detection capability for such small objects, the FODBASA radar operates in Ka-band frequency, with a radar signal wavelength of approximately 1cm.
Despite the complicated design and build of a Ka-band frequency system, we believe it provides clear performance advantages in the radar system, especially in aviation applications.
Separate antennas for high signal isolation
Our unique radar system makes use of separate transmit and receive antennas. This ensures very high isolation between the transmitted and received signal. Without this isolation, weak return signals from the very often small targets can be difficult to detect.
Both antennas are based on an innovative very low-loss slotted waveguide (SWG) array design, with inherent beam steering capability.
Airport FOD detection radar with 3D and 4D operation
The beams of the high-resolution antennas can be pointed in both elevation and azimuth, which means the radar can determine not only horizontal position, but also the height of the target, providing a 3D location. This can be fundamental to the airport safety application.
In addition, the radar is able to transmit multiple waveforms and process the received signals in the Doppler frequency spectrum. This means that the radar can measure the speed of targets, offering 4D radar.
This 4D detection capability significantly increases the ability to distinguish the target from objects that provide a radar return signal but are not a target of interest. For example, the radar has the ability to measure the Doppler frequency characteristics of a bird or a drone, which will distinguish such targets from the return signals that can be received from stationary targets. This enhances the chances of accurately detecting and classifying birds and drones.
For more information about the advanced Nordic Radar Solutions radar, fill out the enquiry form on this page.