High Frequency – Over The Horizon Radar (vHF – OTHR) is a multi–purpose system, designed primarily for vessel detection and tracking well beyond the horizon. The system is used for the coverage of the entire Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), where the country has exclusive rights for fishing, mining, drilling, etc. (up to 200 nautical miles (NM) from the shore). This protection far exceeds the reach of microwave radars and camera systems which require line of sight of the target; enabling efficient and accurate protection of the EEZ. Still for covering entire coastline integration of all mentioned sensors is desirable.
This professional radar system (with separated transmit and receive antenna arrays) utilizes advanced signal processing. The VHF-OTHR system provides outstanding features like:
• Fast and accurate software beam-forming.
• “Quiet” and low-noise non-interrupted Frequency-Modulated Continuous-Wave (FMCW) operation mode. This mode allows continuous system operation which provides extremely long ranges without blind zones, high reliability and data availability.
• Integrates with AIS, providing ship information.
• Software automatically alerts operators of any pre-defined suspicious activity.
• The system is designed using state of the art hardware and software components and operates completely autonomously.
The FMCW operation mode provides data up to a maximal nominal range of 200NM without blind spots. The range depends on operating frequency, target size and orientation, and environmental conditions (sea state and radio fading and interference). The following table showing a maximum range depending of different ship size and operating conditions.