Early in this blog, I made a post concerning radar tracking by naval vessels that may have been close to the flight path of the aircraft. I did not receive a reply from anyone at the time and maybe you could answer the question: would naval vessels be able to track the aircraft using primary returns and, if so, what would be the range if the aircraft remained at a FL greater than FL200?
I was assuming that there would have been some naval vessels, from various countries, operating somewhere in the area believed to have been overflown by the aircraft.
Staggerwing
I absolutely don't know. But I am sure there are some people here who have experience with naval radar ops. However, the radar ist the same, the differences are in the analysis behind. Due to mountaineous terrain our assets were actually adapted navel equipment.
I am sure they could have tracked the aircraft, the problem is more how they could have identified it positively or communicated with someone about it without reveiling their identity.