ATC Radar Displays

[Col. Walter E. Kurtz]

Do ATC radar displays also display Weather returns overlaid on the display?

If so, which stations do this eg Approach, Departure, Director, Tower enroute etc. And how far out (eg range etc)

OR is it a seperate wx radar system and how is that accessed by the controllers??

Any and all info well appreciated!!

[HEATHROW DIRECTOR]

Weather information is suppressed from radar displays at major ATC units in the UK. At the London Terminal Control Centre, which provides approach and departure control for the major London airfields, there is access to a display providing historical and forecast pictures from the UK Met Office but this is not realtime radar. This information is not available at any operational position but can be viewed on the "supervisor's" desk.

[flower]

If the weather is extreme we can see some weather returns but they are not that accurate and they certainly do not show them all.

[Col. Walter E. Kurtz]

Thanks for the replies. I meant to ask if there were any actual weather radar overlaid or incorporated in or onto the traffic radar displays.

Please continue, folks.

[almost professional]

most of the time most of the weather returns are suppresed, however we can bring up the weather quite easily, and if its looking like a problem then we do leave one display with the returns on to help give us an idea of whats going on

[vector4fun]

Col. Kurtz,

(nice handle)

Depends on the Country and radar system being used. My experience is in U.S. terminal radar, yes, we have six-level weather radar available on our 'scopes. Caveat, we can only display TWO of those levels at one time. What that means in very general terms is, for example, in bad weather, I'll set up lvl 2 returns as a faint echo, and lvl 3 and above as a strong echo, Ignoring lvl 1 returns. That generally works well.
I've worked with ARTS IIIA and IIE and ASR-9. (Years ago, the old ASR-4&5s were less reliable in weather)

Over to the side of the scopes, at my facility, we have a Doppler processor display which displays all six levels in color, whcih I can refer to. It also displays possible microbursts and windshear.

If/when we get the STARS system, which has a color display, we'll be able to display all six levels at once on our 'scopes, but I haven't enough experience with actually operating STARS to know if that's optimal from an operational sense. I've only played around with a test system.

Somebody from a U.S. Enroute Center can provide a better discription of their capabilities, (paging Mr. Voigt), but they generally don't have the accuracy of a terminal system on their 'scopes, and in fact, I believe, some of their long range radar sites have no primary radar capability, hence, no WX. On the other hand, they do have some good WX displays available near by the control positions.

[CUNIM]

Wx need not be suppressed if a transparent layer is used that underlies the aircraft returns. Weather information used to be suppressed because it interfered with the aircraft position info, but no longer if you use a decent display software.

If anyone wants a demo, then email me thro this site and I'll send you a Macromedia Flash animation demonstrating this. It has been used for the past three years in a country in Europe and is left on as it does not interfere with the control function.

Lesson for NERC and Maastricht - use a decent display software and problems disappear.

Re V4fun I can put all six layers on mine without interfering with data above or below the WX layer. Anyone who is interested - come to ATC Maastricht 18th - 20th Feb for a demo. I can also demo see through and control thro windows - why have supplementary windows that obscure the underlying traffic - see it under the perfectly readable data and address it directly thro the active window. (Demo'd last year - on a simulator this year))

[Col. Walter E. Kurtz]

Thanks guys for your replies. I am looking specifically for answers with regard to the systems used in Australia....but all replies are enlightening and helpful.

V4FUN made mention about enroute controllers not having access to primary radar units. Now, does this imply that stations utilising primary as well as secondary radar facilities (such as ina major TMA) can read wx returnsas well as A/c skin paints?

[willadvise]

In Aus every controller has access to a METRAD. See ERSA GEN 3.3 2.12 (http://www.airservicesaustralia.com/pilotcentre/aip/aip/gen/33121.pdf) for more info. TAAAAATS does have the ability to show wx returns from Primary radars but on the short occasions this ability has been switched on, the controllers found it distracting and of little use for weather avoidance. I long ago gave up trying to use any system to help me out. The pilots have the most up-to-date information and they will tell you what they want so you learn to deal with weather as it comes. Trying to preempt them, I have found, is a waste of time.

[Scott Voigt]

Hi Col;

Well here is the low down in the US <G>... It depends on the type of radar and processor you are equipped with as well as what sort of display you have.

In the older facilities with ASR 7 and 8 radars, all they get is a primary radar return with one level of weather.

The ASR 9 sites and soon hopefully ASR 11 sites are digital (doppler) radars which can differentiate 6 levels of weather, but if you have an old FDADS type display, you are only going to be able to actually display two levels, but then what you don't see, or a shaddow, will actually tell you the third level. If you have an ASR 9 or 11 with something called WSP, AND you have either the new STARS display, or an ARTS Color Display, then you get all six levels of weather in color since these are color displays. This is the BEST display of weather since the WSP gives the doppler digital radars an accuracy almost as good as the NEXRAD doppler weather radar and it updates every six seconds.

The enroute folks for DECADES had primary weather radar returns that were digitized and put on the scope with lines for moderate precip returns, and then H's for heavy precipitation returns. The problem with this was that our radar was designed to filter out precip so as to see aircraft better. We also have MTI turned on around the radar sites, so normally within about 40 or so miles around the antenna, you aren't going to see any weather unless it is being painted from another radar site that is being used by the system.

The good news though is that we have over 2/3's of our enroute centers equipped with NEXRAD now. This takes the WSR-88D doppler weather radars and transposes them on our ATC radar display. We only see three levels of precipitation. We have moderate and then two levels of heavy. NEXRAD actually shows 16 levels of weather, but we have filtered it way down. We also filter out the first couple of levels of precip to cut down on the ground clutter around the NEXRAD sites.

regards

[Col. Walter E. Kurtz]

Thanks for your time, folks.......