• Indra is the world pioneer in the inclusion of 3D radars to manage civil air traffic. 
• It’s now deploying these systems at critical points for air navigation both in Europe and now in Asia. 
• Their main advantage: they don’t have to rely on the information transmitted by aircraft to determine their position. The reliability and accuracy they provide enables them to manage a greater number of flights

1 March 2022, Spain 

Indra will implement the first 3D civil aviation radar to enter into service throughout Asia in South Korea to reinforce air safety on one of the busiest and most complex routes to manage in the world: the A593 airway, which connects Japan with China and South Korea, and is the gateway for flights from North America.

This route crosses the China Sea from east to west and is itself traversed by the air corridor that connects Korea with all the East Asian countries and Indonesia.

The company will install this long-range 3D radar on the Korean island of Jeju. The reliability and accuracy of these systems can enhance safety on routes with a high volume of traffic such as this one, as well as in cities with several airports or areas in which the presence of wind farms generates interference with conventional radars.

The system will operate in combination with a fully digitalized secondary radar and an ADS-B surveillance system that collects the information automatically sent by aircraft in flight. The merging of all the data provided by Indra’s sensors will offer a much more precise vision and improve safety. 

Three-dimensional radars are the only ones capable of completely independently determining the altitude at which an aircraft is flying, unlike traditional ones, which interrogate the aircraft to collect this information. 

They’re radars that electronically sweep the entire airspace they’re monitoring with hundreds of independent energy pulses. “It’s as if multiple radars were working in coordination to determine the longitude, latitude and elevation of each aircraft”, the company explains. 

With a range of over 220 miles, the system will reinforce surveillance to the south of the island of Jeju and reach as far as the Atoti point, where the Korean controllers hand over the flights to their Chinese counterparts.

The signal’s advanced digital processing will allow operations under the most extreme weather conditions, eliminating noise and interference to ensure the very best vision. 

This is the third radar that Indra has installed on the island of Jeju, having previously installed a secondary radar and later a primary 2D approach radar. The company also won a major contract in Korea in 2015 to modernize the navigation, surveillance and air traffic management systems at Incheon Airport in Seoul.

Indra is the world pioneer in the deployment of 3D radars suited to the needs of civil aviation. The company is implementing these systems in some of the most advanced countries in terms of air navigation.