Offshore Wind Farm Helicopter Search and Rescue Trials

14 Results of the radar observations

The following photograph shows the radar display with the helicopter response outside the wind farm boundary, close to number 1 turbine, at the Southwest corner of the site. In this position it is clearly identified.

However it could not be successfully tracked within the wind farm by either of the two radars used by the MCA, or by the Anatec radar which was also at Gwaenysgor carrying out a vessel traffic survey.

The radar display shows the strong return from the structures, the returned echoes of each turbine being displayed in azimuth in an arc approximately 800 metres in length and 100 metres in depth. The helicopter response was considerably less than those of the turbines and automatic tracking was not able to lock on to this target.

This supports the findings of the first trials undertaken at North Hoyle (Ref 1)

Fig 26 : Positions of the mobile radar and the BHP Billiton radar head