MIDAS III: Analogue Clutter Mitigation System (ACMS)

The rotating blades of a wind turbine mimic the radar signatures of aircraft targets that the radars are designed to detect, so they can appear in the radar picture as areas of clutter. For a small wind farm, or one with widely spaced turbines, the MIDAS III can improve the safety of the radar service by mitigating the effects of turbine clutter at the point of display.

Key features

• Downstream of all radar and display processing.
• Solution is in the Video Domain.
• Non-computational high speed logic processing (FPGA hardware).
• Based on transition and clutter zones, using colour detection.
• Toggles between two modes:
  • Continuous clutter sampling and removal (clear air).
  … OR …
  • Historic clutter removal (target crossing).
• All SSR and Mode S target classes are unaffected.

Specification

Mitigation clutter method

Left: The diagrams show areas of clutter caused by the moving blades of individual wind turbines.

Centre: By detecting the clutter in clear air dimming the clutter, distractions are reduced.

Right: By applying the clear air clutterwhen an airicraft passes over the clutter it clarifies the radar presentation, although aircraft targets will have small gaps.