FLORAKO

FLORAKO is a Swiss radar system for air surveillance of military and civil aviation. The acronym now stands for Florida Radar replacement air radar system capable communication system in the initial phase of the project meant the name FLORES RALUS KOMSYS and emerged from the project name of the subsystems.

Procurement

The FLORAKO system was introduced in the Swiss Air Force on 2 February 2004. It replaces the older FLORIDA airspace surveillance system, which dated from the 1970s. The acquisition costs amounted to approximately 728 million Swiss francs. The four radar sites to Pilate, Scopi, white horn and Weissflue are classified and therefore not publicly available. Supplier of the system was ThalesRaytheonSystems, a joint venture between Raytheon Company and Thales SA From ThalesRaytheonSystems and the further expansion of the system was delivered to 2008 and carried out further updates of the system.

Technology

The FLORAKO radar system is used for air defense. It consists of a primary radar in semiconductor technology, a secondary radar and subsystems for simulation. The FLORAKO delivers 3D target information in real time, correlated with secondary surveillance radar data over a large detection area. The FLORAKO constantly working with an up to 15 revolutions per minute rotating phased array antenna. The FLORAKO is a modified version of the requirements for Swiss radars Master A and Master M Thales. In addition to the data of the FLORAKO radar stations and the data of the mobile TAFLIR radar installations and the civilian Skyguide radar data can be fed into the FLORAKO system.

The FLORAKO system also includes the MIDS Link 16 can be exchanged with the data, then a vehicle equipped with Link -16 aircraft with its radar valleys that are not viewed by the FLORAKO, scan and feed the radar tracks directly on the FLORAKO ads. Conversely, the air layer in the 360 ° radius is displayed thanks to the FLORAKO data in a vessel equipped with Link -16 aircraft. Also, other data such as fuel level or air defense positions can be exchanged. The Link -16 FLORAKO is designed so that each aircraft can be integrated with the correct MIDS -Key. Thus, in a joint mission also data eg with French AWACS aircraft (Boeing E-3) can be exchanged. To calibrate the FLORAKO system ( RADAR, Link16, MIDS, aeronautical ) the Armasuisse has an equipped with the appropriate systems Pilatus PC -12 with the civilian registration HB -FOG.