During the Falklands War Ken Perry had the idea that low flying aircraft could be detected using Over The Horizon Radar. A Marconi project was established at Writtle Road in a Portakabin, and a Prototype Radar built at a remote location on the east coast.
There are two main types of OTHR:
- Surface Wave which uses the salinity of the sea and
- Sky Wave that uses the Ionosphere
Ken's system was Surface Wave. In 1985 following a completion of a contract with Lockheed Aircraft, I was invited to join Ken Perry and his small team that consisted of John Bodonyi, Richard Topliss, Ted Pegram, Alan Batchelor, and Ian Sturley.
They had decided to continue with the R&D following the end of the war with the aim of marketing a completed product. The Marconi sales team of Mike Smith , Les Pickard and Ted Sissons were anxious this should occur.
The Ministry of Defence took a great deal of interest in how we were progressing and there were a number of visits between Writtle Road and Whitehall. The RAF also made some low-level sorties using the Nimrod and Canberra aircraft, however I must say we were not overjoyed at the result.
Enquiries from India and the Gulf states had not proved positive so prior to his retirement Ted Sissons went on a tour of the Far East that included Australia and New Zealand.
The departments allocated money reached a level where staff reduction was required and as a consequence I left to join Ben Wassel on the Yugoslavian project. Then I left Writtle Road and was out in the field updating the RAF radars on UKADGE.
I returned in 1991 when Marconi had secured a Sky Wave contract with Australia who decided to cover the vast area required and looking into the Pacific Ocean with OTHR. It should be noted you can place the whole of Europe within the borders of Australia. The project was named Jindalee Over the Horizon Network (JORN). Jindalee is an Aboriginal word meaning Bare Bones.
The project was headed by Colin Mc Crea and Terry Soam. Australia had just introduced their 1991 Health and Safety Act so safety was a high priority and Colin asked if I would be the JORN Product Safety Engineer. My first task was to write a System Safety Plan and I am grateful for the help of Brian Burgess in providing some of the documentation.
Once the plan was finished, I went to the Australian Ministry of Defence in Canberra for a meeting. One thing I like about the Australians is that they call a spade a spade and one fellow at the head of the table said we do not want any BS in these documents. So how was I going to ensure meaningful safety in the hundreds of items containing thousands of components? The answer to this question is by using Hazard Analysis and Risk Assessment.
JORN was made up of Hardware and Software Engineers from Radar, Comms and Baddow each responsible for specific equipment so they needed to identify the hazards and level of risk using the criteria I provided them with. We were then able to take measures to reduce the risk to an acceptable level and place into a document entitled Hazard Analysis.
There were also other documents that dealt with occupational health issues. Prior to the equipment being passed I gave a safety presentation to the Australian team at Eastwood House. There were thirty-six High Power Amplifiers built at New Street headed by Stuart that were very large and contained many units. The audit was completed by a person who had not worked on it in case something had been overlooked. There were hundreds of receivers housed in racks in metal containers below ground level and Malcolm Mack was responsible for the prototype.
The prototype was above ground in a back yard at Marconi Marine. Placing the heavy items up and into the hatch was no easy feat.
Apart from the equipment safety, consideration had to be given to the spiders and snakes. The receiver containers and the transmitter cooling void were an ideal habitat for these. Radon Gas was also a factor. Safety required a two man operation, one remaining outside.
A small device used by the Fire Brigade was recommended that sounded an alarm if a person became horizontal in the container. There were red back spiders that have a nasty bite. The large Orb and the Huntsman which had the habit of getting in open windows of cars and hiding behind the sun visor and had caused accidents by dropping onto a person's lap while driving.
I have only covered small parts of this project that included staff from many areas. Part of my brief was Human Factors Engineering that has a close link to the safety element, due to weight and equipment handling and other aspects. However that is another story.