The using of radar by sea-river ships in inland navigation on lower part of Odra River

The sea-river navigation consists on ships manoeuvring on inland waters to ports, which are situated sometimes a few hundredths kilometres inside to land. On polish waters, the sea-river shipping is possible mainly on Odra, Wisła and Warta rivers. Such shipping is much advanced on water areas of Swinoujscie, Police and Szczecin ports. The leading of safely navigation requires first of all the high accuracy ship's positioning to avoid the contact with fixed objects and other ships. Therefore, the requirements for position accuracy are much stricter than those in open sea and offshore navigation. The radar is one of the basic devices, which facilitates safe navigation in various conditions-especially in reduced visibility. The basic information for the navigator is presented on the display screen. Presently, the display commonly used on board sea-going ships and other sailing craft is the type ,,P" display (PPI-Plan Position Indicator). The exploitation restrictions of radar can caused some problems in detection, discrimination and presenting of situation during navigation on inland water areas. There is possibility to shipping of sea-river ships to the ports in lower part of Odra river. The paper presents some problems of using the radar in inland navigation on these area. The results of real research will be showed.