The technologies of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have seen extremely rapid development in recent years. UAV technologies are being developed much faster than the means of their legislation. There have been many means of UAV detection and neutralization proposed in recent research; nonetheless, all of them have serious disadvantages. The essential problems in the detection of UAVs is the small size of UAVs, weak radio wave reflection, weak radio signal, and sound emitting. The main problem of conventional UAV countermeasures is the short detection and neutralization range. The authors propose the concept of the airborne counter-UAV platform (consisting of several vehicles) with radar. We use a low-cost marine radar with a high resolution 2 m wide antenna, embedded into the wing. Radar scanning is implemented by changing the heading of the aircraft. For the countermeasures, the authors suggest using a small rotorcraft UAV carried by a bigger fixed-wing one. A mathematical model that allows the calculation of the coordinates of the detected drone while scanning the environment in a moving UAV with radar was created. Furthermore, the results of integrated radar performance with a detected drone and the results of successful neutralization experiments of different UAVs were achieved.

The development of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) technologies provides not only benefits but also threats. UAV technologies are developing faster than means of detecting and neutralizing them. Radar technology is one of the means of UAV detection which provides the longest detection range. Today’s market provides low-cost solid-state marine radar working on FMCW and pulse-compression principles of operation. Despite such radars having attractive features, they were not designed for UAV detection. Although they are not optimal, they could be used for UAV detection. The detection possibility of UAVs by marine radars was investigated by using three types of radars and two types of small UAVs as targets. Radar cross-section measurements of the targets were made in laboratory conditions.

Some models of marine radars are light-weight enough and thus are attractive for potential applications when arranged on UAVs. Elevating a marine radar to high altitudes provides a much wider field of view, however, this could lead to a higher radio interference level. The practical estimation of the radio interferences affecting the solid-state FMCW marine radar at altitudes up to 120 m was the main objective of this contribution. A rotary-wing octocopter UAV was developed and built for the experiments. Two different kinds of interferences were observed at higher altitudes. Ray-like interferences were caused by signals, which are received by the radar’s antenna. Circle-like interferences appear due to the low frequency interfering signal directly penetrating the detector due to insufficient receiver screening.