Anniversary – First radar system deployed at Budapest-Ferihegy airport

50 year anniversary on 6 May 2009

Those who visit Budapest Ferihegy airport these days see a very different facility from what it had been in 1959. If arriving on one of the low fare carriers, you do pass through the original terminal (Terminal 1) but it has changed quite a bit even though an effort was made to preserve the original at least on the inside.
But 1959 was a significant year mainly for air traffic control. On 6 May a radar system was commissioned, the first ever in Hungary used for civilian traffic.

There were actually two radars, both Soviet made (of course…). They were also military hardware, an ORL-5M terminal radar (also called the P-10 after its display units) and a PRL-5M approach radar (the granddaddy of what would later become the real PAR, Precision Approach Radar). The whole set-up carried the designation OPRL-5M and was housed in four military style vans. Two vans for the radars, two vans for the generators. With parts of the system designated top secret, the whole caboodle was closely guarded  and maintenance staff needed special clearance to come anywhere near it.
In time these relics gave way to more modern technology like the Plessey AR-1 Terminal Radar commissioned in April 1966 and the Tesla built PAR several years later. Interesting detail from the time: air traffic control was part of Malev, the Hungarian airline company… kind of like having the traffic police as part of a taxi outfit. As you can imagine, some of the internal influences were about the same.

The Budapest Area Control Centre (ACC) had to wait until 1978 before procedural control could be replaced with radar… of sorts, but that is another story.
P. S. Here is a photo of the IL-14 that went uip in flames… (as mentioned by our contributor jozsi in his comment below). The insurance money was used to buy the new Plessey AR-1 system and also to send a number of controllers for training in the UK.