Radar uses radio waves, and radio waves are a lot like
light. If someone shines a flashlight at you, you can see where it’s coming from, right? With the right kind of sensing equipment (kind of like a camera), you can “see” the radio waves used by radar.
When radar systems are scanning for a target, it’s like shining a light around a room looking for a hidden person. When you spot something interesting, you pint the light directly at the target. This is equivalent to what happens when a radar system “locks on” to a target. The radio waves go from flashes to a near continuous beam.
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