Narrative:

While working the west radar scope I completely lost radar. My radar screen went black for approximately two seconds and then came back on showing TRACON airspace and secondary targets. My radar had changed to modes and I was unable to select fusion mode. At the time I had 4 aircraft in the final airspace/box within 6 miles from one another. All aircraft were issued appropriate altitudes prior to losing radar contact to ensure separation and right before losing radar I was able to apply merging target procedures per the faah 7110.65. When I regained radar; it wasn't usable in a timely manner and I had to slide over to an adjacent scope to continue working traffic. No other scope had issues to my knowledge.it was my understanding that at the time of this occurrence maintenance was working on the radar to some extent. Maintenance seemed to be surprised after hearing me state 'I lost radar.' I was later told the error was a 'no user' issue and explained that it wasn't anyone's direct fault. Regardless; this is unacceptable. Luckily; I was able to utilize the adjacent scope during a moderate traffic session to continue running final traffic with overlapping approaches. I'm not sure what caused this event and I'm not sure why I was unable to obtain an answer. This was not a good time to lose radar; even if momentarily. It also shouldn't be a surprise to maintenance that is possible radar could be lost for the work they are conducting. Due to this I'm unable to recommend anything in regards to preventing a re-occurrence.

Google
 

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: GSO TRACON Controller reported the radar scope went blank for a few seconds.

Narrative: While working the West Radar scope I completely lost radar. My radar screen went black for approximately two seconds and then came back on showing TRACON airspace and secondary targets. My radar had changed to modes and I was unable to select Fusion mode. At the time I had 4 aircraft in the final airspace/box within 6 miles from one another. All aircraft were issued appropriate altitudes prior to losing radar contact to ensure separation and right before losing radar I was able to apply merging target procedures per the FAAH 7110.65. When I regained radar; it wasn't usable in a timely manner and I had to slide over to an adjacent scope to continue working traffic. No other scope had issues to my knowledge.It was my understanding that at the time of this occurrence maintenance was working on the radar to some extent. Maintenance seemed to be surprised after hearing me state 'I lost radar.' I was later told the error was a 'no user' issue and explained that it wasn't anyone's direct fault. Regardless; this is unacceptable. Luckily; I was able to utilize the adjacent scope during a moderate traffic session to continue running final traffic with overlapping approaches. I'm not sure what caused this event and I'm not sure why I was unable to obtain an answer. This was not a good time to lose radar; even if momentarily. It also shouldn't be a surprise to maintenance that is possible radar could be lost for the work they are conducting. Due to this I'm unable to recommend anything in regards to preventing a re-occurrence.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.