The tower for the Rainbow Radar has been fabricated and is now on its way to the site, with installation planned for later this week.

The dome will be installed in October, and until then a temporary cover will be placed over the top platform.

Dr Andrew Tupper, State Manager - Victoria, BoM, said that this is an exciting milestone.

“This is an exciting and very important milestone in the Rainbow Radar project. The fabrication of the 22-metre cylindrical Australian made steel tower made is now complete.

“The tower will be delivered to the Rainbow site over the next couple of days. Weighing a hefty 32 tonnes, it will be transported in three sections and once on site, the tower will be erected by two cranes,” Dr Tupper said.

See the bottom of this article for photos of the tower sections ready for transport.

“Radars are well known for their iconic ‘golf ball’ domes – the one on the Rainbow radar is due to be installed in October. The dome will add an extra five metres to the height of the structure – so, in total the radar will stand 27 metres high.

“I’m pleased to say that the project is still on track to be delivered by April 2020 and we anticipate great benefits to the local community through the improvement of real-time weather information.

“The installation of the radar itself and then the testing of the equipment will still take some time, but getting the tower up shows great progress is being made.”

Below: The Bureau’s maintenance technicians will be able to access the dome by climbing a spiral staircase located inside the tower.