If a target that was shadowed becomes visible again, what should ARPA operators do to maintain accurate tracking?

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When a target you’ve been tracking is shadowed and then becomes visible again, you should reacquire to re-establish the track and confirm the updated data. Reacquiring links the new radar measurements to the existing track, updating range, bearing, course, speed, and the predicted position. This maintains track continuity and ensures the tracker uses the latest information, which is crucial in busy radar scenarios to avoid misidentification or drifting estimates. If you simply keep following the old data without reacquiring, the system may extrapolate from stale information and lose accuracy when the target reappears. Ignoring or stopping the track would break continuity, and switching to AIS-only would ignore the radar-derived motion data for that target. Reacquiring keeps the track current and trusted.