Blue Fox was developed to a Royal Navy requirement for a radar to equip the British Aerospace Sea Harrier FRS.1.

[5] Following the Argentinian invasion of the Falkland Islands in April 1982, the British Government dispatched a naval task force to the South Atlantic, including two aircraft carriers, each carrying a Sea Harrier squadron.

The leadership of 800 Squadron had experienced difficulties with the Blue Fox radar and took the view that it was useless, discounting Ward's claims that the equipment performed better than Ferranti had predicted.

[6] A Ferranti engineer joined the task force at Ascension Islands, primarily to fix a problem with seawater ingress into the radome, but was also able to retune 800 Squadron's radars.

[8] However, in moderate sea states, the Blue Fox was found to be useful in the surface search mode, being able to detect a warship at a range of 100 nautical miles (190 km).