The anomalous tropospheric propagation due to extreme superrefraction of radio waves (known also as ducting) has significant influence on radar and communication systems working in microwave range. Up to the last decade tropospheric ducting has been considered rather an unwanted phenomenon as it causes multipath propagation (with all related impairments on communications systems), missed target detection for radars, unexpected interference between different microwave systems working in the same range, etc. The tropospheric ducting mechanism is more typical for coastal and maritime areas than over land. On the other hand, the coastal and maritime areas are known to cause difficulties in planning and designing of the communications links due to the high environmental variability there. During the last years, the development of accurate operational propagation prediction/assessment models and the increasing improvement in meteorological data collection and environmental models gave rise to the idea of making use of the most common effect of ducting, namely, the long-range radio waves propagation leading to signal enhancement near and beyond the radio horizon. This paper aims at outlining the state, achievements and limitations in the usage of tropospheric ducting mechanism to maintain efficient coastal communications links. Reliability of such links from physical layer point of view, advantages and disadvantages of operational propagation and environmental models will be discussed.