Orolia upgrades US SAR ground stations
Orolia has successfully installed the first operational Cospas-Sarsat second-generation beacon (SGB) signal-processing capabilities technology on search and rescue (SAR) ground stations for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Florida and Hawaii, US
Orolia, which provides GNSS-based systems for defence and commercial industries around the world, has successfully installed the first operational Cospas-Sarsat second-generation beacon (SGB) signal-processing capabilities technology on search and rescue (SAR) ground stations for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in Florida and Hawaii, US. This advancement will allow the ground stations to locate the source of distress signals much faster and more accurately.
The NOAA ground stations in Florida and Hawaii are the only Medium Earth Orbit Search and Rescue ground stations in the world that are ready to be operated and have received the SGB signal specification capability.
“The work performed by Orolia was exceptional, as the process of upgrading an operational system to a higher set of requirements, years after its initial design, involves minimising downtime while validating the new requirements and revalidating the previous requirements,” said Mickey Fitzmaurice, NOAA SARSAT Systems Engineer. “The successful result makes it obvious that the engineering and operations team at Orolia put a great deal of time and effort into planning the upgrade, as the execution was seamless.”
Also referencing Orolia’s launch of a Galileo-enabled personal locater beacon and commission of the first two nodal LEOSAR-GEOSAR-MEOSAR (LGM) mission control centres, Director of SARSAT Operations Steve Ludwig said: “This series of world firsts demonstrates Orolia’s broad technical leadership in the global SAR ecosystem. We continually innovate to enhance the usefulness of these technologies, from generating encrypted beacon alert signals to including alert authentication through the use of Galileo Return Link Service.”