# Presentation: 569451

## Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking (SARSAT) 

**Distress Alerting **
**Satellite System****(DASS)**

**Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking (SARSAT) **

## COSPAS-SARSAT

**COSPAS**** =****	****Cosmicheskaya Systyema Poiska Aariynyich Sudov **
**	****	*****Which loosely translates into: “The Space ******	******	******	******	******System for the Search of Vessels in Distress”***
**SARSAT**** =****	****Search And Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking**

**The Cospas-Sarsat Program protects life and property by providing accurate, timely, and reliable distress alert and location information to search and rescue authorities. **

## Cospas-Sarsat: Current System

**Notes:**
Current State: As depicted on slide:
1. An emergency satellite beacon is activated by a person in distress [EPIRBs (Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacons) are used on watercraft; ELTs  (Emergency Locator Transmitters) are used on aircraft; PLBs (Personal Locator Beacons) are used by persons in harsh environments (i.e. hiking, boating, snowmobiling)].
2. Signal from activated beacon transmits to the search and rescue satellites where it is processed. There are 9 active and 3 spare satellites in the system right now with several launches scheduled in 2008; 
3. Signals from the satellites are transmitted to ground stations located throughout the world. These stations are called Local User Terminals (LUTs); 67 are currently operational. 
4. LUTs send alerts to one or more of the 29 Mission Control Centers. In the U.S., the MCC is located in Suitland, MD, at NOAA’s Satellite Operations Facility. 
5. From the USMCC, SARSAT alerts are geographically sorted and automatically sent to the appropriate SAR authority—one of the USCG’s 11 Rescue Coordination Centers (RCCs) for maritime areas or the Air Force RCC (AFRCC) at Tyndall AFB for inland areas.
On average, satellite-aided SAR contributes to saving 300 persons in the U.S. and 1,300 persons internationally every year. Over 22,400 lives have been saved worldwide since 1982.

## Cospas-Sarsat Space Segment

**Cospas-Sarsat Space Segment**

**2 Types of Satellites:  **
***Low Earth Orbiting Search And Rescue (LEOSAR)- 5 on Orbit***
**	****-  Altitude: 500 miles in “Pole-Pole” orbit**
**	****-  Performs Doppler locating function (primary means of locating...not GPS)**
**	****-  Stores & Forwards alerts continuously for 48 hours (provides worldwide coverage and total system redundancy)**
***Geostationary Orbiting Search And Rescue (GEOSAR)- 4 on Orbit***
**	****-  Altitude: 23,000 miles in fixed orbit**
**	****-  Performs instantaneous alerting function.  No locating capability unless beacon is equipped with GPS.**
**	****-  Coverage from 70N – 70S****	**

**Notes:**
LEO at 850 km
GEO at 36,000 km

The USA meteorological satellites are placed in sun-synchronous, near-polar orbits at about 850 km altitude, and equipped with SAR instrumentation at 121.5 MHz and 406 MHz supplied by Canada and France.
Each satellite makes a complete orbit of the earth around the poles in about 100 minutes, traveling at a velocity of 7 km per second. The satellite views a "swath" of the earth of approximately 6000 km wide as it circles the globe, giving an instantaneous "field of view" about the size of a continent. When viewed from the earth, the satellite crosses the sky in about 15 minutes, depending on the maximum elevation angle of the particular pass.

## Typical Satellite Footprints

**Typical Satellite Footprints**

**LEO footprint**

## LEOLUTS and GEOLUTS

_**LEOSAR Local User Terminals**_
_**(LEOLUT) **_
**Track COSPAS and SARSAT satellites (POES & METOP)**
**Recover beacon signals**
**Perform error checking**
**Perform Doppler processing**
**Send alert to Mission Control Center**

_**GEOSAR Local User Terminals**_
_**(GEOLUT)**_*** ***
**Track GOES, MSG, & INSAT satellites**
**Recover beacon signals**
**Perform error checking**
**Send alert to Mission Control Center**

**LEOLUTS and GEOLUTS**

**(Cospas-Sarsat Ground Stations)**

## Mission Control Centres (MCCs)

**Receive alerts from national LUTs and foreign MCCs.**
**Validate, match and merge alerts to improve location accuracy and determine the correct destination.**
**Query 406 MHz Registration Database and transmit registration info with distress alert.**
**Transmit alerts (SIT msgs) to Rescue Coordination Centers (RCCs) and SAR Points of Contact (SPOC) and filters redundant data.  **
**Most MCC functions are handled automatically...no manual intervention = efficiency!**

***USMCC***
***Suitland, Maryland***

## Emergency Beacons

**Emergency Beacons**

**Two types: 121.5/243 MHz and 406 MHz **
**Four applications: **
**Emergency Position Indication Radio Beacons (EPIRB)  *****for Maritime Uses***
**Emergency Locator Transmitters (ELT) *****for Aviation Uses***
**Personal Locator Beacons (PLB)*****  for Remote Area Personal Use***
**Ship Security Alerting System (SSAS) *****for Shipboard Terrorism/Piracy Alerting (covert)***

## DASS

**More than 50K current military users**** **
**Government **users
**DEA, Secret Service, NASA, DOE, DOD, etc.**
**Most General Aviation (GA) aircraft require ELTs**
**More than 200,000 GA aircraft**
**600,000 pilots, 6-8 million passengers [annual]**
**31 million hours flown [annual]**
**Most commercial fishing vessels carry EPIRBs**
**Ranked one of the most hazardous occupations in U.S.; 150 deaths per 100,000 workers [annual]**
**12 million potential recreational users in the US**
**PLBs became commercially available 1 July 2003**

## DASS

- SARSAT on average, contributes to the rescue of 300 persons in the U.S. and 1,300 persons internationally
*CY 2007: 353 rescues*
*FY 2008: 308 rescues in the U.S. with SARSAT*
- Over 22,000 lives saved worldwide since 1982
- Anticipate more than 1 million distress beacons operational by 2010

**Notes:**
SARSAT has become an extremely successful, worldwide distress alerting system that currently supports more than 500K users in the U.S. and more than a million users globally.  Both of these numbers will continue to grow.
Although originally created as a civilian SAR system, SARSAT also supports the U.S. military in both combat and non-combat situations to meet personnel recovery objectives. Not only does the military operate aircraft with Emergency Locator Transmitters (ELTs) and ships with Emergency Position Indicating Radio Beacons (EPIRBs), but also Personal Locator Beacons (PLBs) have found their way to the warfighter. Emergency beacons are currently being used for distress situations in and out of combat; in all aspects of air, land and sea operations.

## Termination of 121.5/243 MHz 

**Satellite Alerting**

-   International Termination of 121.5/243 MHz Satellite Alerting Occurs On:
- 		 February 1, 2009
-    U.S. Termination of 121.5 MHz EPIRBs  - 3 Phases
-  Certification of new 121.5 EPIRBs ceased in 1999
-  Sales and manufacture of 121.5 MHz EPIRBs
- 		ceased on February 1, 2003
-  Operation/Use of 121.5 MHz EPIRBs became
*	**	*_*prohibited*_ on January 1, 2007
-    121.5 MHz ELTs will still be in use on general aviation aircraft after 	2009...Challenge, voluntary transition by pilots ASAP!

**Notes:**
2009 - a change is coming 
From February 2009 the Cospas-Sarsat satellite system will no longer process the 121.5 MHz frequency used by many distress beacons. The distress frequency used by the satellite network will be 406 MHz. 

The international council that controls the satellite system, Cospas-Sarsat, decided in October 2000 to cease processing 121.5 MHz analogue signals by satellite on 1 February 2009. From that date only 406 MHz beacons will be detected by satellite. The decision was made to reduce the chronically high false alarm rate from analogue distress beacons. Currently 97 percent of analogue distress beacon signals are false alarms.
In the United States there have been cases where pizza ovens and automatic teller machines have been detected emitting an analogue 121.5 MHz signal. 
The digital beacons transmit an identity code on the 406 MHz frequency that can be cross-referenced with a database of registered 406 MHz beacon owners. National databases include phone numbers, emergency contacts, information on the type of vessel, how many people it usually carries and other vital information that enable the right response to the emergency to be provided. On false alarms, it enables us to make a call to the registered beacon owner to see if he/she is in genuine distress or just has a beacon transmitting by accident. Many maritime false alarms occur because the switch on the distress beacon has been bumped on.

## Cospas-Sarsat Limitations

- Limited number of satellites. A single failure can cause an unacceptable gap in coverage
- Delays in confirmation of location. LEOs require at least 2 satellite passes to resolve ambiguity in Doppler location
- Long time interval between satellite passes. Delays calculation of distress beacon position and SAR service’s response to the distress

**Cospas-Sarsat Limitations**

**Notes:**
SARSAT currently consists of two different satellite constellations. Together they support a global distress alerting capability.
Low earth orbiting (LEO) satellites orbit at an altitude of 500 miles and circle the Earth every 100 minutes. Onboard receivers, provided by Canada and France, detect signals from activated distress beacons as the satellites pass overhead. The satellites relay the distress information to ground stations that, using Doppler technology, are able to process the information and calculates a beacon location.

## Cospas-Sarsat Limitations

- Unable to provide independent location information.
- A limited number of GEOs, if one satellite fails, SARSAT would be unable to provide real time coverage to a significant portion of the world.
- GEOs are in synchronized orbit; subject to terrain masking by terrestrial features that can prevent distress beacon visibility.

**Cospas-Sarsat Limitations**

**Notes:**
Geostationary satellites operate in a synchronized orbit 22,320 miles above the equator. This gives each satellite a fixed view of approximately one third of the planet ranging from 70 degrees north to 70 degrees south. Because GEO satellites coverage is constant, distress alerts are relayed almost instantaneously to ground stations.

## Cospas-Sarsat Limitations

- In addition to these limitations:** **
**	**
**	**French Govt has decided to provide only a limited number of SAR instruments in the future. Through NPOESS C2.
- 	The result will be a degradation of the current SARSAT service beginning in 2017 and complete failure by 2020.
- 	This will leave millions of beacon users without a means to signal a distress.

## ICSPA Commitment

**ICSPA Commitment**

**Point at which LEOSAR coverage permanently falls below level of commitment**

## Cospas-Sarsat of Tomorrow: Distress Alerting Satellite System (DASS)

**Rescue Coordination Center**

**MEOLUT**

**Mission Control Center**

**Cospas-Sarsat of Tomorrow: Distress Alerting Satellite System (DASS)**

## Expected Benefits from DASS

- Quicker AlertingTime required to produce a distress beacon location will be significantly reduced from approx 47 minutes to 12 minutes allowing SAR responders to rescue survivors quicker – resulting in more lives saved.
- More accurate positionsError in locating a distress beacon will be reduced fm an average of 3.1km to 1.7km, resulting in reduced search times, quicker rescue, fewer resources wasted.
- Less costly By operating just one satellite constellation, life-cycle costs to build/operate the system are expected to be more than $2.5M less than the current system.

## Expected Benefits from DASS

- High levels of space and ground segment redundancy and availability

**Expected Benefits from DASS**

## DASS

- GPS Block III satellites to host DASS payloads
- Canada offered to build 406 repeater for DASS payloads ($70M-$90M)
- 24-satellite GPS constellation will provide at least 4 DASS repeaters continuously in view worldwide
- Full compatibility with all existing and future Cospas-Sarsat beacons
- DASS will be fully interoperable with EU and Russian proposed MEO satellites/ground stations