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SSBV Aerospace & Technology Group (SSBV) and zero2infinity today announced the signing of an agreement regarding the use of SSBV’s ACRIDS airdrop & vehicle recovery technology for the guided recovery of the bloon Near-Space vehicle.

The bloon vehicle, developed by zero2infinty, represents a family of low-cost high-altitude vehicles that will allow amateur Space explorers to experience Near-Space conditions. The bloon vehicles use helium balloons for their lift-off and flight and will be able to carry up to 6 people in a pressurized pod. After a drift of a few hours at a nominal altitude of 36 km, the vehicles return to the ground by means of parachutes. In addition to “Near Space Tourism” flights, bloon vehicles can be used for cost effective scientific missions.

SSBV’s Aerial Cargo Rider System (ACRIDS) system is able to autonomously control a steerable parachute and perform an automatic landing at a pre-designated point on the ground. This is done through an Autonomous Guidance Unit (AGU) that contains an on-board computer that continuously monitors the present location (by means of satellite navigation signals), altitude, wind and predicted flight-path. Through built-in actuators, the AGU is able to steer the parachute and perform a high-precision landing (50-100 m accuracy) at one or more pre-designated landing points.

The agreement establishes a longer-term co-operation between the companies, starting with a number of test and demonstration flights and the final aim of integrating the ACRIDS guided parachute technology in the bloon vehicles.

About zero2infinity

zero2infinity, a Spanish private company, is developing a family of low-cost high-altitude vehicles for amateur Space explorers to experience Near-Space conditions.

In 2012 the company performed a successful flight up to an altitude of 32 km with a 300 kg unmanned scaled model of the vehicle. In this test flight, the recovery of the vehicle was performed with a ballistic round parachute. However, the objective for the future flights is to make use of the ACRIDS guided recovery system.

About SSBV Aerospace & Technology Group (SSBV)
SSBV is a Dutch-headed, group of technology driven SMEs, active in the domains of (aero)Space, Defence & Security, Remote Sensing & Monitoring and the development of High-Tech Systems.

SSBV develops and manufactures the ACRIDS airdrop system in the Defence & Security, as well as Aerospace markets. The ACRIDS airdrop technology can be used for standalone precision airdrop systems as well as air-vehicle recovery systems to increase the safety and accuracy of nominal, tactical or emergency landings.

For more information please visit the respective company websites www.ssbv.com and www.inbloon.com
Download the full English press-release in PDF

(March 3) Regular working meeting of the EUFODOS project, 7th FP for Research and Technological Development of the EC, was held in the office of ReSAC.

On 21st and 22nd of March 2013 a working meeting on the project EUFODOS funded by the 7th FP for Research and Technological Development of European Commission was held. The main goal of the project is to develop specific downstream forest services related to forest damage assessment and mapping of forest structural parameters. The meeting was hosted by ReSAC and it was held in its administrative office.

The project EUFODOS is a collaborative project (with duration 3 years January 2011 – December 2013) coordinated by the JOANEUM RESEARCH INSTITUTE – Austria. ReSAC develops services that will be provided to Executive Forest Agency of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food. The services are related to preparation and updating of GIS databases for the forest cover and forest cover changes, forest infrastructure as well as rapid mapping for disaster management. The project consortium includes several European organizations including research centers, institutes and private companies active in R&D and Earth observation: VTT (Finland), GAF (Germany), University of Freiberg (Germany), EURAC (Italy), RapidEye (Germany), ReSAC (Bulgaria), EAA (Austria).

On 21st of March for the end user organizations in the forest sector from Bulgaria, Austria, Germany, Poland and Italy field trip was organized to biosphere reserve “Bistrishko Branishte”, Vitosha Mountain. During the field work the expert from Executive Forest Agency and the Directorate of Vitosha Nature Park introduced foreign experts with the activities carried out in the region in fighting forest fire and infestation of bark beetles in the park.

The meeting continued in the Game Administration “Vitosha – Studena” – where the participants exchanged experience in the management of forest area and forest disaster management. On the meeting, together with the above mentioned organisations representatives from Game Administration “Vitosha – Studena” and Southwest state enterprise of Ministry of Agriculture and Food took part.

At the same time the project consortium held technical meeting with a discussion of administrative issues.

On the 22nd of March the meeting continued with participation of consortium partners and end users of the project. Each of the project partners presented the state of forest management services in which they participate. In the frame of the project the RUSH Mode and NON-RUSH Mode services are ready. The RUSH Mode provides a quick product in a few days after a natural disaster and gives information about forest damages, while the second type of services generates products with more detailed assessment of the damages types.

The next EUFODOS meeting will be held on October 2013, Copenhagen in the office of the European Environment Agency. On this meeting, the portfolio of services that the consortium is ready to execute when certain natural disaster occurs in forest area on the territory of European Union will be presented.

Source

(Berlin, Germany, March 14, 2013) RapidEye, a leader in high-resolution, wide area repetitive coverage of earth through its constellation of five satellites, announced today that the African Malaria Control Project, MALAREO, which incorporates RapidEye data, has come to a close and results are now available on the project’s website.

MALAREO, which began just over two years ago, was funded by the European Commission under FP7 and run by a mixed European-African consortium, which incorporated years of experience in malaria control, with the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) Earth Observation expertise.

Remote Sensing Solutions GmbH (RSS) near Munich was responsible for data processing and the development of EO products for the project, which explored the spatial variability of malaria-relevant environmental factors at local level and supported the work of the National Malaria Control Programs in South Africa, Swaziland and Mozambique. The MALAREO study area, about 43,000 square kilometers, was imaged by the RapidEye satellite constellation, and data was provided via the EC/ESA GMES Space Component Data Access (GSC-DA).

After completion of the project in January, a final meeting with end-users from the Southern African National Malaria Control programs and the MALAREO project team took place in Durban, South Africa, where the products derived from the RapidEye imagery were presented. The end-users emphasized the benefit of these products and the resulting Map Atlas for malaria control, as it greatly improves planning of malaria control measures. It also complements the approach of linking environmental and epidemiological data, which is a first step towards an early warning system for malaria.

The MALAREO Map Atlas, summarizing the EO-based mapping approaches and additional information about the project can be found at the project website.

About RapidEye

RapidEye is a leading provider of quality high-resolution satellite imagery. With a constellation of five Earth Observation satellites, RapidEye is able to image up to five million square kilometers of earth every day, and adds over one billion square kilometers of imagery to its archive every year. Online searching and viewing of its massive collection of imagery is quick and easy with EyeFind (eyefind.rapideye.com), RapidEye’s archive discovery tool. With an unprecedented combination of wide area repetitive coverage and five meter pixel size multi-spectral imagery, RapidEye is a natural choice for many industries and government agencies. RapidEye: Delivering the World. http://www.rapideye.com.

Contact
RapidEye AG
Kurfürstendamm 22, 10719 Berlin, Germany
marketing@rapideye.com
Follow us on Twitter at www.twitter.com/rapideye_global
MALAREO / RSS Contact
Dr. Jonas Franke, Project Manager
RSS- Remote Sensing Solutions GmbH
Isarstraße 3, 82065 Baierbrunn, Germany
franke@rssghbh.de // (49) 089 48 95 47 66

Source

…News on releases, Historical Airphoto Processing, Supports SPOT-6 Sensor or GeoEye-1 DEM Generation for Mining …

PCI Geomatics Releases GXL 2013

RICHMOND HILL, Ontario, Canada—March 26, 2013: PCI Geomatics, a world-leading developer of remote sensing and photogrammetric software and systems, announced today the release of its GeoImaging Accelerator (GXL) 2013 – the latest version of the company’s proven, high-performance, and scalable image processing solution.

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PCI Introduces Historical Airphoto Processing (HAP) Workflow

RICHMOND HILL, Ontario, Canada—March 21, 2013: PCI Geomatics, a world-leading developer of remote sensing and photogrammetric software and systems, announced today that it has introduced the Historical Airphoto Processing Workflow, also known as HAP.

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PCI Geomatics Software Supports SPOT-6 Sensor

RICHMOND HILL, Ontario, Canada—March 14, 2013: PCI Geomatics, a world-leading developer of remote sensing and photogrammetric software and systems, announced today that it now supports SPOT-6 imagery within its software suite.

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GeoEye-1 DEM Generation for Mining – Whitepaper

White Paper: Automatic DEM Generation using GeoEye-1 Stereo Data In Mining Applications. This article describes how high resolution satellite data can be used to extract accurate digital elevation model (DEM) for a mining application in the Amazon region. The resulting vertical accuracy can be within RMS error of 1.5m when using a minimum number of ground control points.

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(21. März 2013) The U.S. Air Force’s second Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO-2) spacecraft, built by Lockheed Martin, was successfully launched today at 5:21 p.m. EDT from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.

The SBIRS program delivers timely, reliable and accurate missile warning and infrared surveillance information to the President of the United States, the Secretary of Defense, combatant commanders, the intelligence community and other key decision makers. The system enhances global missile launch detection capability, supports the nation’s ballistic missile defense system, expands the country’s technical intelligence gathering capacity and bolsters situational awareness for warfighters on the battlefield. The SBIRS architecture includes a resilient mix of satellites in geosynchronous orbit, hosted payloads in highly elliptical earth (HEO) orbit, and ground hardware and software. The first two GEO satellites and HEO payloads have now launched. SBIRS GEO-2 includes highly sophisticated scanning and staring sensors that will deliver improved infrared sensitivity and a reduction in area revisit times over the current constellation.

Credits: Space War / SPX

KSAT has recently finalized a contract to monitor vessel traffic in the waters around Easter Island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean.

Using multiple sensors from a variety of satellite missions (including synthetic aperture radar [SAR], electro-optical imagery, and satellite AIS data streams) KSAT will acquire, analyze and distribute information in order to evaluate the existence and extent of illegal fishing in the area.

The effort is part of the PEW Global Ocean Legacy project, which aims to establish a worldwide system of very large, highly protected marine reserves where fishing and other extractive activities are prohibited and which has been pivotal in the designation of some of the world’s largest ocean reserves.

KSAT and PEW are excited about this pioneering effort to bring cutting-edge technology to combat the overexploitation of the world’s oceans by sophisticated International fishing fleets penetrating progressively more remote waters.

Source KSAT

Cambridge, on- March 14, 2013—Last week the Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals met to announce the winners for their 2013 Alliance Excellence Awards.

exactEarth and Kongsberg Satellite Services (KSAT) were awarded the Individual Alliance Excellence Award, a very competitive category. The two companies were recognized for their groundbreaking low-Earth orbit satellite tracking system that enables government agencies around the world to track all ships at sea beyond port areas—an industry first. This system, exactAIS®, enhances maritime domain awareness around the world, with superior detection capability that captures many times more vessels than any other system in a single satellite pass.

“It is a tremendous inspiration for us that our close cooperation with exactEarth is being recognized in this way,” said Fredrik Landmark, Senior VP -Business Development of KSAT.

“We are extremely proud and honoured to receive this award,” said Philip Miller, VP of Operations and Engineering at exactEarth. “Our strategic alliance with KSAT is of utmost importance to our daily operations as we rely heavily on them to provide real-time data downlinks that are crucial to the exactAIS® service we provide to customers worldwide.”

For more information about ASAP and the 2013 Excellence Awards, clik here

About the Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals

Founded in 1998, the Association of Strategic Alliance Professionals (ASAP) is a professional association dedicated to elevating and promoting the profession and discipline of alliance management.

ASAP is the only organization dedicated to providing knowledge and resources, education and professional development, and a community for networking to alliance professionals at every stage of business collaboration—from partnership formation to alliance management after a deal is signed all the way through to the dissolution of a relationship.

About exactEarth Ltd.

exactEarth, based in Cambridge, Ontario, is a data services company providing the most advanced information on global maritime traffic available today. Our premium service, exactAIS, delivers an unrivalled view of the recognized maritime picture at a global scale. Offering fully secure data in a variety of industry standard formats and delivery methods, exactEarth’s data provides real value for a wide range of operational maritime applications delivering operational efficiencies, enhancing security, safeguarding the environment, and assisting in saving lives. For more information, visit our website at www.exactearth.com.

About Kongsberg Satellite Services

Kongsberg Satellite Services AS (KSAT) is a commercial Norwegian enterprise, uniquely positioned to provide ground station and earth observation services for polar orbiting satellites. With three interconnected polar ground stations; Tromsø at 69°N, Svalbard (SvalSat) at 78°N and Antarctic TrollSat Station at 72°S, and a growing mid-latitude network, KSAT operates over 60 antennas optimally positioned for access to polar orbits. KSAT supports more than 60 satellites, including high resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and electro-optical satellites, allowing us to provide earth observation data and services to a wide range of customers.

Contact information:
Børre Pedersen
Sales Director
Tel: +47 776 00 271
boerrep@ksat.no

Source

(March 2013) GRAS has always been 100% owned by DHI. The synergies between GRAS and the rest of DHI have steadily increased over the years contributing significantly to the growth we have experienced at GRAS.

More and more DHI projects and offices around the world are making use of satellite based solutions. Therefore it’s now a logical step for us to change our legal name to DHI GRAS in order to increase the visibility of our strong ties to the rest of the DHI organisation.

We have more than 1100 DHI colleagues in more than 30 countries across the globe. DHI is the expert in water environments – and satellite based mapping is particularly useful in water environments. Whether the topic is monitoring of compliance with environmental legislation during large infrastructure projects, mapping of land cover for hydrological modeling or detailed mapping of urban environments for urban storm water modeling – satellite based information can offer highly valuable information in itself or it can be used to calibrate and validate models.

DHI GRAS will remain a separate company and we will maintain our close collaboration with the Department of Geosciences and Natural Resource Management (IGN) at University of Copenhagen. We will remain located in the Geocenter building in central Copenhagen which has been our home since GRAS was originally founded in 2000.

We look forward to working with you under our new brand that will not only give you access to our core expertise in remote sensing but also link to the rest of DHI’s expertise in water environments.

Best regards,
Mikael Kamp Sørensen
Managing Director

Source

(Aviation Week – March 04, 2013) by Amy Svitak.

Chile has one. So do Turkey and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). By the end of April Vietnam could, too.

Over the next decade more than 280 Earth-observation-satellite systems are expected to be launched into orbit, with roughly 30% lofted for developing space programs in Asia, Latin America, Africa and the Middle East—regions where technology transfer is key to fostering fledgling industries, according to Paris-based Euroconsult.

Earth-observation satellites and the increasingly sharp imagery they produce are the fastest-growing segment of a commercial remote-sensing industry currently dominated by Western suppliers, a market that is projected to generate nearly $4 billion in annual revenue by 2021. But as emerging space economies gain technological know-how—much of it via satellite contracts with European and Asian manufacturers—established companies in the U.S. and Europe will navigate an increasingly dynamic competitive landscape.

Many of these new entrants are seeking Earth-observation satellites of their own to meet defense and civil needs—everything from military surveillance to crop monitoring and urban planning. Other countries simply buy imagery on the commercial market, which today is led by sub-meter-resolution heavyweights DigitalGlobe of Longmont, Colo., EADS-Astrium Services and Telespazio of Rome. At least one has opted to finance an entire constellation in exchange for access to its data, as Beijing-based Twenty First Century Aerospace Technology Co. did in 2011 under an agreement with British small-satellite manufacturer Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. (SSTL), a subsidiary of Astrium.

But an increasing number are seeking technology and know-how to bolster burgeoning domestic space programs, including some with the potential to sell imagery and data on the commercial market.

For example, Turkey is investing heavily in developing its domestic space program, one that already boasts several telecommunications satellites and two Earth-observation spacecraft, with plans to produce more.

In August 2011 Ankara launched a Turkish microsat equipped with an optical payload on a Russian-Ukrainian Dnepr rocket from Yasny Launch Base in Russia, followed by the mostly Turkish-built Gokturk-2 launched in December 2012 atop a Chinese Long March 2D. The 400-kg (882-lb.) satellite incorporates a German solar-generation system and Korean-built optical instrument capable of 2.5-meter (8.2-ft.) panchromatic resolution with a 20-km (12-mi.+) swath.

In January, with Gokturk-2 operating nominally in orbit, Ankara said the government was prepared to enter negotiations with Turkish industry to begin work on the country’s first synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging spacecraft, a development that could be enabled in part by a new satellite assembly, integration and test facility that Thales Alenia Space is building in Turkey. Capable of processing satellites weighing up to 5,000 kg, the plant’s construction is one of the terms in a 2009 contract between Turkey’s defense ministry and prime contractor Telespazio that by the end of this year will furnish Ankara with Gokturk-1, the highest-resolution optical-imaging spacecraft ever approved for export.

At about 1,000 kg, the Thales-built satellite will offer 50-cm (20-in.) resolution at nadir in black and white, according to industry sources, a capability that bests France’s new twin Pleiades Earth-observation spacecraft, which is designed to capture raw data with 70-cm resolution at nadir but can resample images to produce pictures of 50-cm-wide objects.

More than 15 years in the making, the agreement gives Turkish Aerospace Industries the opportunity to complete final integration of the spacecraft at the new test facility before it is launched early next year. Turkey also has the option to purchase a follow-on spacecraft that would undergo complete assembly, integration and test in Turkey, according to industry sources.

“Gokturk-1 is the most impressive example of a satellite with real capabilities that are not so far from the leading technologies of the top five nations in space,” says Philippe Campenon, deputy director for space and Earth observation at Euroconsult.

A similar contract with Astrium will supply two Earth-observation satellites to Kazakhstan, including the DZZ-HR 1-meter-resolution satellite slated to launch on a Vega rocket in mid-2014. The spacecraft is being built entirely by Astrium Satellites in France, based on the company’s Theos platform, which Astrium used to develop Taiwan’s Formosat-2 optical-imaging spacecraft. A separate, 200-kg satellite dubbed MRES is a collaboration between Astrium and SSTL. The 7-meter-resolution spacecraft is based on the SSTL-150 platform with heritage technologies developed for the 2.5-meter-resolution NigeriaSat-2 that launched in 2011.

The contract is part of a broader agreement under which Astrium will train Kazakh engineers, build a satellite integration center in Astana and provide access to optical and radar imagery from France’s SPOT satellites and Germany’s TerraSAR-X radar spacecraft.

Astrium is also helping Vietnam develop a domestic space capability with the first of four Earth-observation satellites Hanoi plans to build through the end of the decade. The contract with the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology covers development, build and launch of the 13-kg VNREDSat-1A, capable of 2.5-meter black-and-white and 10-meter multispectral resolution with a 17.5-km swath, plus ground control; an image-receiving station; and a training program for 15 Vietnamese engineers. Based on the AstroSat100 bus used for Chile’s Sistema Satelital para la Observacion de la Tierra program and the Alsat-2 satellite built with Algeria, VNREDSat-1A is slated to launch in April as a secondary payload on Vega.

Despite such assistance, however, Campenon says most emerging space programs are a long way from developing indigenous sophisticated high-resolution imaging capabilities of their own.

“From a technological point of view, the step from medium- to high-resolution is huge,” Campenon says.

For example, Taiwan has worked for years with Astrium in developing its Formosat series of satellites, with the goal of creating a domestic industrial capacity and associated service industry. After a decade spent acquiring engineering expertise through international collaboration, the country’s new 525-kg Formosat-5 will carry a Taiwan-built optical instrument capable of 2-meter resolution in black-and-white and 4 meters in multi-spectral over a 24-km swath. Formosat-5 is slated to launch in 2015, according to Taiwan National Space Organization officials, with a follow-on spacecraft planned for the same orbit, albeit in a different ground track to effect daily revisit time and global coverage.

Similarly, the Korea Aerospace Research Institute has spent almost two decades developing the Korean Multipurpose Satellite (Kompsat) series, starting with a U.S. satellite bus designed by TRW and using German optical instruments. The latest generation of the Earth-observation satellite, Kompsat-3, carries a camera built by Astrium Satellites that is capable of 70-cm panchromatic and 2.8-meter multispectral resolution. A follow-on Kompsat-3A slated to launch in September on a Dnepr rocket was also built with Astrium assistance, featuring 55-cm panchromatic and 2.2-meter multispectral resolution and an infrared camera.

“It’s very high-tech, even though they are one step behind the European and American systems in terms of technology,” Campenon says.

For now, countries like South Korea and Taiwan pose little threat to established commercial remote-sensing providers, though this is already starting to change. While both countries had negotiated agreements with Astrium Services to market imagery produced by Kompsat and Formosat satellites, South Korea recently switched to small-satellite manufacturer and local data distributor Satrec Initiative, and Campenon says Taiwan may do something similar.

Satrec is also working with the UAE to develop the DubaiSat series of spacecraft. Abu Dhabi is one of several Middle Eastern capitals investing in space capabilities as a response to growing instability in the region, a perceived threat from Iran and desire to foster a domestic aerospace and defense industry (see page 31). In 2009 UAE launched the 200-kg DubaiSat-1 for the Emirates Institution for Advanced Science and Technology, and UAE engineers have since taken the lead in designing a follow-on spacecraft with Satrec, dubbed DubaiSat-2, which will offer 1-meter panchromatic resolution and 4-meter multispectral with a 12.2-km swath.

The UAE air force is also shopping for a high-resolution imaging satellite among U.S. and European suppliers that according to industry sources, include Lockheed Martin, a team comprising Astrium and Thales, and DigitalGlobe, which could potentially furnish the spare ultra-high-resolution GeoEye-2 satellite it acquired in the January takeover of chief U.S. rival GeoEye.

DigitalGlobe spokesman Robert Keosheyan said Feb. 7 the company received an unsolicited inbound expression of interest from the UAE and is in the process of considering whether to engage in discussions.

Other countries in line to loft high-resolution spacecraft include Japan, where Tokyo-based NEC expects to orbit its 300-kg Advanced Satellite with New System for Observation (Asnaro) spacecraft atop a Dnepr rocket this year. Based on the modular NX-300L bus, Asnaro is advertised as offering less than 50-cm panchromatic and 2-meter multispectral resolution at 500-km altitude across a 10-km swath. NEC says a SAR observation satellite and wide-coverage optical observation spacecraft are also planned, forming an Asnaro constellation offering a range of Earth observation services.

Source Euroconsult