Air and sea rescue via satellite systems

Two approaches to a satellite system for air and sea rescue to be put into use by the 1990s, one employing polar-orbiting satellites and the other using fixed geosynchronous satellites over the equator, are discussed. A battery-powered transmitter on a ship or aircraft would be activated in an accident to emit a low-power omnidirectional signal that would be relayed by a satellite to an earth station. The polar-orbiting approach, now being evaluated on a small-scale with the Cospas-Sarsat system, allows complete coverage of the earth, including the poles, and provides a fix on the origin of the distress signals by means of the Doppler shift. A parallel effort for the testing of geostationary satellites to measure system sensitivity to various interference sources, to optimize design, and to measure land and sea performance is reviewed.