Latitude Technologies

Latitude Technologies employed by USFS

Iridium Satellite announces that the U.S.D.A. Forest Service (USFS) has fitted 200 primarily contract aircraft with Iridium equipment. The aircraft are part of the interagency Automated Flight Following (AFF) program and are primarily helicopters, and light and transport fixed wing airtankers used for wildland fire fighting and other natural resource agency missions. In addition to the USFS, agencies involved in the AFF Project include the U.S. Department of the Interior’s (DOI) Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Indian Affairs and Office of Aircraft Services; the National Association of State Foresters; U.S. Department of Commerce’s National Weather Service; and the U.S. Fire Administration.

Iridium partners Latitude Technologies, Sky Connect, Blue Sky Network, and SkyTrac Systems provided the Iridium equipment and air time. Iridium is a key AFF provider for data and voice communications between the aircraft and the ground. The agencies use Iridium for flight following as well as cockpit voice and data communications.

“Iridium provides the technology for fast, secure access to voice and data communications with aircraft regardless of geographic location,” said Robert Roth, Aviation Management Specialist, USFS.

“Iridium’s constellation of low-orbiting satellites provides the only aircraft tracking and monitoring solution that is robust, reliable, cost-effective and that offers global coverage,” said Don Thoma, Iridium executive vice president. “Our involved partners have been leading pioneers in developing advanced, integrated solutions foraircraft requirements when it comes to remote communications.”

The AFF system automatically tracks and displays location and other associated information for aircraft on operational missions. Mapping data includes information on cities, tanker base locations, topography, airports, thermal detection, lightning, flight restrictions, and other critical, time sensitive information geographically dispersed users require from dynamic and static sources.

Under visual flight rules (VFR), aircraft on official missions are required to establish positive contact and report aircraft position at least once every 15 to 30 minutes, depending on the agency. The land management agencies used to rely on voice radio reports to flight following dispatchers, who recorded aircraft positions by hand. Frequent lapses in radio communication coverage and aircraft position reporting required pilots to toggle between different radio frequencies for aircraft position reporting. Position reports consumed limited radio “air time,” and increased dispatcher and pilot workloads.

“Through the AFF system, we have been able to increase the aviation program’s efficiency through timelier, more accurate location capabilities,” Roth said. “This is especially valuable when it comes to worst case search and rescue. With AFF we have reduced radio traffic, frequency switching, work levels at dispatch centers and costs.”

Main AFF users come from the fire community, including aircraft dispatchers, fire managers, aviation managers, aircraft vendors, air tanker base ramp managers and aviation contract administrators. Non-fire natural resource aviation users include sketch mappers, marine mammal survey flights, and Alaskan Operations.

The AFF Project team completed a Pilot Phase in 2003 and its First Implementation Phase in 2004. Phase Two of Implementation is in progress and includes training, policy development, hardware acquisition and installation, flight following procedure development and facilitation of other agency and vendor adoption.

About Iridium Satellite

Iridium Satellite LLC (www.iridium.com) is the only provider of truly global satellite voice and data solutions with complete coverage of the earth (including oceans, airways and Polar Regions). Iridium delivers essential communications services to and from remote areas where no other form of communication is available. Iridium makes this possible through its constellation of 66 low-earth orbiting (LEO), cross-linked satellites and 12 in-orbit spares. The Iridium service is ideally suited for industries such as maritime, aviation, government/military, emergency/humanitarian services, mining, forestry, oil and gas, heavy equipment, transportation and utilities. Iridium provides service to the U.S. Department of Defense. The company designs, builds and sells its services, products and solutions through a worldwide network of more than 100 service providers, value-added resellers, value-added manufacturers, and value-added developers.

About Latitude Technologies

Latitude Technologies is a leading Canadian supplier of TCP/IP and SBD based telematics equipment and services for the management of risk and location of critical assets for customers worldwide. The company develops, manufactures and sells the LMC (Latitude Mobile Controller) family of products, operates the Sentinel data management service, and provides telematics and remote-communication consulting services, including custom application development and onsite technical support.