AeroMetric Forms Quantum Spatial
AeroMetric announced it will acquire Photo Science and Watershed Sciences to form Quantum Spatial (www.quantumspatial.com). The new company will deliver services and solutions for clients across all industry verticals, with specialized expertise in energy, transportation, utilities, environmental, mining, national security, federal agencies, state and local government and commercial applications.
Quantum Spatial plans to invest significantly to enhance its solutions and expand its newly launched GeoApps suite of cloud-based, enterprisewide solutions. Clients will continue to work with the same people within the respective firms who they have in the past while gaining full access to the expanded capabilities and solutions of the combined company.
Patrick Olson, AeroMetric’s CEO, will be Quantum Spatial’s CEO. G. Michael Ritchie, the president and CEO of Photo Science, will serve as Quantum Spatial’s chief operating officer. Matt Boyd and Russ Faux, Watershed Sciences’ former co-CEOs, will serve on Quantum Spatial’s executive committee and lead the solutions applications effort across all industries.
Andrews Wins Contract for Microsatellites
In line with a growing trend toward smaller Earth observation satellites, Andrews Space announced a contract with an undisclosed customer to deliver two microsatellites in 2014.
SCOUT has a short delivery timeline achieved through use of previously qualified hardware and electronics and commercial-off-the-shelf aerospace components, thus minimizing development.
SCOUT is a low-cost, high-performance imaging spacecraft based on the SENTRY 4000 microsatellite bus. Each SCOUT spacecraft relies heavily on products and components designed and built by Andrews Space integrated with a payload provided by an external partner. The satellite design is robust to allow for launch as a secondary payload on a variety of launch vehicles in either a vertical or cantilevered configuration.
Aussie Police Embrace Surveillance Drones
According to The Australian, some 34 organizations across Australia are certified to use drones for activities such as aerial photography, surveying and power line inspection. South Australian police will use them to spy on criminal activity.
South Australian Police (SAPOL) will use sophisticated remote-controlled drones to spy on suspects as it takes the war on crime to new heights. The stealthy miniature unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) will be equipped with still, video and infrared cameras. SAPOL will open a tender process to purchase four “off-the-shelf” commercial quadcopters that could be used to gather intelligence without putting officers at risk.
Civil libertarians have protested the use of such devices, saying they effectively amount to “Big Brother in the sky” and could be used to monitor law-abiding citizens in situations such as political protests. But according to Police Minister Michael O’Brien, UASs have become a recognized policing tool throughout the world. He calls them “a cost-effective solution for a range of policing operations, especially in situations when using conventional aircraft is too dangerous or costly.’’
Cheap Observation Drones Are New Storm Chasers
Large UASs can cost millions of dollars, but the DataHawk—designed by engineers at the University of Colorado—is made of a resilient, springy foam called polypropylene and is cheap in comparison at only $600.
New drones made from disposable materials offer an inexpensive option for collecting data in high-risk environments, like measuring the speed of a wildfire or the temperature of a volcano.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has been using disposable and expendable unmanned aircraft systems (UASs) to track high-impact weather such as tropical cyclones and hurricanes. Because of their small size, a UAS can also monitor marine sanctuaries and other protected ecosystems without human interference.
“We want to get the cost as low as possible, so we use these instead of manned aircraft,” says Robbie Hood, the UAS program director for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “We can put them in dangerous situations, so if we do lose them, we haven’t lost human life.”
DigitalGlobe Wants Higher Orbit, Lower Resolution
Geospatial imagery provider DigitalGlobe says the commercial market for satellite
Earth imagery is growing faster than the U.S. government market and that the company remains sold out in certain regions despite this year’s purchase of rival GeoEye and GeoEye’s satellites.
To expand its offerings, DigitalGlobe is
raising the orbit of the GeoEye-1 satellite, a move that will reduce the maximum precision of the satellite’s images but broaden its field of view. DigitalGlobe officials said the maneuver will increase the image-gathering capacity of the company’s five-satellite fleet by about
5 percent.
Meanwhile, DigitalGlobe is asking the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency to allow the commercial sale of lower-resolution, i.e., finer-detailed, imagery. The lowest current official resolution is 41 centimeters, but the company’s next-generation satellites will be able to supply photos with significantly lower resolutions to government clients such as the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.
Federal Agencies to Remap Coastal Areas Damaged by Hurricane Sandy
Plans for remapping parts of the East Coast where Hurricane Sandy altered seafloors and shorelines, destroyed buildings and disrupted millions of lives last year were announced by three federal agencies. The U.S. Geological Survey, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are using emergency supplemental funds provided by Congress to survey coastal waters and shorelines, acquiring data that will update East Coast land maps and nautical charts.
Using ships, aircraft and satellites, the agencies will measure water depths, look for submerged debris, and record altered shorelines in high-priority areas from South Carolina to Maine, as stipulated by Congress in the Disaster Relief Appropriations Act of 2013. The areas to be remapped will be based on their relative dangers to navigation, effects from the storm, and discussions with state and local officials as well as the maritime industry.
The data acquired by the three agencies, much of which will be stored at NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center and through NOAA’s Digital Coast, will be open to local, state and federal agencies as well as academia and the general public. The information can be applied to updating nautical charts, removing marine debris, replenishing beaches, making repairs, and planning for future storms and coastal resilience.
GMES Copernicus Gets Green Light
Europe’s ambitious global environmental monitoring program will be able to move into operation thanks to the European Parliament’s 2014-2020 budget approval.
Marking a significant political milestone, the multiannual financial framework includes the provision of 3,786 million euros (at 2011 economic conditions) for the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) program, currently being renamed Copernicus. The approval follows difficult negotiations and the subsequent agreement reached this summer at the European Council.
Copernicus will provide reliable, timely and accurate services to manage the environment, understand and mitigate the effects of climate change and help respond to crises. The program’s success relies on the provision of robust data, predominantly from Earth observation satellites. The European Space Agency (ESA) is developing the series of Sentinel satellites for this purpose, but also draws on data from other space agencies that are contributing to the program. In essence, ESA is responsible for the “space component.”
NOAA Tests Drones on Olympic Peninsula
NOAA tested the 13-pound Puma unmanned aircraft in the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is testing unmanned aircraft that could allow researchers to observe animals at relatively close range with minimal disturbance. The test of the Aerovironment Puma unmanned aircraft system (UAS), which can fly lower and slower than manned aircraft and is much quieter, took place in and around the sanctuary this summer and is the first test of unmanned aircraft for use in the Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuary.
According to Carol Bernthal, sanctuary superintendent, the primary objective of the tests was to monitor seabird colonies along the sanctuary’s coastline and offshore islands. NOAA also surveyed remote coastline and open waters for marine debris and other marine wildlife. The tests will help determine whether UAS technology could be used in protected marine areas worldwide.
Tiny Proba-V Satellite Unveils First Map
The first raw image from the Proba-V satellite was acquired over France’s west coast on May 15, 2013. Less than a cubic meter in volume, the miniature satellite is tasked with mapping land cover and vegetation growth across the entire planet every two days.
The first global vegetation map from the recently launched Proba-V demonstrates that the minisatellite—slightly larger than a washing machine—is on track to continue a 15-year legacy of global vegetation monitoring from space.
Proba-V, launched by the European Space Agency (ESA) from French Guiana on May 7, 2013, is designed to map land cover and vegetation growth across the entire planet every two days. The data can also be used for day-by-day tracking of extreme weather, alerting authorities to crop failures, monitoring inland water resources, and tracing the steady spread of
deserts and deforestation.