6 minute read
Disaster preparedness: Planning for continuous connectivity
Connectivity is now an integral part of our day-to-day lives, with consumers and businesses alike utilizing connected applications to enhance daily routines as well as to access and manage essential services. It’s also a critical component of disaster preparedness, response, and recovery, and in these situations, satellite networks are often the only infrastructure that can be relied upon to provide critical communication.
John Yates, Managing Director, Atheras Analytics
Satcom provides connectivity across entire countries or regions. User terminals can be rapidly deployed, and networks can operate without dependence on local infrastructure which may be damaged or overloaded. These features make it extremely well suited for establishing connectivity in disaster situations.
As reliance on connectivity increases across all domains, so too does the importance of reliability. For reliable, continuous satellite connectivity, effective and efficient ground segment infrastructure is essential. However, as satellite operators know only too well, weather can significantly impact the spectrum, and this can hugely hinder an operator’s ability to provide seamless connectivity.
In a disaster situation where the stakes are incredibly high, having uninterrupted lines of communication could well save lives.
IMPROVING RELIABILITY AND RESILIENCE
Disaster planning goes much further than just having a plan; it also involves ensuring that reliable and resilient infrastructure is in place before disaster strikes. It pays to invest in disaster planning.
According to the UNDRR (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction), every dollar spent reducing risks posed by disasters can save US$15 in post-disaster recovery costs.
To ensure continuous connectivity post-disaster, networks need to be reliable and resilient. To achieve this, operators need to mitigate the effects of weather and manage the spectrum effectively. Getting this right is the key to increasing throughput, minimizing signal degradation, and reducing downtime. Efficient ground segment management not only benefits customers across the board who depend on seamless connectivity, but crucially, when incorporated into disaster preparedness, it can also make the response and recovery process more effective.
Managing The Effects Of Weather
Without effective mitigation, wet weather events can cause signal strength and quality to reduce. This attenuation causes interruptions and potentially loss of service. Rain fade is nothing new and satellite operators have a range of tools and techniques at their disposal to mitigate its effects. However, while these fade mitigation techniques are effective at managing the impact of weather in traditional satellite networks that use lower frequency bands such as C, X or Ku-band, they’re less effective when networks use Ka and Q/V-bands, which are becoming increasingly widespread. Used with High Throughput Satellites (HTS) and Very High Throughput Satellites (VHTS), these higher frequency bands can deliver much faster data transfer rates but are also much more susceptible to rain fade than lower frequency bands. Ka or Q/V-band VSAT terminals are increasingly being employed in mission-critical applications such as defense, security, and disaster response.
To manage the effects of weather with these types of networks, it has been common practice to set up a dedicated diversity gateway for each primary gateway so that the two gateways can be kept synchronized. If the primary gateway is impacted by weather, the operator can seamlessly “hot switch” to the diversity gateway that is operating in a different location that is unaffected by the same weather conditions. However, with the increasing use of HTS and VHTS satellites requiring dozens or even hundreds of gateways it becomes economically prohibitive to put in place a dedicated diversity gateway for each primary gateway and operators are increasingly turning to the use of Smart Gateway Diversity whereby a few diversity gateways are shared between many active gateways, thus saving up to 40 percent in ground segment costs.
However, such an approach requires pro-active network management and gateway switching to maintain high levels of network availability and so the ability to predict these outages before they occur becomes very desirable if not essential. Many companies are now looking to AI to improve weather management, by leveraging it to optimize network design. They are using AI-techniques to predict which gateways would likely be affected by weather before the event occurs.
AI’S ROLE IN PREDICTING WEATHER OUTAGES
Weather forecasting is a complex field which has advanced greatly over the years. Forecasting today uses supercomputers and AI techniques to assimilate huge volumes of historical and real-time data for enhanced accuracy and specificity of predictions. AI improves prediction models by analyzing vast amounts of data to identify complex patterns that traditional models might miss.
As well as providing precise, short-term predictions for specific locations, AI also strengthens early warning systems for extreme weather events, enabling better disaster preparedness and management.
When AI’s capabilities are applied to ground segment management, satellite operators can pro-actively manage simple two-station diversity gateways as well as more complex smart gateway diversity arrangements. Operators can use AI techniques to predict outages several hours ahead; to analyze weather predictions at available diversity gateways; and to automatically transfer traffic to alternate gateways before outages occur.
Similarly, AI techniques can be used to forecast outages for a Ka-band or Q/V-band VSAT terminal at a specific location so that appropriate mitigating action can be taken.
The ability to predict outages for users of these terminals will be of significant operational benefit because it will enable lines of communication to remain open during mission critical situations such as disaster response.
Utilizing AI for network design and management allows operators to implement contingency plans well in advance, which can prevent service disruptions and ensure continuity of connectivity, whatever the weather. Not only does this enhance operational resilience, but it also optimizes resource allocation, bringing cost benefits. With the ability to accurately forecast weather events, operators can manage traffic proactively, maximizing the utilization of available spectrum.
Benefits Of Better Weather Management
The benefits associated with using AI-based tools for weather management extends beyond operational efficiency and customer satisfaction. In a disaster situation, having reliable and resilient lines of communication saves lives because if outside agencies can communicate effectively and coordinate with partners on the ground, response efforts are much improved.
The key to overcoming many of the challenges that operators face when delivering continuous connectivity in disaster scenarios lies in having the tools to effectively design ground networks during the planning phase, as well as the ability to accurately predict outages hours ahead to enable pro-active management of gateways. Continuous connectivity needs to be planned for as part of disaster preparedness and AI is fast becoming a key component in improving reliability and resilience.
