Using fiber optical cables for maritime situational awareness
Aggelos Vassileiou
Project Manager, SATWAYS
RESEARCH AND INNOVATION SYMPOSIUM FOR EUROPEAN SECURITY AND DEFENSE 2023 | MAY 29TH – MAY 31ST | RODES, GREECE
FIBERSENSE SUMMARY
Problem statement:
Currently acoustic monitoring in coastal CI, in choke points or in open seas is performed either by arrays of hydrophones (fixed or moving ones) or by sonobuoys that are dropped/ejected from aircraft or ships conducting anti-submarine warfare or underwater acoustic research. Both solutions are expensive and there is always the danger of losing the sensors in the field.
Such acoustic technologies/sensors, which often deteriorate or get damaged due to the adverse conditions prevailing in the underwater environment, provide reliable information but with a limited range and high (per sensor) purchase and maintenance costs.
Concept:
FIBERSENSE aims to enhance Maritime (underwater) Surveillance and Maritime Situational Awareness(MSA), via a very promising and low-cost (per sensor) technology, called Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS), that can turn FOCs to arrays of thousands of “virtual microphones”. We know that vessels can be detected by DAS technology. FIBERSENSE will try to develop detection, identification, classification and tracking algorithms of vessels and maybe submarines , in an effort to estimate the value of DAS technology for maritime surveillance.
The big advantage of DAS is that it can use existing FOCs infrastructure (telecom/power) at sea floor or new FOCs that can be installed in specific areas of interest.
FIBERSENSE TECHNICAL OVERVIEW
Fiber Optic Cable (FOC)
DAS Interrogator
FIBERSENSE Data Collection Platform
FIBERSENSE FEASIBILITY STUDIES
Initial tests in controlled environments in Portugal and Germany
Tests with new FOC deployment in all three sites and
Real operational environment testing by using existing telecom FOC in Greece
Several feasibility studies will be performed in 3 test sites
FIBERSENSE GOALS
Gather & Report relevant Knowledge
Design the FIBERSENSE Concept
Plan Feasibility Studies
Deploy Systems at the Test Fields
Gather data
Test Algorithms
Show Results - Feasibility of the FIBERSENSE Concept
FIBERSENSE IN A NUTSHELL
Project name:
Using fiber optical cables for maritime situational awareness - FIBESENSE
Duration: 36 months
Start date: 01/12/2022 | End date: 30/11/2025
Grant Agreement nο: 101110375
Maximum grant amount: 3.386.861,61 EUR
Topic: EDF-2021-OPEN-R-SME-2
Nο of partners: 5 | Nο of countries: 3
+ 2 Subcontractors:
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
FOR EU FUNDED PROJECTS
FEEL FREE TO MODIFY OR REMOVE SLIDE
(E.G. IF NOT AN EU FUNDED PROJECT)
The work presented in this paper received funding from the European Commission, under the “EDF-2021-OPEN-R: Open call focused on SMEs for research on innovative and future-oriented defence solutions; Topic EDF-2021-OPEN-R-SME-2: Research on innovative and future-oriented defence solutions” entitled FIBERSENSE (Using fiber optical cables for maritime situational awareness) under Grant Agreement number 101110375.
Aggelos Vassileiou
Project Manager, SATWAYS
RESEARCH AND INNOVATION SYMPOSIUM FOR EUROPEAN SECURITY AND DEFENSE 2023 | MAY 29TH – MAY 31ST | RODES, GREECE
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