Integrated flight decks like Garminrsquos G5000 provides WAAS compatibility inflight with support from the GEO satellites and stations Image courtesy of Garmin

Satellite Payload to Further Augment GPS-Focused Aviation System

April 23, 2015

Raytheon has been awarded a contract from the FAA to develop the next Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) payload to help improve GPS signals.

Iliza Sokol

To help make air travel safer and more efficient, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) released the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS) to improve the availability and accuracy of Global Positioning System (GPS) signals. To further support the WAAS system, the FAA recently awarded Raytheon a $103 million contract to develop a payload to incorporate into a new geostationary (GEO) satellite and two associated ground uplink stations.

WAAS helps improve GPS accuracy from 100 m to about 2 m and enables more direct flight routing, precision landing approaches, and even access to airports and remote landing sites without the dependence on ground based infrastructure. Raytheon’s WAAS GEO 6 payload will be hosted aboard the commercial host satellite, receiving processed signals from GEO 6 ground stations and re-broadcasting them to the user aircraft.

The FAA simultaneously operates three WAAS GEO satellite payloads to ensure continuous system availability. The sixth system, along with the previous incarnation GEO 5 (also awarded to Raytheon back in 2012), will replace two WAAS payloads that are approaching the end of their service leases. The sixth payload is expected to launch in the second quarter of 2017, with the system entering its 10-year operational phase in 2019. Raytheon is the FAA’s prime contractor for WAAS.

About the Author

Iliza Sokol | Associate Digital Editor

Iliza joined the Penton Media group in 2013 after graduating from the Fashion Institute of Technology with a BS in Advertising and Marketing Communications. Prior to joining the staff, she worked at NYLON Magazine and a ghostwriting firm based in New York.