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SDIS

Started by jstadter, March 28, 2007, 07:15:26 PM

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jstadter

I am currently the primary user of the SDIS system in eastern ND.  I want to get a feel for how many other wings have SDIS and how they utilize it.

I also would like a discussion on reliability of the satellite phone system used.  We seem to always have problems with sat phone connectivity.  Anybody else have a problem initiating a connection or maintaining a connection?

Thanks!

John Stadter, 1LT
Red River Squadron ND046
ES Officer, AE Officer
John Stadter, 1LT CAP - ESO, AEO - Red River Squadron ND046  Fargo, ND

Tubacap

I've had issues with the SDIS connectivity when flying in the GA-8 when it wasn't wings level.  I can't remember if I've ever had this problem in a 182, but I'm sure it would still cause an issue.  Another issue I had when I first started doing it was not watching what the file size was.  The server connection would either time out or we would be in the air forever if the file size was too large.
William Schlosser, Major CAP
NER-PA-001

RiverAux

Look in WMIRs.  I believe it has information on SDIS distribution. 

DNall

OPSEC on how we use it, check ^ for more info/spins/etc

The phones blow... duct tape a lap top to a cheap sat phone & plug in a camera? This is what we're calling hi-tech? Come on! There's better satcomm advertised in the volunteer. Why you think the add is there?

Eclipse

Boy, ditto on that!

I can do the same thing (illegally, of course) on my cel phone.

As someone who is very active in photo recon in ILWG, I was hyped to get my hands on a set and play with it, then I saw it.

Geez, it was using the same camera I owned (Nikon 5700, which frankly is crap for PRO use), and had a 6-page, double sided set of instructions for what amounted to emailing a picture from the plane.

And still, NOTHING about how to actually take the picture!

I know there have been a smattering of success stories where the immediacy of SDIS came in handy, but in most cases disaster assessment for example, clear, useful photos are more important than immediacy.

With easy internet available in most FBOs, or again via cel phone, its a simple thing to take the pics, drop to an airport, send them to the ICP and wait for response.

"That Others May Zoom"

BillB

Use the FBO   IF you have an airport. After Hurricane Andrew, the nearest usuable general aviation airport was 6o miles away from Miami. All the General Aviation airports in Miami were closed due to airplanes laying around upside down, several blocks away from the airport, and the runways were blocked. Even Homestead AFB was closed. Photos transmitted from an FBO 60 miles away, 45 minutes up to two hours after they were shot have no immediacy.
Gil Robb Wilson # 19
Gil Robb Wilson # 104

DNall

I like the idea of sending from the plane, and frankly you need to think like there isn't internet or even electric at the FBO.

What I don't like is the quality & tedious process to send versus that being faster & more user firendly (mainly related to comm quality). Also you really need GPS data on the frames & captions about what you're seeing.

The thing with this system is you really aren't enhancing anything. You're still just searching with eyeballs, just documenting it now & sending that on a little quicker.

Eclipse

During Katrina the satellites in the AO were saturated, though I did hear that the aircraft had better luck because of their relative proximity to the birds.

Despite the devastation, the cellular data service in most areas was up and running, and actually better than cellular voice.  I was in email contact the whole time.

Like I said, as with all tools, SDIS has its uses, but its not the end-all/be-all, and if no one has shown you how to take a photo, its useless.

For the record, much of the SDIS output (that I have seen) from Katrina was great.

"That Others May Zoom"

DNall

I can imagine some good air photo training & good air assessment training and some good practice would result in good highly useful pix, but that's not what I've seen a lot of. We do some routine stuff where it's not that important. You cn do area assessment from some generalized photos, but if I were trying to do some more exact technical work then you really do need some skill, and that really is where we can push forward.

Tubacap

We did a call around to all the airports that are "usually" in our area of responsibility for internet availability and access.  It doesn't mean that they would be available during an incident, but is nice information to have if you have many files to upload in a short amount of time.

That being said, the in air transmission is definitely a nice feature, and allows for retasking without landing, it just takes training and practice like everything else.
William Schlosser, Major CAP
NER-PA-001

jstadter

Due to the reliability issues with SDIS, we usually do land and send the pics via modem.  One of the guys in our squadron has a pocket PC with cell modem abilities and we are thinking of using that  from the air instead, which is a shame.  Granted, we have sent via sat phone, but we can only get one or two pics down, if we're lucky.

  That is one of the conflicts I have when dealing with SDIS.  I think the system was designed for the immediacy; being tasked to take pics of approaching flood waters and ice jams at bridges is what we mostly do for county Emergency managers, and to have the ability to take a picture, send it, get feedback via radio such as "a pic from farther north of last pic" or "different angle of ice jam at bridge x" and then being able to immediately take said pics and then send them again is what I think is the advantage of the satellite system.  That being said, with the reliability issues with Globalstar, this is almost impossible.  But, if we have to use a cell phone with modem capabilities, then so be it.  It is a nice camera, though.  We have a Nikon D1000 w/zoom lens.

Some of the other questions I have for you all who use SDIS, when you send pics, do you send many at once or one at a time?  Do you rename the jpeg file before you send it or do you write an accurate description in the email?  Do you crop the pics or do you try to compose your photo for what you need when you are taking the pics?

Thanks!
John Stadter, 1LT CAP - ESO, AEO - Red River Squadron ND046  Fargo, ND

floridacyclist

When we were doing ground RECON after Charley, we went to the next EOC inland where they had working internet and let us use it in exchange for copies of the pics we had taken of their county.

There was talk last year about setting up aircraft with high-power wireless connections. They would overfly the GT, the GT would upload their pics and the aircraft would fly to the nearest location with working wireless internet and email or FTP them. It would have been a lot cheaper than SDIS and almost as fast.

Gene Floyd, Capt CAP
Wearer of many hats, master of none (but senior-rated in two)
www.tallahasseecap.org
www.rideforfatherhood.org

sschwab

I have a little training with SDIS, and I have not seen photos taken from our plane yet, mainly due bad weather grounding training flights, but anyway.  From the other members in training, one of the biggest complaints was the camera.   It is "too nice", if you will, too many buttons that could get pressed while bouncing around in an airplane, altering some setting, and then the scanner spends their time trying to reset the camera instead of looking out the window.

We have some flights scheduled for mid April, maybe I'll have a better idea. 

For me, I just look at it as a way to send small photos to MB, get some feedback to tweak the mission, but the big value will still be when you land and they can see the whole photo set.

As far as the customer lacking internet connections, that's a problem, but now some of the counties around here have started using "virtual EOC", so the internet is the way to reach them.


alice

John in Nodak:  In California, most aircrews with SDIS will take pix, make small thumbnail files of the images, download to customer, and then send larger, better resolution images for the ones the customer wants after the first look-see.    You might also check your wing's repeators to see if they can handle digital files to use CAP radion freqs to transmit images instead of sat phones.

Our State ES agency prefers to have each image stamped with a georeference.  Here is a link to a company for software to have a GPS stamp on an image.  Don't know offhand which georeference software CAP uses now for its SDIS system, but my State government uses this company's software. Regards, Alice

http://www.geospatialexperts.com/
Alice Mansell, LtCol CAP