StratCom explores tie-ups for airships

Circuit EC / Bangalore

Stratospheric airships from US-based StratCom International will be ready to offer communication links soon. The first prototype is expected to hit the air by 2005-2006. StratCom, under the chairmanship of James Abrahamson, former director of the Star Wars programme, is exploring the possibility of collaborating with Indian organisations such as DRDO and ISRO for developing airships. Each airship will cost $15 to $20 million.

Besides other parts of the world, airships will be offered in India for military and civil applications and for bridging the Digital Divide. Abrahamson said, “We are talking to Indian organisations regarding development of an airship, but everything is still at a nascent stage. Once stratospheric airships take flight in India they will help streamline and augment existing communication systems in rural and remote areas.”

The unmanned solar cell-powered stratospheric airships are as big as a football field (500-600 feet in length and 150-180 feet in diameter). They will be placed at a height of 20 kilometres (approximately 65,000 feet) and will carry payloads from 907 kilos to 5,440 kg. The airship is designed to remain in a stationary position vis-à-vis the earth’s surface. It will be able to navigate over long distances or on combat patrol when required.

The civil applications of the airship include modern communications and broadcasting capabilities, supply of analogue and digital voice in several bands, fully interactive video, broadband data communications, disaster management, mobile data communications in remote and rural areas, tele-medicine and tele-education. Defence applications will include flexible combat patrol, ballistic missile defence sensor and interceptor platforms and in facilitating remote air traffic control combining radar and communications.