Network Includes ADS-B, Mode S and SDR Capabilities

Founded in 2014 and headquartered in Reading, U.K., Altitude Angel is a developer of Unified Traffic Management (UTM) software tasked with developing and building 165-miles of Drone Superhighways connecting the airspaces overlying the British municipalities of Reading, Oxford, Milton Keynes, Cambridge, Coventry, and Rugby.

The company’s first-party solutions are utilized by leading Air Navigation Service Providers (ANSP) and aviation authorities for purpose of managing the integration of Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS) traffic into extant national airspace systems.

Altitude Angel has commenced deployments of the U.K.’s largest planned commercial, aviation-grade sensor network developed specifically for wide-area low-altitude Unmanned Aerial System (UAS)/drone and aircraft detection.

Incorporating purpose-built ADS-B and Mode S receivers and comprehensive Software Defined Radio (SDR) capabilities, the network is capable of detecting existing and future Remote ID broadcasts transmitted by drones, and collecting transmission information emitted from control systems commonly used to pilot UAS platforms. Ergo, Altitude Angel’s sensor network will detect both manned and unmanned aircraft regardless of whether or not they broadcast their respective positions.

The data received by Altitude Angel’s sensor network will be fused with supplemental information to create a high-resolution, near-real-time digital map of the low-altitude airspace environment.

Notwithstanding the growing importance of managing manned and unmanned low-altitude aircraft traffic, the technology by which to detect and identify such remains largely immature. Existing systems are characterized by patchy coverage, high-latency—up to a minute or more—and detection of only limited transmission signal types.

Altitude Angel’s network sets out to dramatically lower latency and expand detection, thereby upping awareness of aircraft within the low-altitude environment and facilitating the safe operation of such.

Extensively tested across four sites, Altitude Angel’s network is being expanded to comprise a further thirty sites across the Midlands and areas southeast of England.

Altitude Angel founder and CEO Richard Parker stated: “In building this network we’re building the most comprehensive, real-time picture of whatever is moving through the country’s low-altitude airspace.”

Mr. Parker continued: “Coupled with our ARROW technology, the sensor network is a key component in the enablement of the digitization of low-altitude airspace, leading toward greater visibility of air traffic, and enabling automated BVLOS drone operations anywhere in the U.K. at scale, while providing operators of uncrewed aircraft the security they need to operate safely in unsegregated airspace.”

Unlike conventional flight-tracking software (e.g. Flight Radar and FlightAware) Altitude Angel’s network was designed from the outset to support new and future airspace users, such as drones and UAM operators, the operations of which are restricted to low altitudes. Moreover, Altitude Angel’s network makes use of certified, robust, and resilient aviation-grade hardware—not the hobbyist-style equipment common to such applications.

FMI: www.altitudeangel.com