19th Century Airship Technology for Port Security

fenimor writes "Airships - known today mainly for advertising flyovers at football games - are the core of a new coastal surveillance system in development for the the U.S. Department of Defense. These stationary platforms 25 times the size of a Goodyear blimp will be equipped with an array of cutting-edge equipment for remote sensing, communications, and risk analysis, providing surveillance coverage over a surface area of 500,000 square miles from an altitude of 70,000 feet."

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Article Text -- In Case of Fire

[maggeth]

19th Century Technology for Port Security

October 13, 2004

Researchers at New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) are putting a 21st century spin on a 19th century technology to make the nation's ports and coastal waters safer. Airships -- known today mainly for advertising flyovers at football games -- are the core of a new coastal surveillance system in development for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) of the U.S. Department of Defense. But the new models will bear little resemblance to their predecessors. These High Altitude Stratospheric Airships (HASAs) will be unmanned, stationary platforms 14 to 16 miles above the ground. At 500 feet long and 150 feet in diameter with a volume of 5 million cubic feet, the HASAs will be 25 times the size of a Goodyear blimp.

The airships will be equipped with an array of cutting-edge equipment for remote sensing, communications, and risk analysis of suspected threats -- and that's where NJIT comes in. The university is partnering with StratCom International LLC to serve as the academic research and development base for the project.

NJIT's component of the project is under the direction of Donald H. Sebastian, PhD, vice president of research and development and director of the university's Homeland Security Technology Center. Sebastian says the project is a natural fit for NJIT. "We have expertise in the whole range of applicable technologies -- terahertz imaging, advanced materials technology for the airship skin, microelectromechanical systems (MEMS), intermodal freight transportation through our transportation centers, wireless telecommunications, and information-assurance systems. We're also an agile university with a strong entrepreneurial character that allows us to respond quickly to an emerging need such as homeland security."

While the airship technology is driven by important defense applications, the impact on civilian life may be far greater. When production can be scaled to meet the need of widespread deployment, the airships will become an important layer of our telecommunications infrastructure, empowering a wide variety of applications based on mobile, bi-directional exchange of voice, video and data -- broadband access anywhere at any time. Closer in time, homeland-security applications ranging from first-responder communications for emergency response and command through border security and surveillance systems will be important markets for HASA technology.

One area of development that has been proposed to the federal Transportation Security Administration concerns "maritime domain awareness" -- pushing the national boundaries out to sea where problem cargo can be identified and handled far from our populated port cities. The primary focus of the project is shipping containers, considered to be among the most serious potential threats to homeland security. More than half of all U.S. trade travels in sealed containers 20 to 40 feet long, piled by the thousands onto ships for delivery to ports, where they are often transferred, unopened, to trucks and trains for shipping to secondary destinations. Some six to eight million containers arrive in U.S. ports annually, and fewer than four percent are ever inspected for contraband or dangerous materials.

"The threat is a serious one, but container traffic is also one of the keystones of the global economy," Sebastian says. According to recent statistics, $728 billion in goods were shipped in containers, accounting for nearly seven percent of the gross domestic product. Many American businesses are dependent on materials and components shipped from other nations. Equipped to scan quickly and remotely, the airships won't disrupt commerce."

At an altitude of 70,000 feet, a HASA's advanced radar would provide surveillance coverage over a surface area of 500,000 square miles. Advanced sensory technology in each cargo container would be in communication with the airship to ensure the integrity of the ship's contents during transit. Unmanned air and sea craft would