New search & rescue geolocation system offered

Photo: Smith Myers

Smith Myers showcased ARTEMIS, a mobile phone detection and location system designed specifically for airborne search and rescue (SAR) and disaster relief, at a helicopter trade show in Dallas.

The company, founded 35 years ago in the United Kingdom, also designed and developed software-defined radio and cellular protocol stacks designed specifically for the SAR role. According to the company, ARTEMIS turns any mobile phone into a rescue beacon, only requiring two antennas to generate a latitude/longitude fix at up to 19 nautical miles (35 km), offering an alternative to traditional airborne sensors.

ARTEMIS’s features include:

• texting and calls in no service areas
• possible automatic cueing of electro-optical/infra-red (EO/IR)
• deployment as a stand-alone with embedded mapping or integration with mission system providers
• making missions in low light / instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) safer and more successful and
• availability in several SWaP configurations for manned/unmanned platforms.

Smith Myers announced in February that ARTEMIS has been integrated into the new Robotics Centre Echo SAR payload for small unmanned aerial systems (UAS) built by Teledyne FLIR Defense.

ARTEMIS airborne capabilities are available for use on manned rotary and fixed-wing platforms and drones with large and small payloads. It has already been in service with the AW101 Norwegian all-weather SAR helicopter and can be deployed across payload categories down to a small quad-rotor UAV.