The SpaceData transmission system consists of seismic vessel shipboard antenna and equipment, a satellite fleet, a ground receiving station and transmission elements, capable of transmitting data at 311Mbits per second.

Seismic vessel onboard components are discussed in the Services and SeismicStar sections of this site.

The satellite element is a fleet of 7 NASA Tracking and Data Relay Satellites (TDRS) in geo-synchronous orbit with worldwide up-link coverage to within 5° of the Earth’s poles. Data for the test are received at the NASA receiving station at White Sands, NM which consists of two fully redundant systems (one of which is shown in figure below) composed of numerous satellite dish antennas, operational support, down-link and up-link RF systems and fiber connectivity to SDI’s Las Cruces Control Center, which is operated by General Dynamics.

This transmission system facility is composed of file and communications servers, RAID storage, an automated SeismicStar monitor and control system, control center with customer support, operations control, and administration, and fiber connectivity to Houston. A fiber loop in Houston provides connectivity to the client’s main processing center, and transmitted data is available via FTP from Las Cruces by client technical staff.