Defence

Italy is coming to the end of a "key year" for development of dual-use space communications and observation technology, according to the head of the Italian defence ministry's general directorate of telecommunications, information and advanced technologies (Teledife), General Pietro Finocchio, who was speaking at the recent Armed Forces Communications and Electronics Association symposium on dual-use aerospace technologies and applications in Rome.

The second of four COSMO-SkyMed satellites will be launched by year-end, he said, with the third and fourth to be in service by the end of 2009. The first satellite was launched in June, and contracts for the remainder of the constellation had been signed by the end of 2006.

COSMO-SkyMed is a space-based earth observation system centred on SAR (Synthetic Aperture Radar) technology, developed for dual use including military, institutional and commercial applications

Finocchio added that the date of the second launch depends on upgrades based on first spacecraft calibration. COSMO-SkyMed was developed under the aegis of the Italian Space Agency by an Thales Alenia Space-led industrial team with Teledife support.

Adopting advanced technologies, the satellites' coverage will be extended towards the Indian subcontinent, to assist with peacekeeping and disaster management, he said.

He added that Teledife hopes to add COSMO-SkyMed to a basket of programmes in a co-operation arrangement with France that already includes ORFEO (optical and radar federation for earth observation) and the future bi-national dual-use communication programme ATHENA-FIDUS (Access on Theatres and European Nations for Allied Forces).

At the European level, Italy is working to include COSMO-SkyMed in the multinational space-based imaging system (MUSIS) and Galileo space-based navigation programmes. "Teledife is the contractual agency for the MUSIS ground segment study. Industrial offers for this segment are already in our hands and the contractual activities will be launched by year-end," he said.