Report

Teaser, summary, work performed and final results

Periodic Reporting for period 1 - RANGER (RANGER: RAdars for loNG distance maritime surveillancE and SaR opeRations)

Teaser

Traditional watch-keeping methods including visual observation; the use of audible warnings such as foghorns, bridge-to-bridge Very High Frequency (VHF) radio communications and radar (including the Automatic Radar Plotting Aid) have all improved over the years but still...

Summary

Traditional watch-keeping methods including visual observation; the use of audible warnings such as foghorns, bridge-to-bridge Very High Frequency (VHF) radio communications and radar (including the Automatic Radar Plotting Aid) have all improved over the years but still suffer from lack of accuracy and time delays due to limited detection range. It is therefore imperative to exploit current and emerging technological advancements in view of providing the appropriate tools that, when combined with existing/legacy systems will be able to lead to significant reduction of the loss of lives at sea, a better control of irregular immigration entering the EU undetected, while safeguarding internal security by preventing cross-border crime such as trafficking and smuggling.

The most important contribution of RANGER will be to significantly progress the accuracy and long distance detection, identification and recognition capacity thus drastically improving the response and intervention capacity of European SaR services and personnel, severely reducing the expected number of casualties in the Mediterranean basin, whether it is the Greek archipelago, the southern Atlantic or the open seas of Italy and France, while being cost-efficient both in terms of ownership but also in terms of operations and maintenance.

RANGER innovates by combining novel and ground-breaking Radar technologies with innovative supporting technological solutions for early warning, in view of delivering a surveillance platform that will offer detection, recognition, and identification as well as tracking of suspicious vessels capabilities far beyond existing legacy radar systems, seamlessly fitting and contributing to the CISE framework through the provision of on-demand CISE compliant services.

Work performed

Within the first 18 months the project has achieved the below results (the system is going to be updated periodically depending on the progress that it has been achieved):
All deliverables of the 1st period have been submitted and Milestones have been met
Smooth collaboration among partners and common RANGER vision established
User requirements have been elicited and the first version of technical requirements have submitted
administrative issues have been accomplished like pre-financing and quality management procedures.
Successfully organized a kick-off meeting, 2 workshops for WP2, several coordination team meetings and we established the Security Advisory Board and the 1st SAB meeting.
Set the procedures regarding Quality and Risk management.
Project Advisory Board has been set up
Independent Ethical Expert is on Board
Set the procedures regarding classified information.
Risk management and mitigation strategy have been created
Analyzed current state of the European Border Surveillance System (case EUROSUR). EUROSUR has been assessed in the light of the RANGER project objectives in order to ensure that RANGER will contribute and maximise its impact. In addition it has been analysed EUROSUR roadmap in order to ensure that RANGER project is aligned with EUROSUR’s policies and practices.
Analyzed current state of the European Border Surveillance System (case CISE). In addition it has been analysed CISE roadmap in order to ensure that RANGER project is aligned with CISE’s policies and practices.
Analysed ethical and societal dimensions of the proposed RANGER solution, in order to be taken into account and to aid RANGER developers, maritime surveillance experts and end-users.
Analyzed and summarized regulations and guidelines that must be taken into account regarding protection of the environment, HF radiofrequencies allocations and EMF public and worker radiofrequency exposure.
Finalized the first version of the data management plan (D1.2) and are in progress 2 tasks OTH Radar simulator and MIMO Radar design
Analyzed the drug trafficking and irregular immigration in the Mediterranean Sea and South Atlantic Sea.
Set and organized the strategy regarding communication, awareness-raising and dissemination of results that will ensure long-term impact and exploitation of the project results.
Created RANGER’s web page http://ranger-project.eu/, LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/groups/12014068, Twitter https://twitter.com/H2020Ranger and project’s internal repository “Redmine”
Successfully elicited the operational user requirements after 2 workshops, questioners and extended discussions with the end users
Participated in a workshop on Boarder Security related to EU funded projects organized by FRONTEX where RANGER was presented by EXUS
1st version of Architecture and interoperability layer have been submitted
OTH radar simulator has been set up
Antenna of the Greek pilot have been designed
1st version of PE-MIMO design has been submitted
1st small scale (4x4) prototype of MIMO radar has been deployed and tested
Greek pilot sites have been identified
1st version of pilot scenarios and validation plan has been submitted
Communication, Dissemination and Awareness Raising Strategies has been set up
Details of the achieved results are going to be included in the technical periodic report (part B)

Final results

Project is running the 18 month of its life. Therefore progress beyond the state of the art, specific results and expected potential impact is foreseen for the next period

Website & more info

More info: http://www.ranger-project.eu.