Compass Navigation Satellite
March 16, 2009 by airianto
Filed under COMPASS, GNSS, Geomatics Science
Compass Satellite
The Compass system (also known as Beidou-2, BD2) is a project by China to develop an independent global satellite navigation system. Compass is not an extension to the previously deployed Beidou-1, but a new GNSS system similar in principle to GPS and Galileo.
The new system will be a constellation of 35 satellites, which include 5 geostationary orbit (GEO) satellites and 30 medium Earth orbit (MEO) satellites, that will offer complete coverage of the globe. The ranging signals are based on the CDMA principle and have complex structure typical to Galileo or modernized GPS. Similarly to the other GNSS, there will be two levels of positioning service: open and restricted (military). The public service shall be available globally to general users. When all the currently planned GNSS systems are deployed, the users will benefit from the use of a total constellation of 75+ satellites, which will significantly improve all the aspects of positioning, especially availability of the signals in so-called “urban canyons”. The general designer of Compass navigation system is Sun Jiadong, who is also the general designer of its predecessor, Beidou navigation system.
