Data Communication Between the German NBC Reconnaissance Vehicle and Its Control Center Unit

Abstract

In Germany, the public safety system is largely organized by the German Federal States, which operate, among other equipment, a fleet of Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Reconnaissance Vehicles (NBC RVs) to take measurements in contaminated areas. Currently, NBC RV staff verbally report measured data to a Control Center Unit (CCU) over the assigned Public Safety Organization (PSO) analog voice radio channel. This procedure has several disadvantages. The channel is not secure and its capacity is wasted, which places a limit on the achievable throughput and thus on the number of NBC RVs that can be operational simultaneously. Also, while data is being reported, other PSO members are blocked from sending, and operating personnel is distracted from other work. To overcome these problems, we propose a heterogeneous and flexible communication platform that complies with reliability and coverage requirements for PSO. More specifically, our proposed system is designed to replace current ways of communicating between NBC RVs and the CCU. A drastically higher amount of data can then be transmitted to the CCU, and it can be processed in a much more effective manner in the CCU as well as in cooperating PSO units. Ultimately, this will improve NBC RV missions and consequently shorten PSO response time when dealing with NBC disasters.