Enhancing Maritime Domain Awareness in the Southwest Pacific Brian Young Defence Technology Agency New Zealand Defence Force

Position in the Pacific Concentric 1,000km radii circles Population 4.4 million 15,000 km of coastline 330 islands larger than 5 hectares Source of more than 3000 international shipping movements Over 99% exports and imports (by volume) moved by sea

NZ EEZ = 4.4M km 2 NZ ECS = 1.7M km 2 Exclusive Economic Zone

Search & Rescue Region NZ SAR Region = 30M km 2 From South Pole north to Kiribati group From mid Tasman Sea east to Cook Islands 844 emergencies (EPIRBs and maydays) in NZ SAR area May 2011 – 2012

Recreational fleet NZ registered vessels must have Category 1 safety certification to legally leave NZ EEZ International vessels do not need to pass Source: Yachting New Zealand Safety Inspection Database Source - YotReps (

Drivers for Maritime Domain Awareness Military operations Disaster relief Search and rescue Illegal fishing Energy security Conservation Illegal immigration Terrorist activity Smuggling Military operations Disaster relief Search and rescue Illegal fishing Energy security Conservation Illegal immigration Terrorist activity Smuggling Humanitarian Assistance Economic Security Criminal Activity

Military Operations (in the wider Pacific Region) Timor-Leste Solomon Is Defence White Paper: Possible use of military force in the following circumstances: in response to a direct threat to New Zealand and its territories; in response to a direct threat to Australia; as part of collective action in support of a member of the Pacific Islands Forum facing a direct threat; as part of New Zealand's contribution to the Five Power Defence Arrangement (FPDA); or if requested or mandated by the United Nations (UN), especially in support of peace and security in the Asia-Pacific region

Disaster Relief (in the wider Pacific Region) Samoan Tsunami, Sep-09 Aitutaki Cyclone Feb-10 Christchurch Earthquake Sep-10, Feb-11 Tokelau/Tuvalu Drought Oct/Nov-11

Search and Rescue Crippled Fishing Boat Dec 2011, Ross Sea, Russian “Sparta” Lost Jan 2013 Mt. Elizabeth Ross Dependency Antarctica 3 Canadians DHC-6 Twin Otter Lost Jun 2013 Tasman Sea 6 US, 1 UK 21-m Nina Found Jan 2010 Kiribati 5-m Lost Feb 2011 Ross Sea 3 Norwegians 14-m Berserk

Economic Security Semi-Submerged Containers Oct 2011, Reef off Tauranga Coast Container Ship “Rena” Grounding

Criminal Activity

Current approaches to MDA

Other MDA Technologies AIS Yotreps VMS

Recentred from Plot of AIS messages collected over first 6 months of NTS operations (Image courtesy of AGI). Newland, et.al. Nanosatellite Tracking of Ships — Review of the First Year of Operations. 7th Responsive Space Conference, Los Angeles, CA 2009 Vessel Traffic (AIS)

Recreational Movements YotReps is a volunteer yacht reporting database Vessels travel between Pacific Islands and NZ to shelter from the tropical cyclone season. Peak departures are in May to Fiji and Tonga Peak arrivals are in November from Fiji, Tonga and New Caledonia. All months May November Source - YotReps (

Evolving solutions for enhanced MDA

Commercial EO Imagery DTA is collaborating with US ONR-G and U Leicester (UK) on Space-Based Maritime Domain Awareness Fusion of imagery from multiple satellites and sensors Sail Fiji yacht race used to test the concept Ground truth data derived from YellowBrick Cloud cover was a major issue

YellowBrick Tracks

Synthetic Aperture Radar Penetrates cloud Working with Canada to characterize RadarSat-2 for NZ region Polar regions are a common interest Automated technology required to interpret the imagery Swathe width versus resolution trade-off RCM may improve coverage

CubeSat Nanosatellites Most satellite operations are not designed for a large oceanic ‘low market’ area. Economics of persistent surveillance of the South Pacific currently do not stack up CubeSats may fill CubeSats – 10cm x 10cm x 10cm – may fill this role in the future

Planet Labs’ “Flock 1” 28x 3-unit “doves” deployed from ISS in February 2014 Provide high resolution and high frequency Earth imagery Could be used to tip and cue higher-value space and/or airborne sensors.

Automation – AIS Behaviour Drifting Circle U-Turn Reverse-Turn S-Turn Proximity Drifting Circle U-Turn Reverse-Turn S-Turn Proximity Vessel Movement Analysis Automated analysis of AIS information for tipping and cuing airborne or space-based sensors

Summary With more than 30M km 2 to cover, persistent MDA is a big problem, but not insurmountable Current surveillance technologies will not meet New Zealand’s MDA needs The solution will be multi-faceted, but primarily space-based Automation is key

Mahalo Thank You