Building on Bold Quest, airborne network moves forward Published Dec. 9, 2009 By Chuck Paone 66th Air Base Wing Public Affairs HANSCOM AIR FORCE BASE, Mass. (AFNS) -- A team from the Electronic Systems Center here is now building on some encouraging airborne networking results achieved during Bold Quest 2009, the Joint Forces Command-led exercise conducted in November. Despite some issues that took the main test aircraft off line, officials from the 653rd Electronic Systems Group's Airborne Networking Division demonstrated some specific data exchange capabilities. Air-to-ground exchanges went particularly well, said Mike Therrien, the division chief. From what officials refer to as the mid-tier of the ever-evolving airborne network, a general range between 20,000 and 25,000 feet, aircrews were able to pass data and even stream video at rates of six to seven megabytes per second over about 20 nautical miles. "Those results were pretty impressive, better than what's been demonstrated before," said Lt. Col. Brad Rennich, who led the team's efforts at Bold Quest. "We were able to maintain good connectivity throughout with the (joint terminal attack controllers)." From a product standpoint, the team sought to validate the air-to-air capabilities of the Common Data Link, referred to as CDL. They wanted to examine its transmission capabilities while experimenting with a miniaturized version ideal for space-constrained environments such as small unmanned aircraft, or the backs of JTACs who must carry units with them. "The miniaturization capabilities proved to be very, very good, and the ability to use multiple waveforms to move data was the other clear success story," Colonel Rennich said. That success revolved around a Joint Concept Technology Demonstration, called the Communications Airborne Layer Expansion, or CABLE. This concept is championed by JFCOM and U.S. Strategic Command, both of which seek greater aerial comm capability, independent of individual systems. "CABLE allows us to manage the links that are available at any given point to maximize data throughput," Colonel Rennich said. "If CDL is available, that's probably going to be the best way to push data. If it's not available, for whatever reason, then if you can fall back to your next best option and pick a route to get to your endpoint, you probably want to do that." CABLE gives operators that option, thus creating a true network and even linking disparate networks. The bottom line is that data gets to and from where it's needed, and CABLE handles that automatically. "It's like with your cell phone," Colonel Rennich said. "You don't really care how you're connecting, as long as you're connecting." The Defense Department's Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Task Force got to observe these connectivity developments during Bold Quest. This provided great value, officials said, noting that the task force members get lots of marketing pitches, but that Bold Quest allowed them to see what really works in a rigorous test environment.