Building on more than 25 years of expertise in acoustic processing, SAES has developed a complete family of Sonobuoy Processing Acoustic Systems (SPAS) that covers all martime patrol airfcraft (MPA) and Helo anti-submarine warfare (ASW) operations.

The SPAS is fully integrated with the aircraft / helo tactical mission system and enables acoustic sensor operators to detect, classify, localise, and track submarines and surface ships, based on analysis of the acoustic signals from the deployed sonobuoys.

The SPAS is capable of concurrently processing of up to 64 sonobuoys of any type (passive and active either in digital and analogue implementation).

Main features:

• Number of sonobuoys managed: Available in different configurations: 8, 16, 32 & 64
• VHF band: 136 MHz to 174 MHz
• Type of sonobuoys: Low-frequency array for radio astronomy (LOFAR), directional frequency analysis and recording (DIFAR), VLAD, air deployable active receiver (ADAR), low frequency coherent source (LFCS), BARRA, HIDAR, CAMBS, ANM & BATHY
• Analysis tools: Narrowband, broadband, transient, Demon, Double Demon, Swath
• Localisation tools: multistatic plot, energy plot, automatic cross fixing, target movement analysis (TMA), closest point of approach (CPA)
• Performance prediction tools: ray tracing, minimum detection range (MDR), probability detection range (PDR)
• Classification tool: Harmonic and modulation dividers. Interacts with an acoustic intelligence database (ACINT)
• Sonobuoy remote command: Command function selection (CFS) and command signal generator (CSG)
• Onboard acoustic information recording: Yes, STANAG 4283 compliance.
• System maturity: TRL 9: system test, launch and operation
• Design and quality standards (only for reference): ISO 9001:2008; ISO/IEC 12207; ISO 9100; STANAG 4283 Annex C Ed. 5; STANAG 4586; MIL-C-38999 Series III; MIL-STD-1399 (Navy); ISO 3741; AQAP-2110; AQAP-2210; Open System Architecture Design (OSA).