Signal statistics obtained from a LMSS experiment in Europe with the MARECS satellite

A land mobile satellite system (LMSS) propagation experiment at 1.5 GHz has been carried out in Europe in the framework of ESA´s PROSAT program using the MARECS satellite as the signal source. Rural, suburban and urban environments were investigated in Spain, France and Sweden in order to analyze the propagation factors responsible for degradations in LMSS. A second series of tests were performed in Spain using a locomotive as mobile platform. The results obtained show that shadowing is the main impairment in LMSS, achieving availabilities of 80-90% for the unfaded signal which decrease to 30% for the extreme cases of urban environments, dense woods, or suburban environments in low elevation angles, or railroads with a large number of tunnels