Originally Posted by
Dick Smith
The iridium system works to ground level all over Australia now. By trying to "show off" to be the first in the world with archaic ground based transceivers it costs more and our industry goes broke- unless you are a monopoly!
To be fair Dick, ADS-B was introduced in Australia way before this satellite ADS-B was even thought about. In fact I'd suggest that Aireon has been able to launch this platform because of the work that Australia has done over the years.
And as KittyKatKaper suggests, the Aireon solution requires antenna's that can 'see' the satellite and therefore would knock out a lot of the GA aircraft that have fitted. The airlines may benefit in airspace (oceanic) where there is only ADS-C surveillance as it would allow radar-like separation however using CPDLC or HF for air/ground comms may still be a limiting factor.