Alaska is the largest state in the nation (sorry, Texas). Connecting Alaskans with wireless service and high-speed broadband means overcoming obstacles like vast distances, harsh climates and rugged terrain. It requires innovation and the willingness to use all the tools in your toolkit, including satellites. No one has a better understanding than Paloma Hawn, GCI staff engineer in the architecture and planning group. We recently sat down with Paloma to discuss satellites and their role in the state of connectivity in Alaska. Paloma is just one of GCI’s team of experts who are always seeking new and more effective ways to deliver service—especially to rural customers.
Before we dive in, give us a little background on yourself.
I have lived in Alaska for 30 years – born and raised! I joined the GCI team in 2012 and I will soon be celebrating nine years at the company. Here at GCI, I am a planning engineer for the architecture and planning group. I focus on developing GCI’s roadmap for delivering service through satellites. GCI uses satellites for primary services where extending fiber or microwave towers isn’t feasible. We also use satellites to provide redundancy, or backup services. I spend a lot of time on our satellite platforms, but our customers are often in locations that require a variety of transport types. Through this effort, I’m always working closely with our GCI Business teams to support requests over all GCI transport platforms. At GCI, we want to make sure we are a step ahead in planning for our customers and our network so we can deliver services quickly and reliably. Planning years in advance helps us ensure we make the right investments to serve our customers now and in the future.
Tell us a little bit about GCI’s history in the satellite space. Is this something the company is just beginning to explore?
No — just the opposite. GCI has delivered services using satellite technology for decades. You might say GCI is a long-term expert on delivering satellite service — especially in Arctic environments. We don’t own or operate the satellites directly, we essentially lease raw capacity from satellite operators. Then it’s up to our folks on the ground to install the dishes, position them exactly right to receive the signal, calculate the network load necessary to serve the community, and deliver connectivity through the satellite service. It’s a complex system with lots of variables.
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What’s one thing you want people to understand about satellites?
This industry is rapidly changing. Alaska has consistently been a place to explore new technologies using satellites. If we can make it work here, we can make it work anywhere! Everyone is excited about the potential of Low Earth orbit satellites. One thing that is important to understand is that broadband LEO networks are still in beta testing. Each satellite (or spacecraft) is designed to cover a certain geographical area and number of users. As the number of users and service areas grow, more spacecrafts need to be launched to support the increased data load on the LEO constellation. The constellations can end up being massive. Lawmakers and regulatory bodies are making rapid updates to policy to keep up with the pace of LEO constellation development — it’s a thrilling time to be in the satellite industry!
I’m incredibly excited to see how deploying new equipment and technologies will impact our communities, and to also see how Alaska installations will change the model for the rest of the world.
Can you explain the difference between geostationary and low Earth orbit satellites?
Geostationary satellites are positioned at an altitude of 35,765 km over the Earth’s equator. At that altitude and position, the satellites appear stationary over a single point from the Earth. This is because their orbit and velocity is synchronized with the Earth’s rotational speed (which is why we call them geo — stationary). Dishes on the ground can be fixed, and don’t require equipment that moves the dish to track the satellites — typically this means cheaper installations. The tradeoff is that because the satellites are so far away from the Earth, round-trip latency is roughly 250ms.
Low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites are positioned at altitudes between 180-2000 km. Because they’re closer to the Earth, the satellites are moving faster than the Earth is rotating. To provide constant coverage, multiple satellites are required. For this reason, LEO systems are referred to as constellations. Their functionality relies on anywhere from tens to thousands of satellites working together as a single constellation. Latency is much lower with LEOs than geostationary satellites. At 1,000 km, the round-trip latency is around 7ms.
On the ground, equipment needs to track these multiple satellites as they pass overhead and coordinate the traffic handoff between the satellites as they pass. Many LEO operators are opting to use flat panel antennas that use digital beamforming technology to track the satellites. This technology is still fairly new and quite expensive — this is an area we are expecting to see some exciting innovation.
What are some of the biggest misconceptions about satellites?
When working with satellites, it is hard to make blanket promises to consumers regarding service levels and equipment costs. There are a lot of power, equipment, and service performance considerations that require design review for each installation. For example, the received signal level from a satellite will vary over a geographic area, so you may need different dish and power amplifier sizes to deliver the same service in two different communities. Another example is a customer with limited power available at their site, but lots of vacant land — in that case we may choose to put in a larger dish with a smaller power amplifier.
How did you get interested in satellites and become one of the leading satellite experts at GCI?
My interest in satellites began when I took an antenna theory class in college and when I first saw a spectrum analyzer at a job shadow. Satellite technology has it all — space, power and the ability to deliver a message thousands of miles away through invisible waveforms! I completed my bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering which was an essential foundation for understanding satellite communications systems. However, most of my satellite-specific knowledge was gained on the job and through courses provided by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Satellite is such a powerful and ever-evolving technology that after almost a decade in the industry, I still feel like I’m learning something new every day.
Some of my keys to success are persistence and strong interpersonal skills. Being persistent until any issue, big or small, is resolved ensures we don’t lose sight of smaller efforts that might be overlooked in the noise of larger efforts. Strong interpersonal skills are important when working on collaborative projects. All the projects that GCI’s engineers work on are complex and intersect with multiple teams and systems. Having the ability to bring the right individuals together to solve a problem is important in this industry. Focusing on relationships and communication has helped me overcome some of the obstacles that come with being a woman in a STEM field as well. Over the course of my career, I have realized there are a lot of people who want to see women (and young people in general) succeed in STEM, and those are the people you should surround yourself with. It is their support, opinions and guidance that should matter the most. Having a good support system will give you the confidence to be your authentic self, to ask questions, and to request help when you need it.