CFS Senneterre and GATR Site

CFS Senneterre

The location of RCAF Station Senneterre / CFS Senneterre, operational from 1953-1988, was a significant air defence station, as it was the fall-back in case North Bay (The Hole) were to be taken out by a nuclear strike.  Some ruins of the buildings exist, but many are still intact and in use, re-purposed by local businesses.

RCAF Station Senneterre / CFS Senneterre

CFS Senneterre GATR Site

A GATR (Ground-to-Air Transmit & Receive) station was set up in the early 1960s, and I'm unsure what of that location is still intact - it's up the road a little North of Senneterre. 

Locals report there is nothing at the top of the mountain... I suspect the foundation and stumps of antenna poles will still be present.  In late 2012 I tried to get to the Senneterre GATR site, unsuccessfully.  The road is quite wet, and I didn’t have the right footwear.  The trail would be passable by ATV, but there is a steel farm gate at the end.  Rubber boots would be required to get to the base of the mountain.

CFS Senneterre GATR Site

2014.03.07 Update: It seems like there is better satellite imagery than previously available, so here are three views of the site (HERE Maps is the best)


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Former site of the CFS Cenneterre GATR building and antenna farm
48.48089, -77.2093

Photos of CFS Senneterre Trip (October 2012)


Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

NATO III & IV SATCOM Constellation Satellite Ground Terminals

From my previous posts here and here, I've been interested in the satellite uplink that was at CFS Carp.  Well, let's see if we can knit it all together.

The NATO III and IV constellations were NATO owned and operated, and provided communications for the NATO countries for their leadership.

NATO III Satellites were launched between 1976 and 1984.
NATO IV Satellites were launched between 1991 and 1993.
The last NATO IV Satellite was decommissioned in 2010.

These satellites communicated with ground stations in the NATO countries as well as having two control stations.  Once these ground terminals ceased to be used they were either sold off to private companies or re-purposed by their host nations.  Checking out where they were located, and what the immediate surroundings are, yields some very interesting sightseeing.

Here are all the satellite ground terminals that were used for the NATO III and NATO IV Satellite constellations. (click the top right of the map to enable full screen and see things a lot easier)

Globalstar feeder-link earth station - Smiths Falls

   Globalstar provides satellite based communication to phones and devices through a constellation of 48 sattelites in a low earth orbit, and 24 ground stations (that they call feeder-link earth stations).  You know SPOT?  Signals from SPOT are transmitted using the Globalstar constellation.

You can find this earth station at 44.91638, -76.01671; at the moment the Google Satellite imagery and Bing imagery is pretty bad, so I used Here Maps for an areal shot below.  

There is a second Canadian feeder-link station in High River, Alberta; but I haven't visited yet.

Globalstar Feeder-link Earth Station - Smiths Falls

Globalstar Feeder-link Earth Station - Smiths Falls
Credit: Here Maps

Thank you Treasury Board Secretariat!

Shockingly, I really really like the endless amount of Federal Government paperwork every department has to work through at this moment, right now.  The Canadian Government bean-counters, the Treasury Board Secretariat, keep an online database of all the property they manage and pay for.  Including that of the Canadian Department of National Defence.

What?

Yes.

Military property needs to be documented with paperwork too!

So here's a map of all the Canadian Military sites that the Treasury will own up to. (click the top right of the map, go full screen)

Canadian Department of National Defence Antenna Sites

While trawling MERX, these locations came up; with some Google Satellite View snooping it was pretty easy to identify their locations.  However, I'm light on details as to what system they support.  Are they part of the "Strategic National Communications infrastructure"(citation)?  I would guess that Cardiff and Riverbend are remotely operated by CFB Edmonton, and that Carrying Place and Point Petre are operated by CFB Trenton; but that's only a guess, based solely on proximity. Three of the four sites have the unmistakable LPH-89 antennas in their antenna farms, so I assume some of their duties involve HF communication.


(LPH-89 Antenna @ USAF HF Receiver Site, Lincoln, California)

The next time I'm near Trenton I'll certainly check out Carrying Place and Point Petre and hopefully get some better pictures of their antennas.

Carrying Place Receiver Site

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Note the directional microwave antenna pointing SE toward Point Petre.

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Point Petre Transmitter Site

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Cardiff Transmitter Site

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Riverbend Receiver Site

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Note the directional microwave antenna pointing NW toward Cardiff

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