Border and coastal security require military and security forces to maintain persistent surveillance and control over long stretches of land and coastal areas, holding the line with observation posts equipped with remotely controlled sensors, communications, and patrols.
On clear days outposts can cover tens of kilometers, but at night or in degraded visibility conditions, the line becomes porous and attracts unlawful or hostile activity. Until recently, electro-optical sensor and signal processing technology was not able to maintain effective coverage even under degraded visibility conditions but the new SPEED ER system developed by Israel’s Electro-Optics (EO) payload specialist CONTROP Precision Technologies Ltd. succeeded to expand such sensor coverage beyond 40 km, enabling security forces to deploy fewer observation towers while improving the coverage of long borders and coastal lines.
SPEED-ER is a long range, gyro-stabilized high definition ISR system designed for border protection and coastal protection. The system was developed to improve limited visibility conditions experienced in twilight hours and problematic weather conditions. Improved visibility is achieved by combining operating multiple sensors in four different channels – two Visible video cameras – one with a Wide Field-of-View (WFOV) and another with Narrow Field-of-View (NFOV), and two thermal cameras – a Mid-Wave InfraRed (MWIR) and Short-Wave InfraRed (SWIR). Each channel offers specific advantages and has certain limitations, but the combination of all three offers superior performance in all environmental and visibility conditions, including haze, dust, rain or high humidity.
The system is fitted with powerful telescopes for all sensors, enabling the system to detect a standard NATO target from a distance exceeding 40 km. visibility at night and adverse weather are also extended using a 1,400mm lens for the MWIR thermal camera and 2,500mm telescope for the SWIR, both are equipped with continuous zoom function.
Controp’s SPEED family also includes two panoramic surveillance systems – SPEED-V and SPEED-ER, designed to monitor a wide area for intruder detection using automatic, panoramic intruder detection and recognition.
