WEEKSVILLE — Within 24 hours after Hurricane Katrina made landfall near New Orleans in August 2005, local aerostat company TCOM received a call requesting assistance with on-ground communications.

While TCOM said it could provide an aerostat for use as a mobile communications platform, the aerostat was never used because no one could decide what radio frequency to set the onboard communications package to, recalls Jodi Sokol, TCOM's director of business development.

Justin Falls/The Daily Advance (ENLARGE)

TCOM technicians (right) launch an aerostat equipped with the Cellular Aerostat Platform System communications package during a demonstration Thursday for the U.S. Army at TCOM's facility in Weeksville. Below: A close-up view of the CAPS.

"So we had an aerostat, but nothing that they could agree to put on it," Sokol said.

In the years since Katrina, TCOM has seen a rising need for aerostat-supported communications equipment, Sokol said.

On Thursday, at TCOM's facility in Weeksville, TCOM officials demonstrated new aerostat technology that they hope will improve on-ground communications in the critical hours leading up to and following a natural disaster.

Called the Cellular Aerostat Platform System, the communications system includes a 56-foot aerostat with mooring system, a supply of helium, a diesel generator and technical equipment to support cell phone communications. The aerostat can be flown as high as 1,000 feet in winds up to 50 mph for seven days, and a three-person crew can unpack and deploy the system in about two hours, Sokol said.

The system has been a joint project under development by TCOM and the Maryland-based company Tecore Networks, which makes equipment for small- to medium-sized wireless networks.

Thursday's trial run was the system's first airborne test, and included a communications coverage radius of about 14 miles.

Casey Joseph, chief technology officer with Tecore, successfully completed several calls between cell phones using competing cellular technology to show the system's compatibility with existing cellular technology. The system, which in its current development can handle about 90 calls, can also be used with laptop computers for wireless Internet connection.

After the test, Sokol said a report and analysis would later determine what modifications would be needed to the system.

Emergency management agencies that TCOM has spoken with so far are "very interested" in the system, Sokol said. TCOM's challenge is finding the agencies that would be responsible for purchasing and deploying the systems in a crisis event.

"It has to be thought through before the (disaster) happens, not after," said Sokol, adding that TCOM could provide training on the system or provide its own crew to operate it.