The stratoport located in the Fuerteventura Technology Park has successfully hosted the first high-altitude, long-range stratospheric flight in Europe with a pseudo-satellite or HAPS (High Altitude Platform System) platform, a project led by the company Telespazio Ibérica where the technical team from ATLAS and CATEC (Advanced Centre for Aerospace Technologies), have played a key role as the flight operator for this platform and the entity responsible for the operational authorization issued by the Civil Aviation Authority (AESA) in Spain.
This authorization is the result of an extensive and complex preparation process carried out by ATLAS and CATEC in close collaboration with the Telespazio Ibérica drone team, Murzilli Consulting, and MIRA Aerospace. The operation is part of the ISSEC project, which Telespazio Ibérica is developing in collaboration with Pegasus Aero Group under a joint venture agreement at the Fuerteventura Technology Park to combat sixth-generation fires.
With this milestone, ATLAS CATEC have demonstrated its leadership as a UAS operator by offering a comprehensive response to a highly complex operational and regulatory scenario. In fact, CATEC has led the management, application, and obtaining of the necessary flight permits for an operation involving multiple entities, effectively coordinating the platform operator MIRA and the end user Telespazio Ibérica. ALTAS and CATEC have also acted as the UAS operator for the operation, assuming the legal and operational responsibility that has allowed Telespazio to carry out the flight campaigns under the current European regulatory framework. This capability is supported by a team of professionals with more than 15 years of experience in the aeronautical and UAS sector, with high technical skills and in-depth regulatory knowledge, which has made it possible to successfully complete an operation of this complexity.
ATLAS and CATEC have unique experience in operations carried out both in controlled environments—including coexistence with airports—and in uncontrolled environments, such as segregated airspace. In these scenarios, the technical, operational, and regulatory complexity requires advanced mastery of European civil regulations applicable to drones, rigorous risk management, and close coordination with the relevant aviation authorities.
These complex flights include BVLOS operations, urban environments, scenarios with critical infrastructure, coexistence with manned aviation in airport environments, and operations over the sea, which may fall under SAIL II risk levels, according with the SORA methodology.
Joaquín Rodríguez Grau, CEO of CATEC, said: “This milestone reinforces CATEC and ATLAS’s position as the UAS operator for our customers, the leader in Spain in the management, execution and operation, for third parties, of permits and complex flights with unmanned aerial platforms. In-flight operations verify that these pseudo-satellites are functioning correctly and are useful to users, mainly for emergency services, as is the case with this initiative”.
ATLAS and CATEC’s added value lies in its comprehensive capacity to design, plan and execute this type of operation with maximum safety guarantees, as well as to take the most appropriate approach, always aimed at enabling operational authorisation in a safe environment for our clients within the current legal framework. Its activity ranges from the detailed definition of CONOPS to the planning of take-off, route, approach and landing trajectories, the analysis of the operational environment and the design of specific mitigation measures to minimise risks throughout the entire operation. This technical and methodological approach allow ATLAS and CATEC to transform complex operational scenarios into viable and safe operations that are fully compliant with European regulations.
All operations are carried out under the supervision of the Spanish Civil Aviation Authority (AESA)recognised for its regulatory rigour and high safety standards.
ATLAS and CATEC’s experience as a leading operator of HAPS and UAS flights
This milestone, with the first high-altitude and long-range stratospheric flight in Europe using a pseudo-satellite, adds to ATLAS and CATEC’s success as an operator of UAS or HAPS platforms in other previous initiatives, such as the Lilium aircraft, the BAE Systems P35 platform, and the Airbus Zephyr HAPS.
ATLAS and CATEC has also participated in other historic milestones in unmanned aviation, such as the first flight of a legal civil BVLOS platform in Spain, and the first flight operated with UAS systems incorporating 4G and 5G technologies in an urban environment, in Benidorm (Alicante).
Photo: Telespazio Ibérica.
