Time to confront solutions with End-Users
The European Union’s GEXTRECS project — GOVSATCOM Extreme Events Crisis Management Service — is intensifying preparations for its final demonstrations, which will showcase an end-to-end secure satellite communication (SATCOM) solution for massive, extreme disaster scenarios. The project, funded under Horizon Europe and coordinated by GMV, aims to define and validate a new service pack that integrates secure GOVSATCOM with other EU space components like Galileo (navigation) and Copernicus (Earth observation) to enhance the EU’s resilience.
The demonstration phase, which begins with a dry run and will culminate in a final Live Event on 23 October 2025, focuses on validating technological solutions by GOVSATCOM End-Users in a realistic, high-impact crisis setting:
Land Use Case (Cross-Border Crisis): Simulating a major earthquake off the coast of Porto, Portugal, resulting in a complete communication blackout and massive infrastructure damage. The demonstration will test the ability of multinational first responders (like I.S.A.R. Germany) to coordinate complex Search & Rescue and humanitarian aid missions across borders using secure, reliable SATCOM when all terrestrial networks fail.
Maritime Use Case (Multinational Maritime Crisis): Based on the same earthquake scenario, this case focuses on a humanitarian vessel’s (we will feature the Spanich research vessel Sarmiento de Gamboa) ability to communicate with the Coordination Centre and deliver supplies and evacuate casualties. It will validate the seamless, secure exchange of geo-intelligence products and essential operational data between a vessel at sea and the crisis command centers.
GEXTRECS is testing key innovations essential for multi-national, high-demand crises:
Dynamic Planner: A prototype ground segment component that ensures optimal and dynamic allocation of SATCOM resources in real-time, maximizing usable throughput even with sudden, high-demand surges from multiple user teams.
Network Balancer: A solution to ensure interoperability and secure communications when switching between different satellite and terrestrial communication networks, maintaining data integrity and confidentiality.
Demonstration activities will be carried out simultaneously in 2 EU Member States. Participants and observers will have an opportunity to evaluate presented solutions and exchange their views during an interactive Stakeholders Workshop which will take place on the same day.
Visit our Demonstrations page for more information.