The ceremony, held in the city of Manaus in the heart of the Amazon, comes five years to the day after Raytheon Company and its partners, Embraer and ATECH, began work on SIVAM. The project will provide real time information on conditions across the breadth of the region to a wide range of government agencies, research institutions and other users. It includes the capabilities to build one of the world's largest environmental databases.

Under the auspices of the Federal Government in Brasilia, SIVAM is the first step in Brazil's long range effort to protect and control this unique natural area that encompasses over half of the country's landmass.

The event is a significant milestone in the realization of Brazilian commitments made at the UN Conference on the Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and SIVAM is a critical asset for maintaining Brazilian sovereignty over its national territory.

The newly operating SIVAM system uses a diverse array of equipment to monitor both the surface of the vast Amazon jungle and the national airspace above it. SIVAM data will be used to support essential Brazilian government programs, university and private scientific research efforts, and sustainable development initiatives.

It will also help to address the health, educational and economic needs of Brazilian families and individual citizens. Tied together by an innovative satellite telecommunications infrastructure, the system combines data generated by space-based, airborne and surface sensor and support systems. Satellite remote sensing data are received through the Government's ground station at Cuiaba and image processing site at Cachoeira Paulista, which have been upgraded by the National Space Research Institute (INPE) and Raytheon.

Raytheon-supplied sensors -- including synthetic aperture radars, multispectral scanners, optical infrared sensors, high frequency direction finding equipment, and communications and non-communications exploitation gear -- have been installed onto three remote sensing aircraft, modified versions of the Embraer ERJ- 145.

These jets give users the opportunity for remote mapping through the dense jungle canopy, forest fire detection, and photoreconnaissance. On the jungle floor and in the waters of the Amazon river system itself, Raytheon provides an array of weather and environmental monitors that provide a real time and comprehensive picture of regional environmental conditions ranging from meteorological and lightning information to water characteristics and air and river pollutants.

SIVAM's air traffic control (ATC) and associated airspace surveillance for the first time provides Brazil with a comprehensive monitoring capability throughout the region. The system will contain 14 state-of-the-art Raytheon fixed base air traffic control radars and six transportable radars, supplemented by five existing government-furnished ATC radars.

These ground- based radars are augmented by five newly developed SIVAM airborne radars, also adapted ERJ-145s, outfitted with Raytheon and Swedish sensors. Collectively these radars provide an area-wide monitoring capability permitting vastly enhanced counter-smuggling, border surveillance and law enforcement operations over an area the size of the United States west of the Mississippi.

Data from the various airborne and ground-based sensors are sent to and processed in an Air Surveillance Center located in Manaus, Regional Coordination Centers located in Manaus, Porto Velho, and Belem, and a General Coordination Center to be located in Brasilia.

Dick Nelson, Raytheon vice president for SIVAM, said, "Working with the extremely professional members of the Brazilian Air Force - led by Brigadeiro Teomar Fonseca Quirico, and earlier by Brigadeiros Marcos Antonio de Oliveira and Jose Orlando Bellon -- over the past five years has been one of the highlights of the project.

Their operational, technical, and program management expertise so evident during the development and installation of the project ensures that SIVAM will meet all of the expectations that the Brazilian Government had in mind when the system was first conceived over a decade ago."

With headquarters in Lexington, Mass., Raytheon Company is a global technology leader in defense, government and commercial electronics, and business and special mission aircraft.

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