ANALYSIS OF RAIN RATE AND RAIN ATTENUATION FOR EARTH-SPACE COMMUNICATION LINKS OVER UYO - AKWA IBOM STATE

Rain rate and rain attenuation predictions are vital when designing microwave satellite and terrestrial communication links, such as in the Ku and Ka bands. This paper presents the cumulative distribution functions (CDFs) of the predicted rain rate and rain attenuation for Uyo, Akwa Ibom State (AKS) (Latitude: 4.88°N, Longitude: 8.09°E, Height above Sea Level: 51.2 m), a typical rain forest zone in Nigeria, using rainfall data for three years spanning between January 2010 and December 2012. These measurements were recorded by the meteorology department of the Akwa Ibom International Airport (AIIA), Uyofor percentage availabilities 99.9 to 99.999. Rain-rate measurements were carried out using the Moupfouma and Chebil models – models purposely designed for tropical zones, while the International Telecommunications Union Radio-wave propagation (ITU-R P) models were used for estimating rain-attenuation. The results obtained will serve as a good preliminary design tool for both terrestrial and earth-satellite microwave links. http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/njt.v35i1.2