Measurement of the l-band air-to-ground channel for positioning applications

In the paper, we present results from flight trials conducted to investigate the characteristics of the L-band air-to-ground radio channel for positioning applications. We discuss the employed hardware setup, synchronization concept, calibration procedures, and investigated flight patterns. It is shown that the setup is suitable for investigating both multipath structure and absolute propagation time of the radio signals. The power delay and Doppler power profiles, as well as the time-of-arrival estimation accuracy, are presented.