Radio channel description and quality of service for TETRA direct mode operation in forest environments

This paper describes radio channel and BER investigations performed in various scenarios typical to the TETRA direct mode operation (DMO), in a forest area. The data from radio channel sounding measurements was analysed in terms of average fade duration and envelop CDF. The same data was used to evaluate the unprotected BER on a TETRA communication link. The BER level distribution was compared to the distribution obtained when simulating a pedestrian speed TETRA DMO radio channel. The dynamics of the mobiles can have a strong influence on the radio link quality. As a general tendency, higher practical BER values can be expected as compared to the simulations when using the simple TETRA radio channel model.