Distress Tracking and Safety Communications in Aviation and Maritime Domains – A Comparative Analysis of GADSS and GMDSS

Citation: Ravikumar Chakka Devarajan, "Distress Tracking and Safety Communications in Aviation and Maritime Domains – A Comparative Analysis of GADSS and GMDSS", Universal Library of Engineering Technology, Volume 03, Issue 03.

Copyright: This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

The article presents a comparative analysis of the Global Aeronautical Distress and Safety System (GADSS) and the Global Maritime Distress and Safety System (GMDSS), which are used to support safety operations in the aviation and maritime sectors. Particular attention is devoted to distress tracking architectures, emergency communications, search and rescue support, and information management under emergency conditions. The study examines the characteristics of normal tracking, distress tracking, distress alerting, search and rescue coordination, and information dissemination within aviation and maritime environments. It also analyzes approaches to distress condition determination, the role of CONOPS documents and ARINC 680 in the evolution of GADSS, as well as the regulatory framework and operational logic underlying GMDSS. The findings demonstrate that the aviation and maritime sectors employ different operational paradigms for distress response. GADSS is built around autonomous object tracking and the early detection of emergency situations, whereas GMDSS is centered on the transmission of distress information and the coordination of communication among participants in rescue operations. The principal outcome of the study is the development of the author’s Integrated Distress Tracking and Safety Communication Framework, which integrates event detection, object tracking, information transmission, data management, satellite interaction, search and rescue coordination, and decision support within a unified analytical structure. The proposed model enables comparative analysis of aviation and maritime safety systems based on common functional layers while preserving the distinctive characteristics of each domain.

Keywords: Aviation Safety, Maritime Safety, Object Tracking, Emergency Communications, Distress Signals, Search And Rescue Operations, Satellite Surveillance.

https://doi.org/10.70315/uloap.ulete.2026.0303007