Akiak village goes live with its new satellite connection to Broadband, high-speed internet

The small Akiak village near Bethel is switching on its new broadband and high-speed internet connection through the OneWeb Low Earth Orbiting Satellite, or LEOS, system.

The system will be fully operating on Nov. 15 but a successful test of the connection was carried out Sept. 14 and village residents are now using the system.

“The first testing of the OneWeb network connection was established between the user terminal in Akiak and OneWeb satellites, completing the connection to the Internet,” said Shawn Fitzpatrick, Vice President of Engineering at Pacific Dataport, the Anchorage-based company working with the Akiak Native Community and OneWeb.

“Testing will continue as new hardware and software are perfected,” he said.

Although systems are still being tested residents of Akiak are now able to use high-speed internet and broadband at periods of the day when OneWeb’s satellites pass over.

By Nov. 15 OneWeb will have enough of its satellites in low polar orbit so that Akiak will have internet and broadband 24 hours a day, said Shawn Williams, Pacific Dataport’s external affairs manager.

Kevin Hamer, President and CEO of Akiak Technology, LLC, a tribal company formed to develop systems in rural communities, said, “Akiak is the first ‘LEO’ village in the United States and we are delivering affordable broadband internet to 100 percent of our homes and businesses, because we have strong and committed tribal leaders and an outstanding project team.”

Akiak Native Community is a federally recognized Indian Tribe working with Pacific Dataport and Microcom, a sister company, to deploy a wireless broadband network.

Akiak received permission to develop a local 2.5 GHz wireless spectrum for community use in a Federal Communications Commission decision to grant local wireless rights to U.S. tribes.

Akiak’s tribe is the first in the U.S to use the new authorization and develop a system linking it to worldwide broadband and internet service.

The tribe is also the first customer worldwide for OneWeb, a U.K.-based company that is now deploying its system of satellites in ow polar orbits.

MicroCom supplied facilities for the community wireless and Pacific Dataport supplied the community user terminal system to link with the satellites.

Pacific Datacom is also providing the “backhaul,” service, or the connection to and from the OneWeb satellites. One connected, the systems now allow high-speed broadband and internet from homes in Akiak.

The user terminal communicates with the satellites and connects to the community wireless distribution system, which is based on Cambium wireless technology provided by Microcom.

The broadband signal is received from the satellites at the user terminal and is then sent to a tower where the signal is transmitted throughout the community. Each home will have a small antenna in a subscriber module outside the building.

The device receives the signals from the tower and then travels inside the home through an inside Wi-Fi router.

Fitzpatrick, of Pacific Dataport, said similar community wireless systems connecting to the satellites will be done across rural Alaska where there is no connection to existing terrestrial fiber-optic or microwave systems.

An estimated 90 rural communities, now not. Connected to Broadband and high-speed Internet could take advantage of the new systems using their FCC-granted local wireless rights.

“We are dedicated to seeing broadband reach all of Alaska and look forward to leveraging OneWeb’s network to help make vital connectivity possible in Akiak and communities across the state,” Fitzpatrick said in a statement.