Fast IP Handover Between Satellite Networks and Wireless LAN Networks for High-Speed Trains

Internet services using satellites for high-speed trains are being widely studied these days. The major drawback of satellite networks is that antennas on the trains can not receive signals from the satellites in train stations. To solve this problem, IP handover to terrestrial wireless networks in the stations is considered. However, due to long disconnection time of layer 2 and layer 3, the performance of current IP handover schemes is not good in this handover case. In this paper, we propose a new IP handover scheme between a geo-satellite network and a terrestrial wireless LAN network for high-speed trains. Through simulations, we show that proposed handover scheme greatly reduces overall handover latency and increases TCP throughputs.