The Brief

With stringent specifications to meet for their coverage
of the 2009 FIFA Under-17 Football World Cup,
NTA Nigeria turned to WTS Group. Africa’s biggest
broadcaster, they required complete renovation and
upgrade work to their fleet of six 12-camera outside
broadcast vehicles, and to their International Broadcast
Centre (IBC) facility to give them the high definition
capabilities needed to meet FIFA’s requirements. An
uninterrupted power supply (UPS) capable of powering
the IBC was also provided.
To get NTA’s coverage on air, WTS Group installed a
nine-metre C-Band earth station at the international
stadium in Abuja, and supplied six HD portable satellite
uplink systems.

Uplink Satellite Antenna

The Solution

WTS Group (Now C2S Nigeria) provided a further two 16-camera portable
flyaway kits – including engineers and operators – to
provide coverage of tournament games from two
locations to the host broadcaster.
To deliver this vast project within a tight timeframe,
WTS Group planned and coordinated the purchase
of thousands of items of equipment, and had 64
engineers working around the clock, seven days a
week to complete work on time.
WTS Group arranged training for engineers on the new
systems, and even chartered an enormous Antonov
cargo plane to transport the renovated HD OB trucks.

NTA OB Vans

SPECIFICATION

International Broadcast Centre

  • Upgrade of existing system from SD to HD, with complete rebuild of the video and control systems, and added 5.1 Remix facilities.
  • The facility is capable of switching 20 satellite and fibre external feeds and 16 internal stadium feeds, 12 VT and 8 Vectorbox transmission servers to 16 contribution circuits, and creating two main Live TX paths via Evertz QMC and Vectorbox systems
  • Key equipment installed included:
    • Evertz distribution equipment
    and Xenon 128×128 router
    with 128 output multi-viewer
    • Sony and Tektronix
    monitoring systems
    • Avid Post Production with
    Central storage from
    EditShare
    • Ingest transmission systems
    provided by means of 8x
    HD Vectorbox 8000 with dual
    redundancy

Outside Broadcast vehicle fleet

  • Upgrade of six 12-camera outside broadcast trucks from SD to HD capabilities, with complete internal refurbishment, including new monitor stacks, air conditioning and electrical and mechanical repair.
  • The overall OB upgrade utilised equipment from more than 60 manufacturers. Highlights included:
    • 60 x Sony HSC-300 and
    12 x HDC-3300 camera
    channels
    • 36 x Canon XJ Series
    box lenses
    • 36 x Canon HJ Series
    barrel lenses
    • 12 x six-channel EVS HD
    replay servers
    • 6 x Sony MVS-8000 2.5ME
    vision mixer
    • 6 x LAWO MC-56 5.1 Dolby
    Surround Sound audio desks
    • Evertz HD routing and
    multi-viewers
    • Evertz distribution equipment
    and control

Other requirements

  • Installation of 9m C-Band Earth Station at the international stadium in Abuja
  • Provision of six Temix HD portable satellite uplink systems
  • Temporary supply of two 16-camera portable flyaway kits, including engineers and operators
  • Specially chartered air freight export arrangements