Cospas-Sarsat is an international satellite-based search and rescue (SAR) distress alert detection and information distribution system, established by Canada, France, the United States, and the former Soviet Union in 1979. The system consists of both a ground segment and a space segment: The space segment of the Cospas-Sarsat system currently consists of SAR processors aboard 4 geosynchronous satellites called GEOSARs and 5 low-earth polar orbit satellites called LEOSARs.[1]