MULTI-ANTENNA GROUND STATION FOR PERFORMING A SEAMLESS HANDOVER WITH DIVERSITY BETWEEN TWO PASSING SATELLITES AND CORRESPONDING SWITCHING METHOD

A ground station with P antennas for individually tracking a satellite out of an origin first moving satellite S1 and a destination second moving satellite S2 comprises, connected in series, a multi-channel reception and processing device and a combination device with configurable diversity, and comprises a device for managing diversity and seamless handover of a reception communication link from the origin first satellite S1 to the destination second satellite S2. The diversity and seamless handover management device is configured to manage and coordinate the execution of a succession of k seamless and unitary antenna handovers Bi, and during each seamless and unitary handover Bi, control the antennas, the multi-channel reception and processing device and the combination device with configurable diversity by determining and sending to them respectively: satellite acquisition pointing commands, and commands for alignment in time and in phase of the P signals received as input of the multi-channel reception and processing device generated as a function of measurements of time and phase deviations of P-1 signals received as input in relation to the signal received as input taken as reference signal, and a setpoint for selection of the output processed signals to be combined as a function of the scheduling of the handover from the first diversity configuration C1 to the second diversity configuration C2 and as a function of measurements of qualities of the signals received as input of the reception and processing device.