Government/Military

[Satellite Today 03-31-09] NASA awarded Harris Corp. a 14-month, multimillion-dollar contract to develop Ka-band capable radios as part of the communication navigation and networking reconfigurable testbed (Connect), which will be installed onboard the International Space Station (ISS), Harris announced March 30.     The Connect program, scheduled to be launched in 2011 on a Japanese H-2...

Discovery Orbiter Vehicle Looks Clean, Few Dings Seen In an intricate orbital dance, Space Shuttle Discovery undocked from the International Space Station and made a landing at Kennedy Space Center as beautiful and point-perfect as its liftoff a lucky 13 days earlier atop a pink plume of exhaust vapor. That silky Saturday afternoon landing was...

Updated — March 28, 2009 – 12:25 p.m. EDT Legend: + Targeted For | *No Earlier Than (Tentative) | **To Be Determined 2009 Launches Date: March 15 Mission: STS-119 Launch Vehicle: Space Shuttle Discovery Launch Site: Kennedy Space Center – Launch Pad 39A Launch Time: 7:43 p.m. EDT Landing Date: March 28, 2009 Landing Time:...

Boeing Briefs On Satellites, Missile Defense, Others Northrop, NASA Detail LCROSS The world space economy increased by almost 2.5 percent, or $6 billion, to $257 billion last year, amidst the deepest global economic downturn in more than half a century, a Space Foundation report stated. The Space Report 2009 was released at the Foundation conference,...

Two Advanced Medium-Range Air-to-Air Missiles (AMRAAM) launched from a High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS), Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT] announced. Lockheed makes HIMARS, while AMRAAM was a product of Hughes and Raytheon Co. [RTN]. The test launches came during an Army "common launcher" feasibility demonstration at White Sands Missile Range, NM. Army and industry representatives...

The Aegis weapon control system and Standard Missile interceptors took down two missiles simultaneously, in an exercise called Stellar Daggers. Interceptors from the USS Benfold (DDG 65) took out a short-range ballistic missile (SRBM) in its terminal phase of flight, and a low-flying anti-ship cruise missile, that were detected and tracked at the same time...

[Satellite Today 03-30-09] SATELLITE 2009 RECAP: Intelsat General Corp. has been awarded a multi-year contract from Artel Inc. to supply bandwidth to the U.S. military to support UAV surveillance operations, Intelsat announced March 24.     The contract, awarded under Artel’s Defense Information Systems Network Satellite Transmission Services-Global contract, calls for up to 432 megahertz of...

The National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) space segment completed its critical design audit, Northrop Grumman Corp. [NOC] announced. NPOESS now moves toward critical design review in late April. In the design audit, in the past year, 85 detailed technical reviews were conducted, with more than 100 customer community reviewers evaluating the depth and...

[Satellite Today 03-27-09] Overwatch Tactical Operations has received an award from Thales France to provide five sets of Ka- and Ku-multiband satellite communications antennas for use on the Royal Norwegian Navy’s Nansen-class frigates, Thales announced March 26.     The Ka/Ku-multiband solution acquired by Overwatch aims to minimize the required amount of deck space by combining...

[Satellite Today 03-27-09] Globecomm Systems has released a Ka-band version of its 1.2-meter Auto-Explorer satellite terminal designed for operation with the U.S. Department of Defense Wideband Global Satcom (WGS) system, Globecomm announced March 19.     The terminal, which is MIL-STD-188-164A compliant, is undergoing certification testing, which is expected to be completed May.     “With the...