Crisis in Syria - Monitoring the Syrian Domestic Broadcast Services

A new article Crisis in Syria - Monitoring the Syrian Domestic Broadcast Services has just been posted to the Shortwave Central Blog at http://mt-shortwave.blogspot.com/2013/08/crisis-in-syria-monitoring-syrian.html and on the Btown Monitoring Post http://monitor-post.blogspot.com/2013/08/crisis-in-syria-monitoring-syrian.html.


If additional broadcast information becomes available, we will post updates on the SW Central blog
http://mt-shortwave.blogspot.com/ and on our companion twitter feed for real time updates at @QSLRptMT https://twitter.com/QSLRptMT.


I will also post any utility related frequencies as they become available here on the MilcomMP  and you can follow our real time updates on the @MilcomMP twitter feed.

The first AEHF & Sbirs satellites will launch around July 30 and in early 2011

Amy Butler wrote the story below on the AWST website:

The U.S. military and intelligence community launch manifest is ramping up to a fast pace to deploy several first-of-fleet models for communications, missile warning and navigation.

The first Boeing GPS IIF, which will deploy a new safety-of-life civil signal, is slated for launch May 21, and the second is expected around Nov. 18.

The first and only Space-Based Space Surveillance satellite, made by a Boeing/Ball Aerospace team, will launch in July from a Minotaur IV from Vandenberg AFB, Calif. SBSS is the first satellite designed to surveil spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit from low Earth orbit, and it is needed to fill a gap in space situational awareness data.

The first Advanced Extremely High Frequency (AEHF) and Space-Based Infrared System (Sbirs) satellites, both made by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, will launch around July 30 and in early 2011, respectively.

As the Pentagon prepares for these seminal launches, The National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) also is preparing for the “most aggressive launch schedule that this organization has undertaken in the last 25 years,” said U.S. Air Force Gen. (ret.) Bruce Carlson, NRO director, during a speech at last month’s National Space Symposium. He says that several “very large, very critical” satellites are awaiting launch in the next 12-18 months for the NRO. “We simply have to get them off,” he said, underscoring how urgently they are needed. Carlson also expressed concern for the industrial base, and says he plans to boost he amount of science and technology spending coming from NRO.

You can read the entire story at
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=space&id=news/asd/2010/05/07/02.xml

General calls for focus on protecting satellites

by John J. Kruzel, American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON (AFNS) -- The chief of U.S. Strategic Command wants better tools for protecting against threats from space debris -- an estimated 20,000 pieces of manmade material orbiting around the planet.

Gen. Kevin P. Chilton laid out what he described as his "wish list" Nov. 4, emphasizing the importance of being able to predict collisions between debris and valuable satellites.

Given the scarce number of personnel tasked with carrying out this mission, "we are decades behind where we should be, in my view," General Chilton said in a speech at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb.

The collision in February of an American and Russian satellite changed an assumption underlying the use of space. General Chilton called the collision between the Iridium and Kosmos satellites the "seminal event" of the year for STRATCOM.

"The big space theory, like the big sky theory, kind of came to a close when that happened -- the thought that we wouldn't have to pay attention to the movement of every satellite up there because there's so much space up there and such a low probability that they'll run into each other," he said.

Those working in the field likely never bought into the theory that a collision was unlikely, the general said, and the event drove home the reality to those responsible for budgeting.

"It's amazing what one collision will do to the resource spigot," he said. "Once that happened, we started to see some resources start to flow in the right directions and some creative thinking going on to improve our ability to predict collisions between the 800 satellites that we care about up there that are active and the more than 20,000 pieces of total debris."

General Chilton cautioned that the 20,000 estimate could likely be off "by an order of magnitude" of actual materials able to damage satellites and systems in orbit.

As in other military scenarios, maintaining situational awareness is no less important in space than it is on land, in the air or at sea.

"Space situational awareness is no different than the situational awareness that we demand in any other domain," he said. "And we do not provide that in an adequate fashion to my component commander in charge of space operations for the United States of America."

To maintain awareness, General Chilton stressed the need for sensors, which he described as the start of the process.

"It starts with having sensors in the right place around the globe so you can surveil the domain," he said.

He also underscored the need to replace the space fence and keep on track the space-based surveillance system. General Chilton suggested more also could be done in the way the United States relates to its allies in space.

"I think there are also opportunities for us to reach out to friends and allies and leverage capabilities that others have in a teaming fashion to provide the increased surveillance assets, the increased observations, that decreases the uncertainty in the location of elements in space," he said. "I think there's great opportunity for us to reach out and do that better as well."

As Space Collision Threat Looms, Pentagon Upgrades Its Monitoring of Satellites

Space Junk An artist's impression of space debris in low-Earth orbit. The U.S. government wants a better surveillance system to keep track of the thousands of space junk pieces. ESA

By Jeremy Hsu on the Popular Science website

The U.S. Air Force has upgraded its ability to predict possible satellite collisions, as the risk from space debris increases

Satellites currently must dodge an ever-growing gauntlet of other satellites and clouds of space debris, and this year the Pentagon has quietly upgraded its surveillance accordingly. The U.S. military announced yesterday that it now tracks 800 maneuverable satellites, compared to less than 100 prior to a February collision between an active U.S. satellite and a retired Russian communications satellite.

That crash served as a wakeup call and emphasized the vulnerability of U.S. satellites, according to General Kevin Chilton, commander of U.S. Strategic Command. Reuters reports that the Air Force also plans to track an additional 500 non-maneuvering satellites by the end of year, and thereby keep tabs on the roughly 1,300 active satellites currently in orbit.

Read more . . .

Where do satellite catalogs come from?

Tracking all the active satellites and orbital debris around the Earth is a challenging task, even for the US Defense Department. (credit: NASA)

Occasionally on this blog I write up information on some of the more interesting military satellite information that crosses my desk. In those write ups you will see mention of the NORAD Space Catalog number, International Designator, and other information on the object's orbit.

I have come across a most interesting article online that describes the creation and maintenance of satellite catalogs and a lot more by a knowledgeable author, Brian Weeden.

http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1417/1

If you would like to learn more about how NORAD tracks stuff in orbit, this is a must read.

Satellite Collision Debris May Affect Space Operations, Cartwright Says

By Air Force Master Sgt. Adam M. Stump Special to American Forces Press Service

WASHINGTON, Feb. 12, 2009 - The collision yesterday of two communication satellites has left a debris pattern that may affect future space operations, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said at a symposium here today co-sponsored by the George C. Marshall Institute and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Space Enterprise Council.

U.S. Marine Gen. James E. Cartwright, speaking on the national security ramifications of the collision between an American and a Russian satellite, said the event shows the need for better information sharing and space situational awareness.

The American satellite, owned by Iridium Satellite of Bethesda, Md., weighed about 1,200 pounds and collided with a Russian satellite that had been nonoperational for more than a decade. The crash happened 491 miles above Siberia. The collision was confirmed when the active U.S. satellite did not report in and the debris field was picked up by sensors.

"My worry is that debris field is going to be up there for about a year, so we're going to have to play a little bit of dodgeball," Cartwright said. "It's going to be a problem because it will take a month or two for the debris to settle down and for us to understand the scope of the field to be able to track it and understand where at least the larger objects are."

The debris will be around for some time because the satellites were in a high orbit around the earth, Cartwright said. Once the debris field has stabilized, there will be a pattern that all countries can use to navigate around, he said.

"It's a field of debris out there that's going to be out there for many years," he said. "The good news is once it's stabilized, it's relatively predictable. The bad news is, it's a large area. If we're denied that large area for use, it becomes a problem."

Many of the commercial and national security satellites, particularly communications satellites, rely on certain spacing between other objects in order to be effective, Cartwright said. Losing a spot because of debris could have a financial or operational impact on anyone wanting to use the space, he said.

"If that's going to be long term, that's a problem for us," he said.

The general said he hopes the incident will result in a better exchange of satellite orbit data between countries.
"I'd like to be able to find a way, not only with Russia, but with other nations to make sure that our exchange of data is more complete," he said. "We would be remiss to not take advantage of this and turn it into good."

The growing number of satellites require improved information sharing, Cartwright said. "It is a crowded place out there today," he said. "There is just no way around that. The need, first and foremost, for better situational awareness out there is something you have to actively pursue."

The need for space situational awareness has changed drastically in recent years, the general said. "It was acceptable five years ago to know something was out there and check on it every couple weeks," he said. "Those days are just not tolerable anymore."

Whereas countries previously could wait a few days or weeks to get satellites stabilized in their orbits, the current congestion in space pushes that timeframe down to seconds and minutes, he said.

Iridium, Cosmos Satellites Collide in Space - Update

In an unprecedented space collision, a commercial Iridium communications satellite and a non-operational Russian Cosmos military satellite ran into each other Tuesday at around 1656 UTC above northern Siberia, creating a cloud of wreckage, government officials said yesterday.

They two satellites have been identified as Cosmos 2251 and Iridium 33.

Cosmos 2251
USSPACECOM Catalog No.: 22675
International Designation Code: 1993-036A
Satellite Details Orbit: 767 x 803 km, Inclination: 74.0°
Launch Date (UTC): June 16, 1993 (0417 UTC)
Mission: Russian Strela-2M military store-dump communications satellite (non-operational)
Launch Site: Site 132/1 at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome
http://www.astronautix.com/craft/strela2m.htm

Iridium 33 (Also called Iridium SV033)
USSPACECOM Catalog No.: 24946
International Designation Code: 1997-051C
Satellite Details Orbit: 783.0 x 798.2 km, Inclination: 86.4°
Launch date: September 14, 1997
Mission: LEO Communications Satellite
Launch site: Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan
Launch vehicle: Proton K #252
http://www.astronautix.com/project/iridium.htm

"They collided at an altitude of 790 kilometers (491 miles) over northern Siberia Tuesday about noon Washington time," said Nicholas Johnson, NASA's chief scientist for orbital debris at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. "The U.S. space surveillance network detected a large number of debris from both objects."

Animated version of the collison at this link http://i39.tinypic.com/2vbk75z.gif (Courtesy of John Locker)

Air Force Brig. Gen. Michael Carey, deputy director of global operations with U.S. Strategic Command, said initial radar tracking detected some 600 pieces of debris.

Iridium Satellite LLC operates a constellation of some 66 satellites, along with orbital spares, to support satellite telephone operations around the world. The spacecraft, which weigh about 1,485 pounds when fully fueled, are in orbits tilted 86.4 degrees to the equator at an altitude of about 485 miles. Ninety-five Iridium satellites were launched between 1997 and 2002 and several have failed over the years.

More on this story at
http://spaceflightnow.com/news/n0902/11iridium/

Here is an computer generated image of all the orbital debris in low earth orbit (LEO). LEO stands for low Earth orbit and is the region of space within 2,000 km of the Earth's surface. It is the most concentrated area for orbital debris. (Courtesy of the NASA Orbital Debris Program Office)

The last major spacecraft fragmentation and probably the most famous, was the intentional destruction of the Chinese Fengyun 1C weather satellite by a Chinese ASAT weapon. The current debris count from that incident now stands at 2,530 pieces.

Academy researcher develops satellite imaging technology

by Staff Sgt. Matthew Bates
Defense Media Activity-San Antonio

1/23/2009 - COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AFNS) -- A research associate at the U.S. Air Force Academy's Laser and Optics Research Center here is developing a new capability that will allow satellites to be seen and see clearer.

Dr. Geoff Andersen developed the process, called holographic adaptic optics, that uses sensors and lenses that can correct for disturbances in the atmosphere.

Atmospheric disturbances can interfere with ground-based optical telescope's abilities to clearly see satellites orbiting the earth.

"Stars don't twinkle," Dr. Andersen said. "This is just the effect of atmospheric interference on our ability to see into space."

Dr. Andersen's process uses adaptive technology to compensate for this interference.

"Think of it like wearing a pair of glasses," he said. "When someone has poor eyesight, the prescription compensates for this and makes his or her eyesight better. This process is similar. It uses adaptive optics so telescopes can see into space better."

This is important to the Air Force because it will allow the service to better see its satellites. For instance, if a satellite stops communicating with personnel on the ground, they can view it on a telescope to determine what caused it to go off the grid.

"Naturally, the clearer you can see the satellite, the easier it will be to diagnose the problem," Dr. Andersen said.

Air Force officials have been using various forms of technology to view its satellites for several decades, but the equipment used to perform this is expensive, computer intensive and large.

"The computer itself is as large as a room," Dr. Andersen said.

This new system, which Dr. Andersen has the patent for, uses holograms and is condensed into a device the size of a standard DVD player. This makes it cheaper and opens the door to new possibilities.

"We could place one of these devices on a satellite and then the satellite would be able to see down to earth with a crystal image," Dr. Andersen said.

Devices could also be placed on unmanned aircraft systems, allowing them to produce a clearer image for combatant commanders. UAS' are perfect candidates for this technology due to their type and height of flight, Dr. Andersen said.

"UAS' produce their own turbulence when flying and they tend to fly in the general area where atmospheric interference is high," he said. "This new technology would eliminate these problems and allow the UAS to produce a high-quality, sharp image."

The adaptive optics technology goes beyond having only military applications. It also has uses within the medical arena -- especially that of laser eye surgery.

"This technology will make eye surgery more precise and specialized," Dr. Andersen said.

Capabilities aside, Dr. Andersen said he is proud to be instrumental in the creation of this holographic technology. He's also proud of the cadets he teaches and who help him on a daily basis.

"They get hands on to help find solutions using research," he said.

The students are happy to help, knowing that the work they are doing today could possibly shape the future of imagery technology.

"It makes it really worth it knowing there's a real-world application for what we're doing here in the laboratory," said Cadet Will Holmes, a senior at the Academy. "And it's great getting to work with Dr. Andersen."

US Launches Advanced Elint Satellite

United Launch Alliance’s Delta IV Heavy rocket carrying a payload for the National Reconnaissance Office successfully lifted off from Space Launch Complex 37 at CCAFS at 9:47 p.m. EST (0247 UTC) today. The launch was originally scheduled for 2005, but was delayed due to a number of issues, and lift-off took place at 0247 UTC on 18 January 2009.

This was the first Delta IV Heavy mission for the NRO. Designated NROL-26, the mission is in support of national defense. This was the third Delta IV Heavy launch in Delta program history.

“This first Delta IV Heavy launch for the NRO is the culmination of years of hard work and dedication by the combined NRO, Air Force, supplier and ULA team,” said Jim Sponnick, ULA Vice President, Delta Product Line.

NROL-26 is a classified spacecraft which is to be operated by the United States National Reconnaissance Office.

According to reports by Aviation Week and other sources, NROL-26 is believed to be either the first Intruder satellite or an Advanced Orion, ELINT satellite.

Aviation Week reports, "It fundamentally involves America's biggest, most secret and expensive military spacecraft on board the world's largest rocket." The combined cost of the spacecraft and launch vehicle has been estimated to be over US$2 billion.

You can read the Aviation Week article online at
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/generic/story_channel.jsp?channel=space&id=news/NRODSP12108.xml

Kevin Fetter on the SEESAT-L group posted these updated element sets based on last night's launch:

GTO burn at 1st descending node 278 X 36398 km
1 70502U 9018.341849515 .00000000 00000-0 00000-0 0 03
2 70502 27.2800 337.3117 7307000 182.9000 167.5000 2.23480000 05

GTO burn at 1st ascending node 278 X 36398 km
1 70503U 09018.16413612 .00000000 00000-0 00000-0 0 04
2 70503 27.2800 337.1517 7307000 3.4000 359.6000 2.23480000 09

Photo by Pat Corkery, courtesy of ULA.

“We appreciate the support from our mission partners in achieving this milestone. ULA is pleased to contribute to our nation’s security, and to continue our strong partnership with the NRO. We look forward to launching many more NRO missions on ULA’s Delta IV Medium, Delta IV Heavy and Atlas V vehicles.” The ULA Delta IV Heavy vehicle featured a center common booster core with two strap-on common booster cores. Each common booster core was powered by the RS-68 cryogenic engine. An RL10B-2 cryogenic engine powered the second stage. Both engines are built by Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne. The payload was encased by a 5-meter diameter (16.7-foot diameter) aluminum, tri-sector payload fairing. ULA constructed the Delta IV Heavy launch vehicle in Decatur, Ala. This was the first launch for ULA in 2009. ULA's next launch is NASA’s NOAA-N Prime mission currently scheduled for Feb. 4, aboard a Delta II from Space Launch Complex-2 at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif.

Malfunctioning component delays satellite launch

By Michael Kleiman. 377th Air Base Wing Public Affairs

KIRTLAND AIR FORCE BASE, N.M. (AFMCNS) — Officials are delaying the launch of Tactical Satellite-3 – which was scheduled to occur later in January – until repairs to a spacecraft avionics component, critical to the system’s operational capability, are complete.

The Air Force Research Laboratory’s Space Vehicles Directorate here administers the satellite program, known as TacSat-3. The program team is working with the manufacturer to resolve the problem.

“We’re very disappointed in the delay, but the fix is necessary to assure the on-orbit performance of the satellite,” said Thom Davis, TacSat-3 program manager. “Had we not discovered and corrected this problem, we would have had a potential catastrophic mission failure.”

The satellite originated five years ago to address military requirements for responsible, flexible, and affordable spacecraft operating in the cosmos. It consists of three pioneering experiments: the Raytheon Company-constructed Advanced Responsive Tactically Effective Military Imaging Spectrometer hyperspectral imager; the Office of Naval Research’s Satellite Communications Package; and AFRL’s Space Avionics Experiment. The trio of payloads will offer real-time imagery (within 10 minutes of collection), sea-based information transmitted from ocean buoys and plug-and-play avionics to support the warfighter in keeping one step ahead of the adversary.

Project partners include AFRL’s Sensors Directorate, NASA, the Department of Defense’s Operationally Responsive Space office, the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center’s Space Development and Test Wing, Army Space and Missile Defense Command, Air Force Space Command, the Office of Naval Research, and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.

When ready, TacSat-3’s launch will occur at NASA’s Wallops Island Flight Facility in Wallops Island. Va.

Satellite’s instrumentation providing scintillation forecast data

By Michael Kleiman
377th Air Base Wing Public Affairs

Whether it’s static interrupting a radio station, or crackling noises interfering with a theater commander’s attempt to contact a deployed unit, scintillation can cause communication chaos.

Scintillation occasionally occurs when radio waves transiting an unstable ionosphere located 50 to 360 miles above the Earth become deformed, fragile, and/or misplaced. This results in transmission difficulties for communication or global positioning system satellites. Ultimately, it hampers the warfighter’s effectiveness.

Scientists examining the ionospheric aberrations have discovered these aberrations happen more closely in the equatorial and auroral areas between twilight and midnight. There also are seasonal fluctuations and a long-term variation corresponding to the solar cycle.

Within the Air Force, a six-instrument payload onboard the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System spacecraft is helping researchers forecast when and where this natural phenomenon will occur.

transpires has been enhanced with the six-instrument payload onboard the Communication/Navigation Outage Forecasting System spacecraft, which began its 13-month mission on April 16.

“This is the first mission by any organization dedicated to ionospheric scintillation, “said Dr. Laila Jeong, Air Force Research Laboratory program manager for C/NOFS. “We’re going to collect a stellar database of ionospheric data.”

During the initial month of the C/NOFS flight – which began its 13-month mission in April -- program personnel evaluated the instrumentation suite to ensure expected performance. Since then, the payload package has functioned properly in responding to sent commands and tasks.

The six sensors installed on the satellite to monitor scintillation, along with their function, are:

> Planar langmuir probe -- calculates the amount of charged particles in the satellite’s course. When the material strikes the metal plate on the front of the device, they generate an electric signal, which if fluctuating, could indicate scintillation. Collected data can be employed in models to identify exactly where the ionospheric disturbances occurred during the computation and when they might transpire in the future. AFRL’s Space Vehicles Directorate constructed the probe.

> Ion velocity meter -- measures charged particles’ speed and direction, perpendicular to and in the same path, of the satellite’s orbital movement in a particular region of the ionosphere. Built by the University of Texas at Dallas, information compiled by the system contributes to physics software designed by the Space Vehicles Directorate to forecast scintillation.

> Neutral wind meter -- computes the pace and track of the gas (uncharged particles) travelling in the spacecraft’s route and in a vertical course to C/NOFS’ movement in the ionosphere. The University of Texas at Dallas also built this device.

> Vector electric field instrument -- gauges the existing force in a region between opposite-charged particles. This amount is referred to as the electric field and the instrument’s payload computes the power and direction of it. Over time, changes in the electric field serve as an indicator of upcoming scintillation. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., built the instrument.

> Coherent electromagnetic radio tomography -- evaluates the signals calculated by ground receivers to verify the quantity of scintillation along the course between the C/NOFS spacecraft and the planet’s surface. If the signals display distortion, scintillation is evident and vice versa. The U.S. Naval Research Laboratory’s system contains a beacon and antenna transmitting on three frequencies to Earth.

> C/NOFS occultation receiver for ionospheric sensing and specification -- measures signals originating from numerous global positioning system satellites orbiting the globe. The system examines these signals to determine the extent of charged matter between the GPS spacecraft and C/NOFS. The Aerospace Corp.-constructed payload features a specially-developed GPS receiver and antenna for remote sensing.

“Data collected by the six instruments is sent to a processing center at the Space Vehicles Directorate’s Battlespace Environment Division at Hanscom Air Force Base, Massachusetts, where project staff run forecasting models and create forecast products,” Dr. Jeong explained. “The information is made available to the scientific and military user community, and the program will continue to provide scintillation data as long as the C/NOFS satellite remains in orbit - it has a predicted lifetime of three to four years.

“The analysis done on the information compiled by the six instruments will pave the way for the next generation of scintillation forecasting models – improving upon the accuracy of forecasting and extending the forecasting time period further into the future,” Dr. Jeong said. “The benefits of the collected data from C/NOFS will ultimately impact the warfighter through improved communication and greater operational efficiency.”

Launch of Cosmos-2430 early-warning satellite

Article below is courtesy of the Russian Strategic Nuc Forces blog and Pavel Podvig:
http://russianforces.org/blog/2007/10/launch_of_cosmos2430_earlywarn.shtml

On October 23, 2007 at 08:39 MSK (04:39 UTC) the Space Forces conducted a successful launch of a Molniya-M rocket from the launch pad No. 2 of the launch complex No. 16 of the Plesetsk launch site. The satellite delivered into orbit, designated Cosmos-2430, is a new 73D6 satellite of the US-KS early-warning system (also known as Oko).

The satellite was given the international designation 2007-049A and the NORAD catalog number 32268. According to the NORAD data, inclination of the initial orbit of Cosmos-2430 is 62.8 degrees, orbital period is about 702 minutes. Apogee of the initial orbit is about 39,200 km, perigee – 560 km. According to the Space Forces, Cosmos-2430 reached its orbit at 09:35 MSK and was taken under control by the crews of the Main Space Systems Center (GITsIU KS) at 10:15 MSK.

Cosmos-2430 is deployed in an orbital plane that has about opposite to that occupied by the only US-KS satellite that has been in operation on highly-elliptical orbit – Cosmos-2422, launched in July 2006. Two other HEO satellites, Cosmos- 2388 and Cosmos-2393, ended operations in November 2006 and March 2007 respectively.

Russia also has an operational geostationary early-warning satellite, Cosmos-2379, believed to be a newer 71Kh6 spacecraft of the US-KMO system. Normally deployed at the point over 24 degrees West, where it provided support to the US-KS satellites, it has been recently moved to a new position – at 12 degrees East. These changes mean that even after the Cosmos-2340 begins operations, the Russian early-warning system will not be able to maintain 24-hour coverage of the U.S. territory. At the same time, geostationary Cosmos-2379 will probably provide some coverage of the Northern Atlantic.

Russia is also working on a new early-warning satellite system, but the fist test launch of this program is not expected before 2009.

GPS upgrade will require 'complicated choreography'

by Staff Sgt. Don Branum
50th Space Wing Public Affairs

1/31/2007 - SCHRIEVER AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. -- Space professionals with the 2nd Space Operations Squadron have a daunting task ahead of them this summer: replacing the command-and-control system for GPS without any loss of "on-time, on-target" service to military or civil users.

The new system, called the Architecture Evolution Plan, will provide 2nd SOPS with the tools to command upcoming generations of GPS satellites, said 1st Lt. Robert Kaegy, who is assigned to 2nd SOPS' AEP migration program.

The upgrade consists of hardware and software to replace the original command-and-control system, which has operated since GPS' inception, said Capt. Brian O'Connell, GPS Modernization Flight commander.

"The system will be capable of commanding and controlling the GPS constellation much as we do today, but planned software drops will also allow us to control the new II-F block of satellites when they're ready to fly," Captain O'Connell said.

The system also lets operators link directly into the Air Force Satellite Control Network, more than doubling the number of sites they can use for satellite command and control.

"This provides us with a greater capability to command our satellites, reduce commanding visibility gaps and potentially reduce our anomaly response time," Captain O'Connell said.

The transition process won't be as simple as turning off one system and turning on another, however.

"The core of the system is something called the Kalman Filter," Captain O'Connell said. "This system takes in data from our monitoring stations worldwide and uses this data to predict where each of the satellites will be in the future. This model is constantly updated, and the model in turn is uploaded to each vehicle."

The Kalman Filter makes sure each GPS satellite is broadcasting a precise navigation and timing signal. The new system will have a new Kalman Filter--which means the system will have to be carefully aligned with the current system's Kalman Filter.

"If we didn't do this, and we began uploading satellites with data from the AEP Kalman Filter, those vehicles would tell you that you're in a different place than the vehicles that still contain 'legacy' uploads," Captain O'Connell explained. "Clearly you wouldn't want your GPS receiver trying to tell you that you're in two different places."

In addition, each GPS ground antenna and monitoring station must migrate to the new system.

"This is a complicated piece of choreography," the captain said.

The process of converting the constellation and ground system takes about five days.

Boeing Military Satellite Launch Schedule

Here is the latest Boeing Military Satellite Payload Launch Schedule:

Satellite Model Owner Launch Date Launch Vehicle
WGS-F1 702 U.S. Air Force 2007 Delta IV
WGS-F2 702 U.S. Air Force 2007 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-1 GPS U.S. Air Force 2008 Atlas V
WGS F-3 702 U.S. Air Force 2008 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-2 GPS U.S. Air Force 2009 Delta IV
GPS IIF SV-3 GPS U.S. Air Force 2009 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-4 GPS U.S. Air Force 2009 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-5 GPS U.S. Air Force 2009 Delta IV
GPS IIF SV-6 GPS U.S. Air Force 2010 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-7 GPS U.S. Air Force 2010 Atlas V
GPS IIF SV-8 GPS U.S. Air Force 2010 Atlas V
WGS-F4 702 U.S. Air Force 2011 EELV
GPS IIF SV-9 GPS U.S. Air Force 2011 Delta IV
GPS IIF SV-10 GPS U.S. Air Force 2011 Delta IV
GPS IIF SV-11 GPS U.S. Air Force 2011 TBD
WGS F-5 702 U.S. Air Force 2012 EELV
GPS IIF SV-12 GPS U.S. Air Force 2012 TBD
WGS F-6 option 702 U.S. Air Force 2013 EELV

DIO -- Delivery in Orbit
DOG -- Delivery on Ground