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Swales to build TacSat-3 military spacecraft SWALES NEWS RELEASE Posted: June 2, 2006 Swales Aerospace announced Friday that it has been awarded a new Task Order under its existing Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity contract with the Air Force Material Command, Air Force Research Laboratory, Space Vehicles Directorate (AFRL/VS). Under this award, Swales will design, build and test the Operationally Responsive Space Modular Bus (ORSMB) for the TacSat-3 mission, which will demonstrate the ability of a tactical satellite to collect militarily useful data over a theatre of interest and provide that data direct to the warfighter in real-time. The ORSMB program will demonstrate modular spacecraft bus standards, interfaces, and processes to meet the goals of the Department of Defense's Operationally Responsive Space (ORS) initiative that seeks rapid, low-cost space assets launched to support the needs of tactical warfighters. The work involves completing bus critical design, fabrication and integration of the bus, and providing support to AFRL for spacecraft integration and test, launch and on orbit operations. Mike Cerneck, CEO of Swales Aerospace said, "This contract award further cements Swales' leadership in the growing market for operationally responsive small and micro-satellites." Cerneck continued, "In selecting us, AFRL recognized several major strengths of our proposed system engineering approach and bus design, including an excellent accommodation of the Advanced Responsive Tactically Effective Military Imaging Spectrometer (ARTEMIS) hyperspectral imaging sensor and other mission payloads on a bus providing good performance margins, thermal management, and pointing agility, as well as our excellent assembly, integration and test approach." The TacSat-3 mission project is funded in part by the DOD's Office of Force Transformation and the Air Force Research Laboratory under Phase II of a four-phased approach to develop modular spacecraft buses, built to an emerging set of ORS bus performance standards. AFRL/VS is leading the TacSat-3 mission development for a planned launch in 2007. Congressman Steny H. Hoyer (D-MD) recognized Swales' leadership in the development of ORS on March 20, 2006 when he visited their Beltsville headquarters. During that visit, Congressman Hoyer said, "This program is not only important to our state's economy, but it will further enhance our military capabilities, and thereby contribute to our national security." The mission of the United States Air Force's Air Force Research Laboratory/Space Vehicles Directorate is to develop and transition high pay- off space technologies supporting the warfighter while leveraging commercial, civil and other government capabilities to ensure America's advantage. The Vision of the Space Vehicles Directorate is to provide innovative space technologies that make warfighter missions more effective and affordable. The Space Vehicles Directorate (VS) Headquarters is located at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, NM, at the site of the former Phillips Laboratory. Swales Aerospace is an employee-owned company that provides a broad range of aerospace engineering services to the Department of Defense, NASA, and commercial aerospace clients. Headquartered in Beltsville, Maryland, the company posted annual revenues in excess of $193 million in 2005 and employs more than 900 professionals in offices in Maryland, Virginia and California. |
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Space shuttle Columbia began mission STS-61C with a beautiful sunrise launch in January 1986 after several delays. Led by commander Hoot Gibson, the astronauts deployed a commercial communications satellite and tended to numerous experiments with the Materials Science Laboratory, Hitchhiker platform and Getaway Special Canisters in the payload bay. The crew included Congressman Bill Nelson of Florida, the first U.S. Representative to fly in space. Watch this post-flight film narrated by the astronauts.
The Boeing Delta 4 rocket launches from pad 37B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station with the GOES-N spacecraft, beginning a new era in weather observing for the Americas.
As night fell over Kennedy Space Center on May 19, space shuttle Discovery reached launch pad 39B to complete the slow journey from the Vehicle Assembly Building. Discovery will be traveling much faster in a few weeks when it blasts off to the International Space Station.
The November 1985 flight of space shuttle Atlantis began with a rare nighttime blastoff. The seven-member crew, including a Mexican payload specialist, spent a week in orbit deploying three communications satellites for Australia, Mexico and the U.S. And a pair of high-visibility spacewalks were performed to demonstrate techniques for building large structures in space. The crew narrates the highlights of STS-61B in this post-flight crew film presentation.
Eight astronauts, the largest crew in history, spent a week in space during the fall of 1985 aboard shuttle Challenger for mission STS-61A, the first flight dedicated to the German Spacelab. The crew worked in the Spacelab D-1 laboratory conducting a range of experiments, including a quick-moving sled that traveled along tracks in the module. A small satellite was ejected from a canister in the payload bay as well. The astronauts narrate the highlights of the mission in this post-flight film.