Lockheed
Mission
The SBIRS program is the follow-on capability to the highly successful Defense Support Program (DSP). The SBIRS program was designed to provide a seamless operational transition from DSP to SBIRS and meet jointly defined requirements of the defense and intelligence communities in support of the missile early warning, missile defense, battlespace awareness, and technical intelligence mission areas.
Description
The SBIRS program consists of the space segment of Geosynchronous Earth Orbit (GEO) satellites and Highly Elliptical Orbit (HEO) sensors riding on Host satellites, with the associated world-wide deployed ground systems. Air Force Space Command's 460th Operations Group is responsible for conducting HEO, GEO and DSP operations at all fixed ground sites. Air National Guard Unit, 233rd Space Group, operates the SBIRS Mobile Ground System (MGS) currently, providing survivable and endurable mission support. The SBIRS program is managed by the Remote Sensing Systems Directorate (RS) at the U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center. Lockheed Martin (LM) Space Systems Company is the prime contractor responsible for program management, systems engineering, and spacecraft development, while LM Information Systems and Global Solutions is the ground systems developer. Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems is the payload subcontractor for the infrared sensors.
Two HEO sensors and GEO satellites have launched and were certified for mission operations. The first and second GEO satellites were launched on United Launch Alliance's (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex (SLC) 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station< Florida. Using updates to the Increment 1 ground system, the SBIRS Mission Control Station (MCS) manages the constellation of HEO sensors, GEO satellites as well as the legacy DSP satellites. Increment 2, the next major SBIRS ground update, was divided into two software releases; Block 10.3 and Block 20. Block 10.3 is on track for transitioning to operations in the fall of 2016, replacing all the Increment 1 software and improving event detection. The SBIRS Survivable/Endurable Evolution (S2E2) program will replace the aging MGS, initially designed for support of DSP operations in the 1960s, supporting SBIRS survivability and endurability requirements.
http://www.losangeles.af.mil/About-Us/Fact-Sheets/Article/734550/space-based-infrared-system-sbirs/
