Tag: hypersonic weapons

Space Systems Command to lead new office for security against missile threats
New Combined Program Office to enhance U.S. ability to prevail against threats in space, including new hypersonic weapons

Space Systems Command (SSC) is leading a new tri-agency Combined Program Office (CPO) comprised of representatives from SSC, the Space Development Agency (SDA) and the Missile Defense Agency (MDA). The CPO was established on Aug. 19 to enhance the United States’ ability to deter, defend and win against competitors’ challenges in space.

The Space Acquisition Council, established by Congress to manage space procurements across the Department of Defense, concurred on the CPO proposal, enabling the coordinated development and fielding of capabilities in the missile warning (MW), missile tracking (MT), and missile defense (MD) mission areas.

The CPO will address growing challenges resulting from the transition of space from a peaceful domain to one that is congested, contested and competitive. Other nations now challenge access to and movement in space, and have demonstrated the capability and intent to hold U.S. and allied space assets at risk.

“The MW/MT/MD mission is driving the U.S. Space Force’s new ‘requirements to execution’ roadmap, rapidly turning USSF Force Design into operational capabilities that will outpace and defeat very determined threats,” said U.S. Space Force Col. Brian Denaro, Space Sensing program executive officer and leader of the new CPO. “Our adversaries continue to develop missile technologies that are faster burning, dimmer and more maneuverable. This Combined Program Office, in partnership with SDA and MDA, will drive critical integration across a new resilient multilayer architecture that will warn, track and defeat these increasingly advanced and elusive missile threats.”

Establishing this partnership among MW/MT/MD acquisition organizations will enhance the interface between requirements, operators and users, optimizing delivery of integrated and resilient sensor-to-shooter capabilities for the United States and its allies.

“We are focused on delivering MW/MT/MD capabilities to the warfighter and the nation,” said U.S. Army Lt. Col. Alexander Rasmussen, Tranche 1 Tracking Layer program manager, SDA. “The Combined Program Office is a critical component in delivering this capability and enabling our nation to counter hypersonic and advanced missile threats. Together, SDA, MDA and SSC will ensure a synchronized end-to-end capability that sets the foundation for a continually evolving and advancing MW/MT/MD architecture.”

“With the emerging advanced threats, space-based sensors are essential to missile defense,” said Walter Chai, director for space sensors at MDA. “The close collaboration between SDA, SSC and MDA will ensure that we are able to defeat these threats.”

The CPO organizational structure integrates strategic decision-making across the interagency, establishing:
1. clear roles, responsibilities, and authorities for SSC, SDA, MDA and other mission partners
2. end-to-end system of systems accountability between requirements and weapon system delivery
3. development and management of standards (models, open architecture, data, etc.)
4. integration with operators, combatant commands and other weapon systems.
Space Systems Command is the U.S. Space Force field command responsible for rapidly identifying, prototyping and fielding resilient space capabilities for joint warfighters. SSC delivers sustainable joint space warfighting capabilities to defend the nation and its allies, while disrupting adversaries in the contested space domain. SSC mission areas include launch acquisition and operations; space domain awareness; positioning, navigation and timing; missile warning; satellite communication; and cross-mission ground, command and control, and data.
September 15, 2022
Seen & Heard: Singapore crashes, BeiDou’s supersonic flight

“Seen & Heard” is a monthly feature of GPS World magazine, traveling the world to capture interesting and unusual news stories involving the GNSS/PNT industry.

Photo: tropicalpixsingapore/iStock/Getty Images Plus/Getty Images

3D Maps Solve Accidents

3D mapping is helping forensic teams reconstruct fatal traffic accidents in Singapore, reports The Straits Times. In 2021, Singapore had 100 fatal road accidents. Experts use 3D replicas of the accident site and simulation models to recreate events leading to an accident and its aftermath. This helps forensic scientists determine whether the vehicles were speeding or flouting traffic rules. The National 3D Mapping Program of the Singapore Land Authority has mapped every road, lane and highway in Singapore with a 3D laser scanner and car-mounted cameras, and plans to update the maps regularly. Autonomous vehicles will also depend on the 3D point-cloud data.

Diagram: U.S. General Accountability Office

BeiDou Enables Hypersonic Flight

In simulation drills using BeiDou, Chinese space scientists flew a hypersonic flight from Jinan, China, to New York over the Arctic Ocean, reports EurAsian Times. BeiDou facilitated contact between the command center on Earth and the hypersonic vehicle as it dodged enemy air defenses. Researchers claim using BeiDou provided a time lag of less than a second. They also claim to have optimized signal transmitters and designed new satellite-jumping methods to overcome communication challenges. China and Russia are the only countries with operational hypersonic weapons — Russia has used its Kinzhal hypersonic missile in the Ukraine war.

Photo: adiartana/iStock/Getty Images Plus/Getty Images

Drone Mapping Aids Education

Indonesia’s National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) and Dr. Soetomo University are cooperating on aerial photo mapping using an unmanned aerial vehicle and GNSS hardware. BRIN’s Ocky Karna Radjasa said he expects that the two parties will extend the opportunity to advance research and innovation as well as bolster the quality of education in Indonesia. The university’s Nur Saidah expects BRIN’s support will increase, stating, “We still have limitation in laboratory facilities, so we seek industry cooperation. Let us hope that, as a result of this cooperation, we can receive help.”

Photo: JacobH/iStock/Getty Images Plus/Getty Images

Navigating with Muons

A new navigation system addresses shortcomings of GNSS using cosmic-ray muons. Muometric navigation enables positioning underground, indoors or underwater within a reference coordinate system defined by the 3D positions of multiple detectors, researcher Hiroyuki K. M. Tanaka explains in the June issue of Nature. Tanaka’s work shows the system offers a navigation quality almost equivalent to aboveground GPS-based handheld navigation by determining the distance between the reference frame and the receivers with a precision of 1 to 10 meters.

September 1, 2022
Orolia selected by Raytheon to support US Missile Defense System

Orolia, through its Orolia Government Systems business, has been selected by Raytheon Missiles & Defense to support the U.S. Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS) radar program with its low SWaP (size, weight and power), rugged time and frequency system.

Defeating hypersonic weapons

An artist’s rendering of the Lower Tier Air and Missile Defense Sensor (LTAMDS), a next-generation radar meant to help defeat advanced threats like hypersonic weapons. (Image: Raytheon/Orolia)

The LTAMDS system — an advanced air and missile defense radar — will help the U.S. Army defeat advanced threats, including hypersonic weapons. It is a radar designed to defeat advanced and next-generation threats including hypersonic weapons, or those that fly faster than a mile a second.

LTAMDS has three antenna arrays — a primary array on the front, and two secondary arrays on the back. They work together, detecting and engaging multiple threats from any direction at the same time. This results in a battlefield without blind spots, according to Raytheon.

LTAMDS’ primary array is about the same size as the array for the Patriot Air and Missile Defense System, but it has more than twice the power. It is designed for the U.S. Army’s Integrated Air and Missile Defense system, but it will also preserve existing military customers’ investment in the Patriot system.

Raytheon Missiles & Defense was selected by the United States Army in October 2019 to provide the next-generation LTAMDS.

Timing from Orolia

Orolia was chosen for the LTAMDS program based on its core expertise in resilient timing and configurable ruggedized PNT systems for challenging environments, together with its proven track record of successfully delivering time and frequency platforms for other Raytheon Programs of Record.

Orolia was the first company to receive approval for a time and frequency reference system on the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) Department of Defense Information Network (DoDIN) Approved Products List for network interoperability, with its flagship SecureSync system.

“Ultra-precise mission timing and sync technology are fundamental building blocks for the Resilient PNT systems that warfighters rely on for continuous operations in contested environments,” said Hironori Sasaki, president of Orolia Defense & Security. “We are proud to be a Raytheon Missiles & Defense partner on LTAMDS and other programs that utilize GPS signals for timing, frequency and network synchronization across critical military systems.”

From critical timing solutions to GPS/GNSS simulation, interference detection, and mitigation, Orolia is an industry leader in end-to-end NAVWAR and Resilient PNT solutions to protect, augment and strengthen military systems for GPS-denied environments.

Orolia Defense & Security provides resilient PNT solutions and custom engineering services to U.S. government agencies, defense organizations, and their contractors, and is authorized to work on the full spectrum of U.S. government classified and unclassified projects.

July 8, 2020