On December 19, the Space Development Agency (SDA) announced the award of four agreements, with a total value of approximately $3.5 billion, to build 72 Tracking Layer satellites to proliferate missile warning/missile tracking (MW/MT) infrared (IR) sensors along with missile warning, tracking, and defense (MWTD) sensors in support of Tracking Layer Tranche 3 (TRKT3) of the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) in low Earth orbit (LEO).
These Other Transaction Authority (OTA) agreements are awarded to teams led by Lockheed Martin of Sunnyvale, California, Rocket Lab USA of Long Beach, California, Northrop Grumman of Redondo Beach, California and L3Harris Technologies of Fort Wayne, Indiana, to each deliver and operate 18 space vehicles (SV) as part of the Tracking Layer constellation for Tranche 3, launching in fiscal year 2029.
“The Tracking Layer of Tranche 3, once integrated with the PWSA Transport Layer, will significantly increase the coverage and accuracy needed to close kill chains against advanced adversary threats,” said SDA Acting Director Gurpartap “GP” Sandhoo. “The constellation will include a mix of missile warning and missile tracking, with half the constellation’s payloads supporting advanced missile defense missions to pace evolving threats. The addition of these satellites will achieve near-continuous global coverage for missile warning and tracking, along with payloads capable of generating fire control quality tracks for missile defense. This is a prime example of spiral development: the ability to rapidly integrate the next generation of technologies, and to proliferate the most impactful capabilities for increased capacity and lethality.”
The TRKT3, organized across eight orbital planes, builds upon SDA’s previous generations, Tranche 1 and Tranche 2, by expanding and enhancing coverage to provide global, persistent indication, detection, warning, tracking, and identification of conventional and advanced missile threats, including hypersonic missile systems. Each SV is equipped with an IR mission payload, optical communication terminals (OCTs), and Ka-band communications payloads as well as an S-band backup telemetry, tracking, and command (TT&C) system.
The Tracking Layer initiates the PWSA’s proliferation of missile defense sensing, or fire control, in support of Homeland Defense and Theater Defense. The PWSA is integrated into the U.S. Space Force’s holistic hybrid missile warning/missile tracking/missile defense architecture to support joint force operations and ensure warfighting success across all domains.
Source: SDA
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