New Ka-band Satcom Link for Global Hawk
The Air Force is engaging industry to find ways to increase the capabilities of its current satellite assets, WGS and Advanced EHF satellites and to respond to a push from combat commanders for more data throughput, particularly on the Global Hawk platform. (The first Advanced EHF satellite was placed into orbit in August, but a problem with the main engine on the spacecraft left the satellite short of its intended orbit. Rescue plans using the satellite’s thrusters will put the satellite into the proper orbit but nearly a year behind schedule, according to the Air Force.)
All the services are moving toward terminals that provide multi-band capability. With WGS, being able to provide increased capability is just a matter of getting the terminals deployed,” says Col. Michael Lakos, milsatcom command lead for Air Force Space Command, who expressed some irony over the fact that terminal development often lags behind the launch of next-generation satellites. Lakos’ command oversees the Pentagon’s High Data Rate-Airborne Terminal (HDR-AT) program and in August held an Industry Day attended by 35 companies as part of the government’s market research into identifying alternatives for getting higher data rates from newly installed state-of the-art intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance sensors on the Global Hawk UAV. The discussions, according to Lakos and his deputy director, Joanne Schissel, were “very fruitful and, I think, beneficial to the government as well as industry.” A decision is expected in 2011 to move forward with development of a high-capacity satcom link for blocks 30 and 40 of Global Hawk. This link will support newly installed airborne sensor packages using WGS Ka-band communications with data rates approaching 300 megabits per second. “This analysis of alternatives is looking at the modems on board, the different waveforms and at the antenna chain used to support the higher satcom data rates and how we can better exploit that. We are looking to increase the data stream and the amounts of data that can be pushed down to the ground,” he says. In addition to focusing on the second phase of Global Hawk UAV satcom capabilities, Air Force Space Command will examine ways to enhance broadband capacity on other air mobility platforms ranging from the tanker aircraft to aircraft that support national leadership.
Looking forward, both commercial and military players agree there is no end in sight for the military’s thirst for broadband and opportunities to keep pace with that growth. While Lakos does not see government supporting the launch of super satellites on the scale of the cancelled TSAT program, he does envision continued investments in current programs that increase the capability of the warfighter. In the next five years, Cavossa foresees government using more X-band and Ka-band communications and also anticipates that as WGS capacity is filled, “government users will have no choice but to go to commercial Ka-band and commercial X-band” sources.
DISA’s New Acquisition Process
Bennett believes that over the next few years, the growth in the magnitude of capability delivered to the warfighter at lower cost will be dramatic: “Right now I am delivering about 8 GB and I expect to deliver 16 GB in another couple of years, and that 16 GB will be cheaper than what I pay for 8 GB today,” he says. Changes in satcom are evolving so fast that Bennett has revamped the Pentagon acquisition process to remove previous limitations placed on how satcom was purchased. “In the past we brought strictly transponders. Now, we’re buying transponders, services and turnkey operations, and we’re doing it across a schedule that is vastly unlimited by the number of people we can support,” Bennett says. He believes the dramatic process changes implemented in the satcom acquisition area signal to industry that it can be “the innovation lead. I’m sitting here, waiting. Now wow me.”
Email
Comments
Print
Reuse
