Lockheed Martin announced Wednesday the successful delivery of the flight structure for the second Advanced Extremely High Frequency spacecraft.
The Advanced EHF system will provide global, highly secure, protected, survivable communications for all warfighters serving under the U.S. Department of Defense, the company said in a news release.
The successful on-schedule delivery allows the team of LM Space Systems, the Advanced EHF prime contractor, and Northrop Grumman Space Technology, of Redondo Beach, Calif., the payload supplier, to begin component installation and payload integration.
"This important milestone is the result of our team's focus and determination to successfully execute this vital program," said Julie Sattler, LM Space Systems vice president. "Advanced EHF will serve as an essential component of our military space architecture, providing high-speed, protected communications to deployed forces and their command structure."
Based on LM's A2100 spacecraft series, Advanced EHF satellites will provide greater total capacity and offer channel data rates higher than that of Milstar communications satellites. The higher data rates permit transmission of tactical military communications such as real-time video, battlefield maps and targeting data.
LM currently is under contract to provide three Advanced EHF satellites and the command control system to its customer, the MILSATCOM Joint Program Office, located at the Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, Calif. Development of the Advanced EHF satellite system is progressing on schedule towards first launch in April 2008.
LM Space Systems Company is celebrating its 50th anniversary of developing systems for military, civil and government customers.
