ITT not only builds sensor components for satellites, but it also helps prepare satellites and rockets to launch them. ITT’s Spaceport Systems International (SSI), which is part of ITT Information Systems, operates a large commercial launch facility at Vandenburg Air Force Base in California.
Much of the satellite preparation work is done in the Integrated Processing Facility. The satellite arrives on a specialized truck and goes through a giant airlock to guard against contamination. A massive 75-ton crane maneuvers the satellites to an area where it is accessed from platforms to test and prepare it for launch. SSI also supports the assembly and attachment of the two sides of the fairing (think of the “nose cone” of a model rocket) to encapsulate the satellite payload.
The work is then moved by crane and truck to a protected mobile access tower at the Spaceport launch facility where final launch preparations and testing are conducted. The SSI team works with the commercial or government customer at every step of the process, including supporting remotely operated telemetry, control circuits and video cameras that are monitored to control and record the launch.
SSI employees recently prepared the successful April 22 launch of the first Minotaur IV space booster carrying DARPA’s Hypersonic Test Vehicle (HTV-2a). This was the first launch—from any location—of this new class of booster, and SSI conducted all the necessary launch complex modifications and operational pathfinder (proof of concept) tasks to ensure it went off flawlessly. The HTV-2a is a triangle-shaped glider being tested as a quick-response global strike system. It was jettisoned from the rocket fairing in the upper atmosphere while traveling at 20 times the speed of sound.
The new Minotaur IV rockets like the one used to carry the HTV-2a is derived from decommissioned Peacekeeper intercontinental ballistic missiles. ITT’s teams will soon begin supporting a similar space booster. The next Minotaur IV launch from Space Launch Complex 8 is the Space Based Surveillance System, which will be launched this summer to help track space debris and monitor satellites.
