L3Harris pitches full-rate production for missile tracking sensor
Developed for the Missile Defense Agency's Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor program, HBTSS, the L3Harris satellite has been on orbit since February 2024. According to MDA, the spacecraft is providing important test data and imagery of hypersonic test events.
Speaking with reporters April 9 at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Ed Zoiss, president of space and airborne systems at L3Harris, said the company is ready to start producing the HBTSS sensor in high volumes.
'The sensor has proven itself out, and we need to start full-rate production,' he said. 'We're ready to do it now.'
In an executive order signed just one week into his second term, President Donald Trump directed the Pentagon to start making plans for a Golden Dome missile defense capability made up of advanced sensors and interceptors designed to track and neutralize both traditional and high-end missile threats.
In response, the Space Force, Missile Defense Agency, National Reconnaissance Office and other Defense Department agencies have been crafting options for achieving that vision. They've also reached out to the defense industry for ideas.
Zoiss said L3Harris proposed increased HBTSS production as part of its response to DOD's call for input.
'We put in an architecture that we recommend for HBTSS and how we would see it to have global coverage,' he said. 'We're waiting to see what comes back.'
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An increase in HBTSS production would be a shift in how DOD officials have envisioned the sensor's role in space-based missile defense — at least publicly. MDA launched the capability in partnership with the Space Development Agency, which is building out a constellation of satellites in low Earth orbit that can detect and track hypersonic and ballistic missile threats.
That constellation will include tracking satellites equipped with wide-field-view sensors — built by L3Harris, Northrop Grumman and Sierra Space — and a smaller number of medium-field-of-view sensors like HBTSS, designed to track dimmer targets and send data to interceptors.
SDA is buying the tracking satellites in batches, or tranches, and has awarded contracts for Tranche 0, 1 and 2. Zoiss said the medium-field-of-view sensors SDA is buying for Tranche 1 and 2 are essentially copies of the HBTSS capability.
In a speech Wednesday at the symposium, MDA Deputy Director Maj. Gen. Jason Cothern said the agency looks forward to the capability being 'operationalized' by the Space Force and integrated into SDA's architecture.
Cothern said HBTSS has, to date, demonstrated 'remarkable capability essential for missile defense.' MDA has used the satellite to track two separate hypersonic test flights and the sensor has collected more than 650,000 images of tailored test events and 'interesting real-world events,' he added.
Missile Defense Agency satellites track first hypersonic launch
As DOD considers how HBTSS might fit into its Golden Dome strategy, MDA has begun work on a follow-on capability, a Discriminating Space Sensor, or DSS.
Whereas HBTSS was designed to track dimmer targets than traditional missile-warning sensors, DSS will help the Defense Department distinguish missile targets from enemy countermeasures, which are meant to make their advanced weapons harder to identify.
MDA plans to launch a prototype by the end of the decade, though Cothern said budget deliberations — which will be informed by the department's Golden Dome approach — could shorten that timeline.
'The whole intent is to, like HBTSS, do an on-orbit demonstration of these discriminating capabilities to inform the future space-based architectures and what we need for next-generation missile defense,' he said.
MDA Director Heath Collins said last year DSS had completed ground concept testing and was ready to move into the on-orbit demonstration phase. The agency requested funds for DSS in its fiscal 2025 budget, but the documents don't specify how much it asked for.
Like HBTSS, the agency will lead prototype development and then work with the Space Force to transition DSS for operational use.
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