Airbus D&S awarded USAF Eagle Vision contract
Airbus Defence and Space (D&S) will perform work on the US Air Force’s (USAF’s) five Eagle Vision stations to reduce footprint and antenna dish size, and integrate new satellites. The company announced a contract for the work plus maintenance on 25 November.
Eagle Vision is a lightweight deployable, commercial satellite imagery downlink ground system. It provides the users with a combination of optical, Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR), medium and very high resolution capabilities supporting wartime operations, natural disaster relief operations and homeland defence preparations.
Under this contract Airbus D&S will undertake system evolution work to reduce the system’s footprint to transit cases versus the current shelter housing; introduce smaller antenna dishes, and enable the system to receive and process data from two new satellites, WorldView and Pleiades. The system currently receives imagery from SPOT 6/7, TerraSAR-X/Tandem-X constellations operated by Airbus D&S together with Radarsat and RapidEye.
Airbus will also perform sustainment work that includes 24/7 support, failure corrections with workaround solutions, spares management, preventive maintenance, training and support during deployments.
Eagle Vision is sponsored by the USAF ISR Innovations office at the Pentagon and the programme management office at Hanscom Air Force Base. Within the Department of Defense inventory, the systems are assigned to Ramstein Air Base (Germany), San Diego Air National Guard Station (California), McEntire Joint National Guard Base (South Carolina), Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam (Hawaii) and Redstone Arsenal (Alabama).
The work will be performed until 2019.
More from Digital Battlespace
-
![Chess Dynamics successfully demonstrates Vision4ce AI-driven tracker]()
Chess Dynamics successfully demonstrates Vision4ce AI-driven tracker
The Vision4ce Deep Embedded Feature Tracking (DEFT) technology software is designed to process video and images by blending traditional computer vision with artificial intelligence (AI) algorithms to present actionable information from complex environments.
-
![Wave Relay devices cleared for security use on commercial systems in industry trend]()
Wave Relay devices cleared for security use on commercial systems in industry trend
Persistent Systems has been cleared by National Security Agency (NSA) to transmit sensitive data on commercial networks. The devices are added to the NSA’s Commercial Solutions for Classified (CSfC) component list which also includes other companies’ products providing the same security.
-
![UK teases cyber spending boost in Strategic Defence Review ahead of “imminent” release]()
UK teases cyber spending boost in Strategic Defence Review ahead of “imminent” release
The release of the UK’s Strategic Defence Review (SDR) has been long promised as mid-year. It is possible it could be as early as 2 June although the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD) continues to play its cards close to its chest.
-
![Intelsat emphasises SATCOM resilience for SOF in contested domains (video)]()
Intelsat emphasises SATCOM resilience for SOF in contested domains (video)
Intelsat outlines how its multi-orbit SATCOM architecture is enhancing connectivity and resilience for special operations forces operating in degraded and contested environments.
-
![US Space Force’s next-generation missile warning system moves forward with $500 million in new contracts]()
US Space Force’s next-generation missile warning system moves forward with $500 million in new contracts
Next-Generation Overhead Persistent Infrared (Next-Gen OPIR) satellites are intended to provide early warning of missile launches from any location worldwide and new ground stations will result in expanded coverage of critical missile warning.
