Technical Services - Winter 2008 - (Page 8)

lco e Life CyCLe OptimizatiOn and engineering TS’ Lanham Site Provides World-Class Support to NASA and Space Technology Customers T heir challenge was to build a spacecraft for less than $80 million (five times less than the budget for typical missions) and make up a year in schedule. In amazing fashion, Technical Services employees at Lanham, Md., working with their teammates on the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) have managed to do just that. They’re on track to launch LCROSS on an Atlas rocket in November 2008. LCROSS program work is conducted in partnership with Northrop Grumman’s Space Technology sector and NASA Ames Research Center (ARC), with the mission objective of finding water on the moon. The LCROSS vehicle will send the spent, Upper Stage of the launch vehicle crashing into a permanently darkened crater near the moon’s south pole. This impact will create a crater the size of a football field throwing a plume of 1,000 metric tons of debris and potentially hydrated minerals, water ice and vapor above the lunar surface while on-board spacecraft instruments and cameras gather and send content data of the debris plume back to scientists on Earth. The theory is that the moon’s permanently darkened craters contain a “permafrost” of water ice particles that have been carried there by meteors over the millennia. If water is present, a future mankind-occupied base could directly harvest it from the lunar surface for drinking and cooling and to produce oxygen for breathing and hydrogen for fuel. 1 “Northrop Grumman Technical Services has been responsible for and has held the ‘front line’ for the LCROSS project since inception. Their capabilities, dedication and accomplishments have been truly impressive.” – NASA LCROSS Program Office The TS Lanham team is responsible for developing both the LCROSS and Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter core avionics and LCROSS flight software. TS Lanham has significant avionics experience, with one-third of all NASA operational satellites containing TS avionics products. Key elements of Lanham’s program successes have been cost and scheduling compression strategies. The site uses a mini-spacecraft integration and test capability, dubbed FlatSat, that provides a comprehensive test of all core avionics and flight software using actual and high-fidelity simulated interfaces. This is all accomplished prior to component delivery to Space Technology for spacecraft integration. The final phase of FlatSat enables NASA’s ARC Mission Operations Center to actually “fly” the satellite through all mission phases just 17 months after program inception. Shining program achievements thus far have included receiving accolades from every NASA review board. The associate administrator of NASA’s Exploration Systems Mission Directorate has touted LCROSS as a new approach to “get more science for the buck.” TS 1 2 3 2 An artist’s rendition of LCROSS on a mission seeking the presence of water on Earth’s moon. Engineer Al Rucker tests out the propulsion distribution electronics during LCROSS FlatSat. Electrical Engineers Shadan Haghani and Jeff Keck perform electrical verification tests on LCROSS command and data handling subsystems. 3 8 Technical Services Magazine • Winter 2008

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Technical Services - Winter 2008

Technical Services - Winter 2008 Contents President’s Column Lake Charles Maintenance and Modification Center Celebrates Milestones F-18 Fleet Support in Malaysia B-2 Receives Upgrades U.S. Army Upgrades Entire Hunter Fleet Global Hawk Missions Flown in Support of California Wildfires Lanham Site Provides World-Class Support FSE Warner Robins Achieves CMMI Level 3 Rating TS Participates in Multi-Sector Conference Egypt and Volunteer Activities Fort Hood Team Prepares Warfighters for Combat; eSupport Team TS Team Members in Turkey Wallops Island Team Wins Kreiger Award TS Teams Win Chairman’s Award for Excellence ACS Program and Continuing Education; Space Gateway Training Team to Combat IED Threat Shoulder to Shoulder – Brad Britt; Saudi Arabia Service Milestones Warner Robins Training and Simulation I’m In! Ethics; ID/IQ Business; All-Hands Meetings

Technical Services - Winter 2008

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