Satnews Daily
November 17th, 2015

NASA Kennedy Space Center + ViaSat Engineers Restoring SLS Tracking Antenna


[Satnews] Posted by author Bob Granath to the NASA Kennedy Space Center blog is his report that engineers and technicians from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and contractor ViaSat Inc. are completing restoration of a launch communications site at the Ponce De Leon Inlet Tracking Annex.

The facility is located in New Smyrna Beach, Florida, 35 miles north of the spaceport. The annex will provide a crucial tracking capability following liftoff of the agency’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket. Carlsbad, California, based ViaSat recently installed the S-band dish antenna site that will provide tracking during the second and third minutes after liftoff.

One minute into flight, the line-of-site from Kennedy tracking antennas are obscured due to the highly reflective plume from the SLS solid rocket boosters. The S-band portion of the microwave spectrum combines command, voice and television signals though a single antenna. The Ponce De Leon Inlet Tracking Annex is being reestablished following decommissioning at the end of the Space Shuttle Program.