The U.S. Space Force-62 Weather System Follow-on Microwave space vehicle, the first of two spacecraft being developed by Ball Aerospace in collaboration with the Space Systems Command, has been delivered to the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The WSF-M satellite will form part of the Space Force’s next-generation space-based environmental monitoring systems and, by augmenting the capabilities of the legacy Defense Meteorological Satellite Program, will work to provide warfighters and operation planners with enhanced weather prediction and analysis, the SSC said Tuesday.
David Betz, the WSF-M program manager at the SSC Space Sensing program executive office, said the upcoming satellites are “a strategic solution tailored to address three high-priority Department of Defense SBEM gaps – specifically, ocean surface vector winds, tropical cyclone intensity, and energetic charged particles in low Earth orbit.”
At Vandenberg, the newly-delivered spacecraft will undergo processing, encapsulation and integration with the SpaceX Falcon 9 vehicle. The launch is expected to take place in late March.
For SSC Space Sensing Environmental and Tactical Surveillance Program Office Senior Materiel Leader Col. Daniel Visosky, the delivery of the satellite to Vandenberg “represents a major milestone for the WSF-M program.”
“It represents a long-term collaboration and unity-of-effort between the Space Force and our combined teams at Ball Aerospace, support contractors and government personnel,” Visosky added.