Jane Edwards
Northrop Grumman has received a contract from the U.S. Space Force to build the second site for a radar capability designed to facilitate object detection and tracking in geosynchronous orbit to provide space domain awareness for the U.S. military and its allies.
Space Systems Command said Wednesday the second Deep Space Advanced Radar Capability site will be established in the U.K.
“With a growing number of space debris and objects now populating Earth’s orbit, DARC technologies detect small space objects and satellites quickly and with highly precise orbital information,” said Col. Bryon McClain, program executive officer for space domain awareness and combat power at SSC.
“DARC also identifies adversarial threats with the potential to disrupt/deny civil and military space services, making it a vital defense technology for the Space Force,” McClain added.
In 2023, the U.S., Australia and the U.K. signed a trilateral agreement to host and run the DARC program as part of efforts to improve their collective space domain awareness through deep space object identification and tracking.
In February 2022, Northrop secured a $341 million contract to build the first of three planned ground-based space radar systems.
Development work on the first DARC site is now underway in Australia.
