Lockheed Martin Implements A GPS For The U.S. Air Force
Headquartered in Bethesda, MD, Lockheed Martin is a $28 billion, highly diversified global enterprise, principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture and integration of advanced-technology systems, products and services. The Corporation's core businesses span space and telecommunications, electronics, information and services, aeronautics, energy and systems integration. The Lockheed Astro Space division was awarded the contract for replacing the existing Block IIA satellites in the Global Positioning System (GPS) network for the United States Air Force (USAF).
It was, to say the least, an inauspicious beginning. In January, 1997, Lockheed Martin Astro Space launched the first of 20 satellites for the Global Positioning System and the Delta booster malfunctioned. As a result, the first GPS IIR satellite was "on the beach." For the factory team in Valley Forge, PA as well as the support team back in Colorado Springs, CO, it was a heartbreaking moment.
Todd Goodermuth is the Operational Support System (OSS) Project Manager for Lockheed Martin. It was his job to build a system that could support the telemetry from the 20-plus satellites that make up the GPS that is such a vital part of our global transportation system. Used in both civilian and military applications the satellites enable anyone with a small and inexpensive ground based receiver to know exactly where they are with amazing accuracy.
OSS monitors satellite performance in real time during launch and on orbit operations from a series of workstations. Lockheed Martin developed OSS with system requirements by Aerospace Corporation of California.
The current generation of GPS IIA Satellites is rapidly aging in orbit and will eventually be replaced with a new generation. Lockheed has committed to support the GPS IIR series until 2006, at which point Boeing will take over with a newer generation (Block IIF) of satellites that are currently on the drawing board.
The manufacturing facility in Valley Forge, PA is an impressive site. It is capable of handling four to six "birds" in production at any one time. The finished vehicles are loaded into a C-130 and then flown down for launching at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The Challenge
The telemetry data from the vehicle comes down to ground-stations and then into the OSS via fiber optic lines. OSS consists of a central data storage facility at Falcon Airforce Base in Colorado Springs and a network of Sun workstations at Falcon Airforce Base, and at a Lockheed in Valley Forge. The downlink is capable of handling 4 KB per second sustained transfer with each of the vehicles online for potentially two hours, in 20-30 minute bursts.
The challenge was to capture, manage and store this data in a very secure manner so that the data could be distributed to various workstations for real time data monitoring or analyses.
Optical was chosen as the media of choice to store the online data for the following reasons:
- Economical
- Quick access time
- Long, secure archive life
Criteria for the selection of the software to manage and archive the data on the jukebox was defined as:
- WORM support for permanent record
- Use of a non-proprietary file system critical so that data could be widely viewed across a diverse network
- Seamless and transparent to the operating system and the OSS/Database application
- First rate 24 x 7 software support
- Scaleable for growth path as database grows
- Need to have proven, dependable equipment with no downtime allowed
- First rate 24 x 7 on-site support
The Players
Lockheed Martin's Todd Goodermuth, OSS Program Manager, directed the program. Lockheed Martin Astro Space is the division principally engaged in the research, design, development, manufacture, and integration of advanced-technology systems, products and services. Overall supervision was provided by USAF Captain John Varljen was Project Officer who was superceded by Captain David Keller during the OSS upgrade.
Hewlett-Packard Storage Systems Division is part of the multinational, Hewlett-Packard's Optical Jukebox product line has set the storage industry standard for overall market share.
KOM Inc. is a software developer whose mass storage and enterprise wide information management solutions are recommended by the industries leading Optical Storage Manufacturers (including HP).
The Solution
With optical as the chosen technology, the system was configured to use an HP600FX optical jukebox with 12 drives and 238 shelves. The capacity of the jukebox is 600GB. Telemetry data was to be stored permanently on a 2.6 GB platter.
Lockheed ran a Sun-based T1 network with a mix of Sun OS and Solaris operating systems. The jukebox was connected to a Sun SPARC 1000 running Solaris 2.5. Lockheed plans to migrate to Solaris 2.6 later this year.
KOM's OptiServer UNIX optical jukebox management software was used to manage the storage of data onto the jukebox. A Metrica database was used to track and sort data as part of the application Lockheed had developed called Operational Support System ("OSS").
As Todd Goodermuth said about the OptiServer UX software, "it provided us with a seamless software solution that allowed us to rapidly adapt to a new system." In selecting the HP jukeboxes, Goodermuth added, "the HP are well suited to the demands of our application"
Lockheed also runs an HP40FX, a 16-shelf "baby box" for testing purposes that allowed the company to keep the HP600FX online at all times in a production environment. The HP40fx allows Lockheed to test new applications without the risk of having to take up to 600 GB of data off line.
OSS represented a significant advancement in data storage and display systems when compared to previous telemetry logging systems. The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics acknowledged the OSS contribution to the GPS program.
Lessons Learned
The importance of planning is critical to the successful implementation of a multi-vehicle satellite telemetry system, which used a widely distributed computer network for the flow and transfer of telemetry data. The support provided by software vendors is critical to this process.
The successful installation demonstrates that optical storage systems can be integrated with database solutions to provide a very secure, fast, yet economical solution. It has been estimated that OSS will save $1.3 million in travel costs alone over the life of the Block IIR program for the Aerospace Corp. launch support team.
Tim Lawlor ,VP Sales & Marketing, and Bill White, VP of Worldwide Sales for KOM Inc.