CHIRP program lessons learned from the contractor program management team perspective

With shrinking budgets and expanding program costs, government program offices are seeking innovative ways to accomplish their goals with better efficiency and less cost. In 2008, the U.S. Air Force's Space and Missile Systems Center's Development Planning Directorate (SMC/XRF) took a bold step in this direction and funded a new program that started as an unsolicited proposal from SES Government Solutions, and its industry teammates, Orbital Sciences Corporation (Orbital) and Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC). The program called for hosting of an Air Force furnished infrared sensor, developed by SAIC, on an SES commercial communications satellite, built by Orbital, and was appropriately referred to as CHIRP (Commercially Hosted Infra-Red Payload). This bold new effort has been a resounding success and has stimulated a whole new market area for hosted payloads that is now germinating throughout the aerospace industry. The concept of a staring sensor using large format focal plane arrays began as a risk reduction program by the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL). Under that program (the Alternate InfraRed Satellite System (AIRSS) or Third Generation Infrared Surveillance (3GIRS) program), SAIC developed a laboratory model of a full-earth, four-telescope staring Overhead Persistent InfraRed (OPIR) sensor for ground validation. For the CHIRP contract, but under the 3GIRS umbrella, SAIC designed and developed a space-qualified, one-quarter earth, single OPIR staring telescope for a technical demonstration in space. The satellite was built by Orbital Sciences as part of an existing commercial contract with SES. The sensor and satellite efforts were leveraged by the CHIRP program, integrating the government furnished equipment (GFE) sensor with the commercial SES-2 telecommunications satellite. The CHIRP program uses contractor ground system facilities and mission operations teams to operate and evaluate the CHIRP system, including sensor commanding, state-of-health monitoring, sensor calibration and characterization, and tracking algorithm assessment on the ground using on-orbit data. The satellite is operated by SES through its commercial satellite operations center (SOC). By design, CHIRP operations are completely independent of spacecraft operations except for initial deployments and CHIRP power on/off activities. Sensor commands are generated at SAIC's CHIRP Mission Analysis Center (CMAC) in Seal Beach, California, transmitted through Orbital's CHIRP Mission Operations Center (CMOC) in Dulles, Virginia, and uplinked to the spacecraft by the SES-operated teleport in Woodbine, Maryland. The CHIRP mission data is transmitted from the CHIRP payload through an Orbital-developed Secondary Payload Interface (SPI) on the spacecraft, where it is encrypted and transmitted to the ground through one of the commercial transponders. The ground entry point for the CHIRP data is a SES teleport, which transmits the data to the CMOC for dissemination in real-time to the CMAC and the U.S. Air Force's Advanced Fusion Center (AFC). The CMOC and CMAC are accredited to handle collateral classified data, while the SES facilities are commercial entities with no access to classified data. The CHIRP program is a truly ground breaking, but like many early endeavors had to overcome challenges along the way. However, at the end of the day, the CHIRP team: a) Space-qualified a ground-breaking wide-field-of-wiew (WFOV), OPIR sensor designed and developed by SAIC in two years on the 3GIRS program; b) Integrated the payload onto a commercial communications satellite platform, including all payload accommodations for heat, power, and commanding, and tested the payload within the commercial integration and testing (I&T) flow; c) Launched and flew the sensor in space a little over three years from the start of the contract; d) Demonstrated the agility and flexibility of the commercially hosted payload concept, which included accommodating a payload development within commercial schedules; e) Delivered a sensor to orbit that was operational and performing its mission two days before the satellite arrived at its operational orbital location and within 24 hours of removal of the baffle cover; f) Proved that classified systems can be operated as a commercially hosted payload; and g) Showed that high quality commercial buses can support demanding optical missions. The CHIRP program uncovered and resolved several hosted payload-related challenges and pioneered solutions for future hosted payloads in areas ranging from contracts to space policy, weight/power/thermal accommodations, security and cultural differences between the commercial and government environments. The main take-away from this unique program is that by working closely together, with a common goal, both government and industry can benefit greatly from the hosted payload model.