|
Space Detection And Tracking System
Space Detection and Tracking System, or SPADATS, was built in 1960 to integrate defense systems built by different branches of the United States Armed Forces and was placed under North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD). The Air Force had a program called Spacetrack, which was a network of space-probing cameras and radar. The Navy had a system called SPASUR, a space surveillance system that was "an electronic fence" the protected the southern United States. SPADATS was developed by the SpaceTrack Research and Development Facility, also called the 496L System Program Office, at Hanscom Field in Bedford, Massachusetts. ( Bendix, Sperry Rand and Hughes competed for SPADATS contract in the early 1962 on the basis of their prior experience in phased array technology.) It first operated at the Electronic Systems Command building at Hanscom and in 1963 was transferred to the Ent Air Force Base and then to the Cheyenne Mountain Complex in 1965 or 1966. From that point, the SpaceTra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
United States Armed Forces
The United States Armed Forces are the military forces of the United States. The armed forces consists of six service branches: the Army, Marine Corps, Navy, Air Force, Space Force, and Coast Guard. The president of the United States is the commander-in-chief of the armed forces and forms military policy with the Department of Defense (DoD) and Department of Homeland Security (DHS), both federal executive departments, acting as the principal organs by which military policy is carried out. All six armed services are among the eight uniformed services of the United States. From their inception during the American Revolutionary War, the U.S. Armed Forces have played a decisive role in the history of the United States. They helped forge a sense of national unity and identity through victories in the First Barbary War and the Second Barbary War. They played a critical role in the American Civil War, keeping the Confederacy from seceding from the republic and preser ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hughes Aircraft
The Hughes Aircraft Company was a major American aerospace and defense contractor founded on February 14, 1934 by Howard Hughes in Glendale, California, as a division of Hughes Tool Company. The company was known for producing, among other products, the Hughes H-4 Hercules ''Spruce Goose'' aircraft, the atmospheric entry probe carried by the ''Galileo'' spacecraft, and the AIM-4 Falcon guided missile. Hughes Aircraft was founded to construct Hughes' H-1 Racer world speed record aircraft, and it later modified aircraft for his transcontinental and global circumnavigation speed record flights. The company relocated to Culver City, California, in 1940 and began manufacturing aircraft parts as a subcontractor. Hughes attempted to mold it into a major military aircraft manufacturer during World War II; however, its initial military projects ended in failure, with millions of dollars in U.S. government funds expended but only three aircraft actually built, resulting in a highly pu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Space Defense Center
The Space Defense Center (SDC) was a space operation center of the North American Aerospace Defense Command. It was successively housed at two Colorado locations, Ent Air Force Base, followed by Cheyenne Mountain's Group III Space Defense Center The 1st Aerospace Control Squadron manned the SDC at both locations, which used the Electronic Systems Division's 496L System for processing and displaying data combined from the U.S. "Air Force's Space Track and the Navy's Spasur" ( NAVSPASUR). The photo is of a console introduced for the 427M system, the 496L inputs were only card readers and paper tape readers, the only output was from two large line printers. History The initial 496L System was at Hanscom Field's National Space Surveillance Control Center and the second was installed at Ent Air Force Base's Space Defense Center. The Ent SDC was one of several facilities providing data to the Cheyenne Mountain Combat Operation Center when the nuclear bunker achieved full operational c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Transistor Computer
A transistor computer, now often called a second-generation computer, is a computer which uses discrete transistors instead of vacuum tubes. The first generation of electronic computers used vacuum tubes, which generated large amounts of heat, were bulky and unreliable. A second-generation computer, through the late 1950s and 1960s featured circuit boards filled with individual transistors and magnetic core memory. These machines remained the mainstream design into the late 1960s, when integrated circuits started appearing and led to the third-generation computer. History The University of Manchester's experimental Transistor Computer was first operational in November 1953 and it is widely believed to be the first transistor computer to come into operation anywhere in the world. There were two versions of the Transistor Computer, the prototype, operational in 1953, and the full-size version, commissioned in April 1955. The 1953 machine had 92 point-contact transistors and 5 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cheyenne Mountain Complex
The Cheyenne Mountain Complex is a Space Force installation and defensive bunker located in unincorporated El Paso County, Colorado, next to the city of Colorado Springs, at the Cheyenne Mountain Space Force Station, which hosts the activities of several tenant units. Also located in Colorado Springs is Peterson Space Force Base, where the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) and United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) headquarters are located. Formerly the center for the United States Space Command and NORAD, the Complex monitored the air space of Canada and the United States for missiles, space systems, and foreign aircraft through its worldwide early-warning system. Since 2008, NORAD and the United States Space Command have been based at Peterson Space Force Base and the complex, re-designated as an Air Force station, is used for crew training and as a back-up command center if required. The military complex has included, in the past, many units of NORAD, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ent Air Force Base
Ent Air Force Base was a United States Air Force base located in the Knob Hill neighborhood of Colorado Springs, Colorado. A tent city, established in 1943 during construction of the base, was initially commanded by Major General Uzal Girard Ent (1900–1948), for whom the base is named. The base was opened in 1951. From 1957 to 1963, the base was the site of North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which subsequently moved to the Cheyenne Mountain Air Force Station. The base became the Ent Annex to the Cheyenne Mountain facility in 1975. The base was closed in 1976. The site later became the location of the United States Olympic Training Center, which was completed in July 1978. Background The first Air Defense Command was established on 26 February 1940, by the War Department. On 2 March 1940, it was put under the First Army Commander. It managed air defense within four geographic air districts. It was inactivated in mid-1944 when the threat of air attack see ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Aviation Week And Space Technology
''Aviation Week & Space Technology'', often abbreviated ''Aviation Week'' or ''AW&ST'', is the flagship magazine of the Aviation Week Network. The weekly magazine is available in print and online, reporting on the aerospace, defense and aviation industries, with a core focus on aerospace technology. It has a reputation for its contacts inside the United States military and industry organizations. ''Aviation Week'' was a favorite conduit for defense-related companies and labs to leak information to the public as part of their policy by press release efforts. This led to it being informally referred to "Aviation Leak and Space Mythology". History The magazine was first published in August 1916. Early editors Ladislas d'Orsy and Donald W. McIlhiney (1921 to 25) were Quiet Birdmen. Publisher (1927 to 29) Earl D. Osborn was also a Quiet Birdman. With the coming of the Space Age, the current title was adopted in 1960. Other titles the magazine has held include ''Aviation & Aircraf ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Phased Array
In antenna theory, a phased array usually means an electronically scanned array, a computer-controlled array of antennas which creates a beam of radio waves that can be electronically steered to point in different directions without moving the antennas. In a simple array antenna, the radio frequency current from the transmitter is fed to multiple individual antenna elements with the proper phase relationship so that the radio waves from the separate elements combine ( superpose) to form beams, to increase power radiated in desired directions and suppress radiation in undesired directions. In a phased array, the power from the transmitter is fed to the radiating elements through devices called '' phase shifters'', controlled by a computer system, which can alter the phase or signal delay electronically, thus steering the beam of radio waves to a different direction. Since the size of an antenna array must extend many wavelengths to achieve the high gain needed for narrow ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sperry Rand
Sperry Corporation was a major American equipment and electronics company whose existence spanned more than seven decades of the 20th century. Sperry ceased to exist in 1986 following a prolonged hostile takeover bid engineered by Burroughs Corporation, which merged the combined operation under the new name Unisys. Some of Sperry's former divisions became part of Honeywell, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon Technologies, and Northrop Grumman. The company is best known as the developer of the artificial horizon and a wide variety of other gyroscope-based aviation instruments like autopilots, bombsights, analog ballistics computers and gyro gunsights. In the post-WWII era the company branched out into electronics, both aviation related, and later, computers. History Early history The company was founded in 1910 by Elmer Ambrose Sperry, as the Sperry Gyroscope Company, to manufacture navigation equipment—chiefly his own inventions the marine gyrostabilizer and the gyrocom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
North American Aerospace Defense Command
North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD ), known until March 1981 as the North American Air Defense Command, is a combined organization of the United States and Canada that provides aerospace warning, air sovereignty, and protection for Canada and the continental United States. Headquarters for NORAD and the NORAD/ United States Northern Command (USNORTHCOM) center are located at Peterson Space Force Base in El Paso County, near Colorado Springs, Colorado. The nearby Cheyenne Mountain Complex has the Alternate Command Center. The NORAD commander and deputy commander (CINCNORAD) are, respectively, a United States four-star general or equivalent and a Canadian lieutenant-general or equivalent. Organization CINCNORAD maintains the NORAD headquarters at Peterson Space Force Base near Colorado Springs, Colorado. The NORAD and USNORTHCOM Command Center at Peterson SFB serves as a central collection and coordination facility for a worldwide system of sensors desig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bendix Corporation
Bendix Corporation is an American manufacturing and engineering company which, during various times in its existence, made automotive brake shoes and systems, vacuum tubes, aircraft brakes, aeronautical hydraulics and electric power systems, avionics, aircraft and automobile fuel control systems, radios, televisions and computers. It was also well known for the name ''Bendix'', as used on home clothes washing machines, but never actually made these appliances. History Early history Founder and inventor Vincent Bendix initially began his corporation in a hotel room in Chicago in 1914 with an agreement with the struggling bicycle brake manufacturing firm, Eclipse Machine Company of Elmira, New York. Bendix granted permission to his invention which was described as "a New York device for the starting of explosive motors." This company made a low cost triple thread screw which could be used in the manufacture of other drive parts. By using this screw with the Eclipse Machine ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bedford, Massachusetts
Bedford is a town in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. The population of Bedford was 14,383 at the time of the 2020 United States Census. History ''The following compilation comes from Ellen Abrams (1999) based on information from Abram English Brown's ''History of the Town of Bedford'' (1891), as well as other sources such as ''The Bedford Sampler Bicentennial Edition'' containing Daisy Pickman Oakley's articles, Bedford Vital Records, New England Historical and Genealogical Register, Town Directories, and other publications from the Bedford Historical Society.'' The land now within the boundaries of Bedford was first settled by Europeans around 1640. In 1729 it was incorporated from a portion of Concord (about 2/5 of Bedford) and a portion of Billerica (about 3/5 of Bedford). In 1630, John Winthrop and Thomas Dudley of the Massachusetts Bay Company arrived aboard the ''Arabella'' from Yarmouth, England. After a difficult ten-week voyage, they landed on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
_Bedford%2C_Massachusetts.JPG "Click for more on -> Bedford, Massachusetts")