Two Russian early-warning satellites apparently completed their operations sometime after August 2009. The satellites, Cosmos-2422 (launched on 21 Jul 2006, NORAD catalog number 29260), which was deployed on a highly-elliptical orbit, and geostationary Cosmos-2379 (24 Aug 2001, 26892) stopped performing station-keeping maneuvers and have since drifted off their stations. The satellites operated three and eight years respectively, the first number being slightly below the average, and the latter - significantly above the average.
This brings the number of Russia's early-warning satellites to three. Two 73D6 satellites of the US-KS system on highly-elliptical orbits are Cosmos-2430 (23 October 2007, 32268) and Cosmos-2446 (2 December 2008, 33447). The only remaining geostationary satellite, Cosmos-2440 (27 Jun 2008, 33108), is apparently a spacecraft of the 71Kh6 type, which was supposed to work as part of the US-KMO system.
The two HEO satellites are positioned to provide some coverage of the U.S. territory for about 12 hours during a day. Cosmos-2440 is currently deployed in the point of 80 degrees East over the Indian ocean, from which it can theoretically observe Russia, China, North Korea, Middle East, and most of Europe.
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With recent reconnaissance and navigation satellites being put into orbit, are early-warning systems a priority? Are the three EW satellites adequate for Russian military needs? The bare minimum? A glaring weakness? Or perhaps, has there been some kind of technical delay in fielding “new technology” satellites to update the current constellation?
Frank Shuler
USA
Has anyone some information on the United States early warning satellite constellation?
Martin
Martin
Today, the United States has three different space based systems that are tasked with “early warning”. The legacy program is the Northrop Grumman (formerly TRW) Defense Support Program (DSP) satellite. The project was originally to have had a life of 25 satellites, but the last two have been cancelled, mainly due to SBIRS (the replacement program) and at least two have been lost in launch missions.
It remains unclear to me how many of these geostationary orbit DSP satellites are operational today, what was their designed “time to live” (TTL) in orbit, or how many were supported at any given time in the original constellation.
The Lockheed-Martin Space-Based Infrared System (SBIRS) is the replacement. When fully operational, SBIRS will comprise of two payloads in highly elliptical orbit (HEO), four satellites in geosynchronous orbit (GEO), as well as fixed and mobile ground-based assets to receive and process the infrared data. Two or perhaps three of these systems are in orbit now.
The third component is the Space Tracking and Surveillance System (STSS). The STSS system is being developed by the US Missile Defense Agency, as opposed to the US Air Force, and is expected to consist of about 24 satellites in low earth orbit and be able to acquire and track missiles in midcourse and during the boost phase.
One thing to note. The new SBIRS and STSS systems are much more than strategic early-warning satellites. These platforms support a wide array of ISR components (Intelligence-Surveillance-Reconnaissance) and can provide actionable data down to the battlefield level.
Frank Shuler
USA
I'm not a specialist of these matters at all, but isn't 3 - or even 8 - years quite short for a satellite's life?
Three years is definitely short - average lifetime of these satellites is closer to five years. Which is also not very long, but this would not be unusual for satellites designed in the Soviet times.
What about a new Russian project EW satellites EKS ?
I haven't heard anything about this program for a while. It may still be active, but it is clear that it's delayed.
If I am not wrong, NATO-SLBMs have become very accurate, enough to be used hypothetically for a preemptive disarming attack towards Russia, so in my view It should need to survey oceans, Arctic and Indian above all, rather than continental masses. If i were a Russian strategician , I would ask for, at least, one other geosinchronous satellite at 180 degrees from cosmos 2440, because If there is not certainity about SLBMs detection from space- when they would be relatively far from their intended targets, and there is more time to think and respond- , it must rely only on early warning land based radars, which would give only few minutes wrning