EWS-RROCI

EWS-RROCI [OSS]

EWS-RROCI (Electro Optical/Infrared Weather System Rapid Revisit Optical Cloud Imager) is a mission to demonstrate an Electro-Optical / Infrared (EO/IR) LEO-based cloud characterization solution for the USSF Electro Optical/Infrared Weather System (EWS) that supports U.S. warfighter operations.

This mission is a response to United States Space Force (USSF) Space Systems Command (SMC) search for a commercial prototype EWS mission capable of characterizing global clouds in near real-time to support Department of Defense operations. SMC selected Orion Space Solutions (OSS) (formerly ASTRA LLC), in collaboration with Lockheed Martin, Science and Technology Corporation, Pumpkin, Inc., and Atmospheric & Environmental Research (AER), for the first phase of the EWS mission to design, develop, and demonstrate its eight-channel RROCI prototype. OSS’ imagery utilizes commercial off-the-shelf systems to produce cloud characterization, mitigate weather risk, provide theater weather, and compare payload outputs to existing satellite data from a 12U-CubeSat meeting USSF mission requirements.

RROCI failed to deploy from the launch vehicle and reentered with the upper stage.

After the demise of RROCI, the US Space Force issued a follow-on contract to Atmospheric to build, launch, and operate RROCI-2. Atmospheric had some additional components to be able to build a second satellite, which it is doing on an expedited timeframe. Atmospheric recognizes that the federal review process of satellite applications can be lengthy, however, a launch slot in January 2024 is available, and so Atmospheric is trying to finish all of the engineering and regulatory work in time to meet the December 2023 integration date for the launch in January 2024.