The U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is a research and development agency within the Department of Defense. Its mission is to develop and deploy a layered missile defense system to protect the United States, its deployed forces, allies, and friends from missile attacks in all phases of flight. MDA is developing space-based sensors for tracking ballistic and hypersonic missiles and works with partners like the U.S. Space Force and U.S. Navy on testing and deployment. Keywords associated with MDA include missile defense, ballistic missiles, hypersonic weapons, space-based sensors, and interceptor technology.
All verified mentions of this organization in source documents.
The Missile Defense Agency launched two Northrop Grumman-made STSS satellites into low-Earth orbit in 2009.
APT works under contracts to support safety at more than 40 U.S. government agencies, including NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, and the Department of Defense Explosives Safety Board.
On 2018-09-27, the Missile Defense Agency awarded 21 contracts of $1,000,000 each to seven companies and Draper Laboratories to develop concepts for hypersonic weapon systems intended to shoot down enemy hypersonic missiles.
The Missile Defense Agency, working through the Air Force-led Space Enterprise Consortium, awarded $1,000,000 study contracts this summer to nine firms to design concept prototypes for a space sensor layer.
The Missile Defense Agency asked each company that submitted Space Sensor Layer concept designs to provide rough estimates of cost.
The 2019 National Defense Authorization Act adds $140,000,000 to the Missile Defense Agency’s budget for development of hypersonic defense capabilities.
Contractors that received study contracts are scheduled to brief the Missile Defense Agency later 2018-08.
SSL was selected through the Space Enterprise Consortium managed by Advanced Technology International to lead a team that will provide the U.S. Missile Defense Agency with a persistent space layer prototype concept for missile defense.
If funding is approved and plans proceed, the Missile Defense Agency could deploy a space sensor layer by 2025.
The committee requires the Missile Defense Agency to develop a persistent space-based sensor architecture capable of supporting the ballistic missile defense system and compatible with DARPA efforts on space-based sensors for missile defense.
The Senate Armed Services Committee directs the U.S. Air Force and DARPA to work with the Missile Defense Agency to study whether the LEO constellation has the potential to meet MDA’s space-based requirements.
More than 1,000 employees work in contractor-support roles for the Missile Defense Agency at various locations for Parsons.
Lt. Gen. Samuel Greaves, Director of the Missile Defense Agency, has supported deploying sensors in space.
The Missile Defense Agency is considering either building out the existing STSS constellation or developing a more distributed architecture of smaller, less expensive satellites.
The Missile Defense Agency operates both STSS satellites and requested $37,000,000 in its 2019 budget for their operations and sustainment.