Imaging and Defense Satellites

Orbital has long been a leader in the design and manufacture of small spacecraft used for imaging, remote sensing and technology validation missions for civil, commercial, national security and international customers.

Imaging and Remote Sensing

In the mid-1990's, Orbital helped to establish the commercial remote sensing market with the development and launch of the OrbView series of satellites. OrbView-1 helped scientists study lightning patterns and collect data on dangerous weather systems. OrbView-2 was the first commercial satellite to supply color digital imagery of the Earth on a daily basis, enabling researchers to better monitor the health of oceans and land vegetation and allowing fisherman to more efficiently locate schools fish. The OrbView-3 satellite was one of the first commercial spacecraft to provide high-resolution imagery for commercial, environmental and national security applications.

Defense Technology Satellites

Orbital’s smaller spacecraft platforms are ideally suited to serve as platforms for the demonstration of national security space technologies. The MiTex experimental satellite for the Defense Applied Research Projects Agency (DARPA) successfully conducted its mission using a new small spacecraft bus developed expressly for national security space missions. Previously, Orbital built and launched the Tri-Service Experiment-5 (TSX-5) satellite and provided the spacecraft buses for the U.S. Space Test Experiment Platform (STEP) series of satellites to demonstrate and validate new space technologies.