Nagging SBIRS Software Issue Tempers Optimism on Program

摘要

Even as the first two sensors in the U.S. Air Force's new missile warning system perform well on orbit, where they are hosted aboard a classified spacecraft, software issues continue to dog the long-troubled program and threaten to further delay the launch of the first dedicated satellite. A new report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) says the Air Force has only a 50 percent chance of meeting its launch schedule for the first geosynchronous-orbiting Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) satellite. According the congressional watchdog agency, that launch currently is slated for December 2009.