Our Brave Landsat 9 Team! Hammers Stands Up New Landsat 9 Backup Site amid Pandemic Challenges

Sioux Falls, South Dakota, December 12: Two Landsat 9 Administrative Team Members from the Hammers Company this month drove 1200 miles from the East Coast to successfully set up, configure, and test key equipment for the backup site of the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Landsat Multi-Satellite Operations Center (LMOC) facility.

This key milestone for USGS allows it to provide full backup control of its Landsat 9 and Landsat 8 satellites from Sioux Falls in the event that the main LMOC in Greenbelt, Maryland is not accessible to perform satellite operations.

“We are incredibly proud of our brave engineers. They have stepped up again and again to make the Landsat 9 mission a success,” said Steve Hammers, company President.

The work was challenging technically and logistically, but Hammers Landsat 9 System Administration team members Adrian Cabrera and Justin Jones agreed to work extended days over a week and a half to complete the work ahead of schedule.

Hammers Senior Systems Engineer Dan Casey recognized the challenges overcome by his colleagues. "The technical challenges are familiar, but when you try to do this in the middle of a pandemic, you really have to be constantly self-aware, and be ready to change plans at a moment's notice. These guys really came through at a difficult time.”

Backup equipment located at the main LMOC facility at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) in Greenbelt had to be removed from racks and packed securely for shipment to EROS. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the installation team drove from Maryland to Sioux Falls, South Dakota to reassemble and reinstall cable in the new racks.

With minimal interaction with local onsite EROS staff, Cabrera and Jones overcame technical challenges to reestablish communications between local servers and workstations at EROS in Sioux Falls and corresponding equipment at the USGS LMOC at GSFC in Greenbelt. The Hammers personnel also reestablished communications with the NASA ground Communications System (NASCOM) facility in Greenbelt, which manages terrestrial communications between ground stations, mission control centers, and other elements of spacecraft ground segments.

Conference Room 1310 at EROS has already been converted to a backup Operations Control Center and will host staff in the event of an inability to operate from GSFC. It will also be used for proficiency tests. The backup equipment was originally scheduled to begin arriving at EROS in spring 2020, just as the Covid-19 pandemic began shutting down nonessential travel throughout the U.S.

the Hammers Company, Inc., is a Maryland based woman owned small business with nearly 30 years of experience providing aerospace software and related services for major satellite programs.

SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA, December 12, 2020: Hammers Company Landsat 9 Administrative team member Justin Jones checks rack equipment configuration after driving 1200 miles from the East Coast amidst the Covid-19 pandemic to successfully set up, configure, and test key equipment for the United States Geological Survey (USGS) Multi-Satellite Operations Center (LMOC) Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) backup facility.

SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA: Hammers Company Landsat 9 Administrative team member Justin Jones configures wiring at the USGS LMOC EROS backup facility.

SIOUX FALLS, SOUTH DAKOTA: Hammers Company Landsat 9 Administrative team member Adrian Cabrera adjusts rack wiring harness at the USGS LMOC EROS backup facility.