MDA

August 20, 2011 - The SBX departs Vigor Shipyards after completing three months of scheduled maintenance and planned upgrades.

May 10, 2011 - SBX passes the Seattle skyline as it enters Elliott Bay just before arriving at Vigor Shipyards Seattle. Missile Defense Agency photos.

May 11, 2011 - Video footage of the SBX radar traveling towards Vigor Shipyards Seattle.

March 20, 2007 - On March 20, 2007, the SBX radar and two Aegis ships using onboard SPY-1 radar, successfully tracked a Minuteman II target missile as it was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The largest radar of its type, the SBX is designed to track and discriminate small objects in space, which makes it especially effective for missile defense.

Feb. 2007 - In February 2007 the SBX successfully traveled from Hawaii to the waters of the Aleutian Island chain of Alaska. It departed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on Jan. 3, and conducted numerous sea trials and exercises while en route to Alaska, and also continued the calibration of the X-band radar mounted on top of the ocean-going platform.

Jan. 9, 2006 - The Sea-Based X-Band radar arrives in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, aboard the heavy lift vessel Blue Marlin on January 9, 2006, passing behind the U.S.S. ARIZONA Memorial.

April 3, 2005 - The 2,000-ton radar is lowered aboard the converted oil rig in what will become the Sea-Based X-band Radar (SBX) for the Missile Defense Agency. The assembly took place at the Kiewit Offshore Services in Corpus Christi, Texas. The 282-foot high structure will displace nearly 50,000 tons when at its operating draft. The SBX, a unique combination of an advanced-radar with a mobile, ocean-going, semi-submersible platform will provide the nation with highly advanced ballistic missile detection and will also have the capability to discriminate hostile missile warheads from decoys or countermeasures. Its mobility gives it the capability to be positioned on the ocean to support Missile Defense Agency tests and also operationally support defense of our homeland, deployed forces and allies and friends. The SBX will be homeported in Adak, Alaska later this year.

Sept. 25, 2009 - The Space Tracking and Surveillance System - Demonstrator, or STSS-Demo, spacecraft lifts off through a cloud of smoke from Launch Pad 17-B at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket. It was launched by NASA for the Missile Defense System. Launch was at 8:20:22 a.m. EDT on September 25, 2009. The STSS-Demo is a space-based sensor component of a layered Ballistic Missile Defense System designed for the overall mission of detecting, tracking and discriminating ballistic missiles. STSS is capable of tracking objects after boost phase and provides trajectory information to other sensors.

Cooling Equipment Unit

Electronic Equipment Unit

Portable Power Unit

October 24, 2008 - AN/TPY-2 in Juneau, Alaska.

AN/TPY-2 Radar site

AN/TPY-2 operating in Forward Based Mode

AN/TPY-2 operating in Forward Based Mode at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico, in preparation for a flight test.

AN/TPY-2 Cooling Equipment Unit (Left) , Antenna Equipment Unit (Right) , and Electronic Equipment Unit (Center) operating in Forward Based Mode at Wake Island in preparation for Flight Test FTM-15.

AN/TPY-2 Antenna Equipment Unit operating in Forward Based Mode at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico.