WASHINGTON
—
The
Space
Force
announced
today
that
its
software-centric
program
for
managing,
processing
and
disseminating
space
monitoring
data,
the
Advanced
Tracking
and
Launch
Analysis
System
(ATLAS),
has
been
accepted
as
“operational.”
The
move
paves
the
way
for
the
service
to
finally
rid
itself
of
its
dysfunctional
1980s-era
computer
system
called
the
Space
Defense
Operations
Center
(SPADOC),
which
as
been
used
to
keep
tabs
on
satellites,
spacecraft
and
dangerous
space
junk
even
after
nearly
two
decades
of
failed
replacement
efforts.
Operational
acceptance
of
ATLAS
delivers
the
“the
key
capabilities
[needed]
to
not
be
reliant
on
the
SPADOC
system,”
Shannon
Pallone,
program
executive
officer
of
Battle
Management,
Command,
Control,
Communications,
and
Space
Intelligence
(BMC3I)
at
the
service’s
primary
acquisition
unit,
Space
Systems
Command,
told
Breaking
Defense
on
Sept.
16.
ATLAS’s
official
greenlight
comes
after
a
nearly
year-long
trial
period
for
the
software
at
Space
Operations
Command’s
Mission
Delta
2,
headquartered
at
Vandenberg
SFB,
Calif.
Pallone,
speaking
in
an
exclusive
interview
during
the
Advanced
Maui
Optical
and
Space
Surveillance
conference
in
Hawaii,
explained
that
since
the
trial
began
delta
operators
successfully
have
been
using
the
system
to
create
actual
tracking
data
for
space
objects.
“[O]n
the
ops
floor,
it’s
generating
a
catalog
—
it’s
publishing
data
to
Space-track.org
They’re
using
that
as
a
primary
system,”
she
said.
SPADOC
originally
came
online
in
the
1980s
and
was
by
2017
an
“old
clunker”
that
wasn’t
fit
for
space
warfighting
functions,
according
to
then-head
of
Air
Force
Space
Command
Gen.
Jay
Raymond,
who
went
on
to
lead
the
Space
Force.
The
ATLAS
project,
initiated
in
2018
and
contracted
to
L3Harris,
was
designed
as
part
of
a
larger
Space
Force
effort
to
replace
and
improve
upon
the
infamously
flawed Joint
Space
Operations
Center
(JSpOC)
Mission
System
(JMS).
The
JMS
program
began
in
2009
to
replace
SPADOC,
but
after
a
decade
of
effort
and
not
quite
$1
billion
in
spending
it
was
killed
in
2018.
The
Space
Force
originally
planned
for
ATLAS
to
become
operational
in
2022,
but
the
program
has
been
bedeviled
by
technical
issues
and
schedule
delays
—
to
the
point
where
then-Air
Force
Space
Acquisition
Executive
Frank
Calvelli
in
2023
dubbed
it
one
of
the
Space
Force’s
three
most
troubled
programs.
The
decommissioning
of
SPADOC,
Pallone
said,
will
be
a
game-changing
achievement.
“Maybe
that’s
when
I’m
just
like:
‘I
retire’,”
she
joked.
“It’ll
be
a
major
coup.”
A
Space
Operations
Command
spokesperson
told
Breaking
Defense
today
that
at
the
moment
there
isn’t
a
set
timeframe
for
SPADOC
to
be
shut
down.
Pallone
stressed
that
ATLAS’s
operational
acceptance
is
a
first
step
to
improving
the
Space
Force’s
ability
to
detect,
track,
and
characterize
objects
in
space
in
a
precise
enough
way
to
allow
persistent
“eyes”
on
adversary
satellites.
“That’s
really
just
the
start
of
getting
after
where
we
need
to
go
in
space
domain
awareness
as
a
mission,”
she
said.
“I’m
in
a
new
baseline,
and
now
I
can
start
to
do
some
really
exciting
things
with
that,
and
I
can
start
to
actually
get
after
gaps
instead
of
getting
after
modernizing.
…
I
want
to
get
out
of
modernization
into
closing
gaps,
and
this
is
going
to
let
us
do
that.”