Weekly GEOINT Community News

Ball Aerospace Ships Ozone Mapping Instrument for Weather Satellite

Ball Aerospace shipped the Ozone Mapping Profile Suite (OMPS) instrument for integration onto NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System-2 (JPSS-2) weather satellite. The OMPS instrument observes stratospheric ozone and measures its concentration as it varies with altitude. It is a three-part hyperspectral instrument, which includes a Nadir Mapper that will map global ozone with about 50-km ground resolution, a Nadir Profiler that will measure the vertical distribution of ozone in the stratosphere and the NASA-provided Limb Profiler that measures ozone in the lower stratosphere and troposphere with high vertical resolution. The JPSS series of polar-orbiting weather satellites are funded by NOAA to provide global environmental data in low-Earth polar orbit. NASA is the acquisition agent for the flight systems, launch services, and components of the ground segment.

Planet Names Top Three Finalists of The Copernicus Masters Planet Daily Change Challenge

Following a multi-phase evaluation this past summer, Planet announced the top three finalists of our Copernicus Masters Planet Daily Change Challenge. The Copernicus Masters competition awards prizes to developers who leverage Earth observation data to solve important problems for business and society. The three finalists and their proposed solutions demonstrate the diverse range of use cases and applications that can be built upon global satellite imagery. The top three finalists, in no particular order, are: DirtSat, leverages geospatial data and AI to unlock powerful insights and help reframe urban food systems; IMARA, combines ground truth and satellite data to boost land restoration projects to work toward a more sustainable, biodiverse, and better-balanced world; and Geo Gecko, a Ugandan company that remotely monitors how Africa changes to enhance decision-making. The winner of the Planet Daily Change Challenge will be announced during the virtual awards ceremony during European Space Week in December.

Esri Announces New Security Enhancements through Integration of U.S. Government-Approved Drone and Cloud Deployment to the European Union

Esri announced two major capabilities in Site Scan for ArcGIS that will enable governments and critical infrastructure organizations to meet hardware and software regulations in the U.S. and Europe. Through an established partnership with Auterion, creator of the most widely used open-source drone autopilot operating system, security-conscious U.S. organizations will be able to use Site Scan, Esri’s unmanned aerial systems flight planning and processing solution, to plan and execute missions with the trusted and secure Freefly Astro drone, powered by Auterion. Additionally, for organizations in Europe with data sovereignty requirements, a new and fully independent instance of Site Scan for ArcGIS has been deployed to European servers, ensuring that organizational data resides within the region.

Raytheon Intelligence & Space Launches Virtualized Testing Solution to Assess Cyber Vulnerabilities

Raytheon Intelligence & Space, a Raytheon Technologies business, is launching a new hardware emulation and software analysis tool called DejaVM that provides a virtualized environment to evaluate and reduce cyber threats against mission-critical systems in a modern networked space. DejaVM enables system-level cyber testing without requiring access to the limited number of highly specialized physical hardware assets. The tool creates an emulation environment that virtualizes complex systems to support automated cyber testing. DejaVM focuses on improving software development, testing, and security via its advanced analysis features.

Peer Intel

Dewberry announced that Larry Sugarbaker joined the firm as a senior technical advisor to the geospatial and technology services group based in the firm’s Fairfax, Virginia, office. Sugarbaker previously worked as the senior advisor for the National Geospatial Program at the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and was responsible for developing geospatial policy for the National Map and National Atlas, as well as other national program activities. He also served as the senior project director for a new geospatial information service to support senior executives within the Department of the Interior and its bureaus.

Ball Aerospace President Rob Strain was selected to serve as a subcommittee member on the Defense Innovation Board (DIB) Space Advisory Committee (SAC). As a member of the SAC, Strain will draw on more than 30 years of experience in the aerospace industry to provide his unique perspective and expertise to the DIB for Department of Defense leaders on how to best leverage innovation to address current and future challenges and opportunities in space.

Featured Image: Ball Aerospace Ozone Mapping Instrument | Photo Credit: Ball Aerospace