An integrated Raytheon -- Northrop Grumman program team conducted the rigorous six-month C3 segment integration testing. The NPOESS Integrated Program Office (IPO), led by the Department of Commerce's National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and composed of DoD, NOAA and NASA personnel, performed a detailed review of all artifacts and witnessed Raytheon's test.

"Raytheon's Command, Control, and Communications Segment is the first segment on the NPOESS program to complete this milestone," said Mike Mader, vice president and NPOESS program lead for Raytheon.

"Our ability to complete the factory acceptance test in a timely fashion was due to Raytheon's application of software reuse and a command and control product line that supports fast tailoring to multiple spacecraft missions." Mader added that the NPOESS ground segment contains 1.8 million lines of code with five major hardware subsystems and was completed in 36 months.

"I congratulate the C3S team on the completion of factory acceptance testing," said Colonel Sue Mashiko of the NPOESS IPO. "This milestone represents an important achievement, and I'm especially proud this portion of the NPOESS development has been completed very close to the original estimates in terms of lines of code and development and test durations."

The factory acceptance test certification positions Raytheon to ship hardware to 10 sites for installation: the NPOESS mission management center in Suitland, Md.; data processing centers at Offutt Air Force Base, Neb., and Suitland, Md.; data communications sites at White Sands, N.M., and Svalbard, Norway; system integration and maintenance sites at Boulder, Colo., Indianapolis, Ind., Redondo Beach, Calif., and Landover, Md.; and the launch site at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. Implementation and integration of all sites is scheduled to be complete by May of 2006 with a segment acceptance test in September of 2006.

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