So far the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is pleased with an aerostat-based ground surveillance system being used by Customs and Border Protection (CBP) along the southwest border as part of an evaluation of a number of Defense Department assets that are being examined for border security missions, according to Lockheed Martin [LMT] officials.
CBP likes that the Lockheed Martin-built Persistent Threat Detection System (PTDS) that the Army has provided CBP flies at higher altitudes for longer times and in higher wind conditions than other aerostats the agency is also testing, Karl Kettner, Lockheed Martin’s PTDS program manager, told Defense Daily. The system is capable of carrying a combination of payloads weighing between 500 and 1,000 pounds, he said.
The PTDS system being evaluated by CBP flies upward of 5,000 feet and is carrying an L-3 Communications [LLL]-built MX-20 electro-optic/infrared imaging system for day nighttime surveillance. The system, which began operating along the southwest border in July, provides sensor data to a ground control system via a fiber optic link that extends from the ground to the aerostat.
CBP is also evaluating the Persistent Ground Surveillance System and the Rapid Aerostat Initial Deployment (RAID), tethered aerostat systems that like the PTDS have been used in Iraq and Afghanistan to provide force protection for military bases and installations. PGSS, made by NEANY Inc., and RAID, made by TCOM, L.P., fly at lower altitudes and carry fewer payloads in terms of weight.
The agency’s evaluation of different aerostat systems and other technologies will provide it with options. CBP has also deployed or is in the process of deploying fixed and mobile sensor systems consisting of day/night cameras and radar to detect and identify illegal migration across the southern and southwest border regions.
CBP also operates a much larger tethered aerostat system, the Tethered Aerostat Radar System, which is being used to monitor border and coastal regions in the southwest and southeast United States for low-flying aircraft and maritime vessels. The TARS operate at between 10,000 and 12,000 feet and are based at eight locations across the southern and southwest United States.
Lockheed Martin delivered 65 PTDS systems to the Army for use in Iraq and Afghanistan with the first one deployed in Baghdad in 2004. The systems have achieved one million combat mission flight hours, said Ron Browning, Lockheed Martin’s business development director for PTDS.
The Army’s systems are now coming back for reset. The service is developing a program of record for tethered aerostats under the Persistent Surveillance System Tethered (PSST) program. Browning said that plans call for 29 of the PTDS to go into the PSST program, which is currently projected to be a program of record sometime in FY ’16.
The PTDS systems are moored to a relocatable trailer that can be taken down, moved and set up elsewhere within a week. The system is capable of monitoring out to 100 miles, although the useful horizon depends on the sensors being used and the altitude at which the aerostat is operating.