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US Space Force staff have toured the global Joint Task Force - Space Defence Commercial Operations network during an operational readiness review of the site in South Australia.
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Defence Space Command and Australian Defence Force personnel welcomed the US Space Force’s Space Systems Command space domain awareness strategic adviser Barbara Golf and the US Space Force’s Major Dustin O’Donnell to the Commercial Operations cell in Adelaide on 6 October.
JCO is a United States Space Force-led initiative utilising industry providers to deliver diverse and timely space domain awareness capabilities and drive critical partnerships. The aspiring global system already operates across three regional cells in the Americas, Pacific, and Meridian.
The No. 1 Space Surveillance Unit began site lead duties in early September, with six newly accredited Defence personnel now leading operations for JCO-Australia. 1SSU will support other national cells, including JCO-New Zealand, to contribute to a broader JCO-Pacific Cell.
“Australia’s space advantages include our Southern Hemisphere location and vast, open, electronically quiet land mass,” according to Defence Space Commander Air Vice-Marshal Cath Roberts.
“We can observe and receive signals from space at times when other nations cannot. Our allies and international partners offer their own advantages. We collaborate on capabilities and work together on operations and activities, sharing missions and data.
“Space is of global significance. Defence is collaborating with international partners to maximise resilience in a contested space domain. Space domain awareness allows us to monitor activities in space and detect and respond to potential threats.
“JCO operational integration is also one of the ways we develop our space workforce. Collaborations like these help our space professionals learn from their counterparts across the world.”
JCO-PAC will contribute to JCO’s “follow-the-sun” model from the Adelaide site in the south, while each cell around the world collaborates at different times in shifts, taking control of a mission during local daylight hours to produce continuous global space domain awareness operations of what is happening in space.
JCO intends to harness the space industry, providing a diverse sensor network, leveraging industry innovations.
Barbara Golf, strategic adviser for Space Domain Awareness to the US Space Force’s Space Systems Command, said they were enthusiastic about Australia’s role with the JCO.
“Australia’s Southern Hemisphere location enables a ‘follow-the-sun’ collaborative operating model. Commencing shifts in the JCO further solidifies the US–Australia and wider coalition bonds in the space domain,” Golf said.
