Telescope Information
IDENTIFIER urn:nasa:pds:context:telescope:madrid.dss66_26m::1.1
NAME DSS-66 Radio Telescope
DESCRIPTION DSS-66 was used primarily for communication with Earth orbiting spacecraft and for initial acquisition of any spacecraft immediately after launch. It partnered with DSS-16 (at Goldstone, CA) and DSS-46 (near Canberra, Australia) in a 26-m subnet for this purpose. DSS-66 could transmit 50-2000 W at 2.1 GHz (S-band). It could receive right- and left-circularly polarized signals simultaneously at both 2.3 GHz and 8.4 GHz; its receiver could combine the signals to obtain a rotatable linear polization. The antenna became operational in 1966, was moved from the nearby Fresnedillas NASA tracking site to its present location in 1983, and was decommissioned in 2009. The Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex (MDSCC) is located about 65 km west of Madrid, near the town of Robledo de Chevala, Spain. Under an agreement between the governments of Spain and the United States, dated 1964-01-29, the National Institute for Aerospace Technology (INTA) and the U.S. space agency NASA signed a contract for operation and maintenance of the MDSCC facilities. The creation, in 1992, of the state-owned Aerospace Engineering and Services, SA (INSA, S.A.) under INTA, allowed the concentration of these responsibilities in the new company. INSA has disappeared and Ingenier??a de Sistemas para la Defensa de Espa?ħa is the company that has managed MDSCC since December 2012.
FACILITY Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex
APERTURE 26.0
LONGITUDE 355.74857
LATITUDE 40.429974
ALTITUDE
COORIDINATE SOURCE Geodetic coordinates derived using an ellipsoid with semi-major axis a = 6378136.3 m and flattening f = 298.257 (see DSN document 810-005, Module 301 issued 2001-01-15, Table 5 and associated text). These coordinates are valid for the years 1983-2009.
INVESTIGATION(S)
INSTRUMENT(S) NASA Deep Space Network Radio Science