By REID TUCKER
It’s not every day that passing multiple levels of security clearances and background checks are required before enjoying some scrambled eggs and a biscuit.
However, these concessions are eagerly made when the prospect of a hearty breakfast is accompanied by a tour at one of the U.S. Air Force’s most important radar installations – that, of course, being Eglin Air Force Base’s Site C-6. The home of the 20th Space Control Squadron, the Site C-6 facility, is charged with providing America and its allies with surveillance of outer space and situational awareness of the same, said squadron commander Lt. Col. Mafwa Kuvibidila. The colonel was the keynote speaker at the Walton Area Chamber of Commerce’s First Friday Breakfast event, held March 6 at the restricted-access facility located about six miles from Freeport, and she explained Site C-6’s role and capabilities to those in attendance.
“Basically, we ‘watch the sky,’” she said. “[Site C-6] is one of only 29 sites in the world that ‘looks’ the way it does. We can keep track of 200 near-earth objects or one deep-space object at a time – that means we can ‘see’ 10-centimeter objects at the distance from here to Daytona Beach.”
The station’s abilities for objects farther away from Earth are even more impressive: the facility’s powerful radar array could read the writing on a basketball-sized object at a distance of 41,700 kilometers, she said. These awesome capabilities are crucial to Site C-6’s role in the worldwide Space Surveillance Network, which keeps tabs on the vast cloud of man-made satellites and spaceborne debris, and, especially during the Cold War, enemy rocket (and sometimes missile) launches. Nowadays though, Site C-6 provides this information to commercial partners, other nations allied with the U.S. and even sometimes adversaries like Russia or China.
“Our mission is critical because we have to be sure we’re providing everybody with the information they need to be aware of what’s up there so they can take appropriate actions,” Kuvibidila said.
All that power comes with a tremendous electricity requirement, as CHELCO CEO Steve Rhodes told the crowd on hand for breakfast. The energy demands of Site C-6 are so massive, he said, that it uses the same amount of electricity as a 500-home housing subdivision, easily making the facility CHELCO’s biggest customer. The relationship between CHELCO, the primary sponsor of the Chamber’s First Friday Breakfast events, and the Air Force is a strong one, with the last unplanned outage at Site C-6 occurring in 2007. Rhodes assured everyone that outage was a brief one.
Site C-6 isn’t only about watching foreign rocket launches and making sure runaway space debris doesn’t collide with the International Space Station. The facility’s staff is deeply involved in the local community, hosting a regular blood drive and making frequent donations to food pantry charities in the area, while also conducting educational seminars for the students at Freeport Elementary School.
