The 20th Space Surveillance Squadron (20 SPSS) is a Space Delta 2 unit located at Eglin Air Force Base, Florida with the mission to execute multiplatform, tactical space warfighting domain characterization, recognition, and responsiveness to achieve 21st Space Wing and United States Space Command intent. The unit, formerly designated the 20th Space Control Squadron (20 SPCS), was renamed on 25 March 2022.
Eglin Site C-6 was assigned to Aerospace Defense Command on 20 December 1968. In 1972 20% of the site's "surveillance capability...became dedicated to search for SLBMs" and was subsequently renamed the 20th Missile Warning Squadron (the USAF SLBM Phased Array Radar System was initiated in November 1972 by the JCS while the Army's MSR and PAR phased arrays for missile defense were under construction.) The AN/FPS-85 facility was expanded in 1974, and "a scanning program to detect" SLBM warheads was installed in 1975. Alaska's AN/FPS-108Cobra Dane phased array site was completed in 1976 and from 1979 until 1983, Site C-6 was assigned to Strategic Air Command's Directorate of Space and Missile Warning Systems (SAC/SX)--as were the new PAVE PAWS phased array sites operational in 1980.
On 25 March 2022, the squadron was renamed the 20th Space Surveillance Squadron (20 SPSS) in a ceremony officiated by the Space Delta 2 Commander, Colonel Mark Brock.
Space Command
In 1983 Eglin Site C-6 transferred to Space Command (later renamed Air Force Space Command), and the "FPS-85 assumed a deep space role in November 1988 after receiving a range-extension upgrade enabling integration of many pulses." With the addition of additional missile warning sites becoming active, the squadron eliminated its missile warning mission, and the surveillance squadron name was restored in 1987. The unit was renamed the 20th Space surveillance squadron when a "new radar control computer" was installed at the site in 1994. By 1998, the site was providing space surveillance on "38 percent of the near-earth catalogue" of space objects (ESC's "SND C2 SPO was the System Program Office.) "A complete modernization...of the 1960s signal-processing system was being studied in 1999", and in 2002 Site C-6 was tracking "over 95 percent of all earth satellites daily."[citation needed] The squadron was renamed the 20th Space Control Squadron in February 2003. In 2004, significant components of Naval Space Command were transferred to the 20th Space Control Squadron, including components of the former Naval Space Surveillance System (renamed the Air Force Space Surveillance System). By 2011 the site's "16 million observations of satellites per year" (rate of 30.4/minute) was "30 percent of the space surveillance network's total workload".[citation needed]
United States Space Force
In September 2020, the 20 SPCS joined the newly created United States Space Force.
Col Mark Brock and Lt Col Alfred T. Maynard officiate the renaming of the unit to the 20th Space Surveillance Squadron.
United States
United States Space Force
