Elodie Collins
North Wind, formerly Calspan Aero Systems Engineering, has secured a contract valued at $98.5 million to build a prototype ground test facility for high-speed systems such as hypersonic weapons. The award was made under the Training and Readiness Accelerator II for the Minnesota Aerospace Complex prototype project, according to a notice posted Wednesday on SAM.gov.
Advanced Technology International oversees TREX II as the consortium management firm.
The MAC program seeks to create more large ground test facilities for hypersonic systems development in the United States. Currently, there are only four such facilities in the country, two of which are owned and operated by industry, which may present challenges when testing highly proprietary concepts.
The other two primary large-scale test facilities are the Aerodynamic and Propulsion Test Unit at the Arnold Engineering Development Complex in Tennessee and the NASA Langley Research Center in Virginia. While both are government-owned, the facilities use combustion air heaters that result in airflow that may not accurately reflect real-world flights.
Under the contract, North Wind will integrate new technologies and develop novel test and evaluation infrastructure into the prototype hypersonic facility.
The defense and space manufacturing company also signed a memorandum of understanding with the University of Minnesota to design and operate the MAC facilities. The MoU will enable the University of Minnesota to use its computational expertise to support the prototype.
