St. David's Island, St. George's Parish, Bermuda

Notes:
St. David's Island is one of the main islands of Bermuda. It is located in the far north of Bermuda, one of the two similarly sized islands that make up the majority of St. George's Parish.





The island was originally 503 acres (2.04 km2) in size (2.0 square kilometres), but was enlarged by reclamation, and by absorbing Long Bird Island, in 1942 to 650 acres (2.6 square kilometres), to allow room for a US military base (originally the US Army's Fort Bell / Kindley Field, later Kindley Air Force Base, and then USNAS Bermuda) which occupied over half the island.





The US Naval Air Station was closed in 1995, but much of its facilities are still used as part of L.F. Wade International Airport. Cooper's Island is now attached to St. David's in the southeast, although the two islands are still widely regarded as if they were separate entities.

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The role of NASA's Tracking Station on Cooper's Island:





As an integral part of the NASA Manned Space Flight Network (MSFN), the Bermuda station played a vital role in the United States' Apollo lunar program and other flight missions.





The Cooper's Island station was located on the southeastern tip of Bermuda. Radar dishes and helical antennae were used to track anything from spacecraft to sparrows.





Because of its location in relation to Cape Kennedy, Florida, USA, the Bermuda station had a dual-purpose role for the Manned Space Flight Network (MSFN). At the time of launch, the primary mission of the station was to provide trajectory data to the computing facilities at Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) in Maryland, USA. Computations based on data obtained during the final portion of powered flight was used to confirm the orbital "Go-No Go" decision. Bermuda normally acquired the spacecraft at approximately T + 3 minutes.





The station was usually able to supply a minimum of 60 seconds of valid radar data prior to engine cutoff and orbital insertion. For subsequent passes of the space craft, Bermuda served as a normal tracking station with command capabilities.





In addition to supporting manned missions, the Bermuda station commanded, tracked and acquired valuable data from a host of unmanned scientific and application satellites launched from Cape Kennedy and NASA'sWallops Island launch facility in Virginia, USA.





In between flight missions, the Bermuda station's sophisticated instrumentation was employed by scientists to conduct research ranging from the migratory habits of birds to astronomy.





NASA began construction of the Bermuda station in the early 1960's. The station became operational by September 1961.

Latitude: 32.365413, Longitude: -64.663423