NV5 provided MEP/FP/Telecom engineering for the relocation of the mission control center for the Chandra Satellite Program from Cambridge, MA to Burlington, MA. This program, a collaboration between NASA, Smithsonian and Harvard, monitors the activity of the Chandra X-Ray Observatory satellite, a NASA telescope that orbits above the earth’s atmosphere – 86,500 miles in space. The Chandra satellite is used to locate exploded stars, galaxies and the matter that surrounds black holes through the detection of X-ray emissions in space. The project was first launched in 1999 for what was originally supposed to be a five year mission. Over the past twenty years, the Chandra satellite has found and imaged black holes all throughout the universe, including the supermassive black hole at the center of the Milky Way.
NV5 was initially hired to provide a 50% CD package for three different sites to allow the Smithsonian and NASA to understand the construction costs associated with the three buildings being considered. Once the 30,000 SF site in Burlington was selected, NV5 took the project through CDs and construction.