NASA’s Goldstone DSN Complex Welcomes New 34-Meter Antenna

A time-lapse video of construction operations for a new antenna at the NASA Deep Space Network’s Goldstone Space Communications Complex near Barstow, California, on Dec. 18, 2024.

Called Deep Space Station 23 (DSS-23), the new antenna joins others at three Deep Space Network complexes around the world that communicate with spacecraft at the Moon and beyond. During construction operations on Dec. 18, the 112-foot-wide (34-meter-wide) steel parabolic reflector framework was lowered into position by crane before a crew bolted it into place. Shortly after, engineers placed what’s called a quadripod onto the center of the dish framework. A four-legged support structure, the quadripod weighs 16 ½ tons and features a curved subreflector that will direct radio frequency signals from deep space to bounce off the main reflector into the antenna’s pedestal, where the antenna’s receiver is housed.

DSS-23 is a multi-frequency beam waveguide antenna that will boost the DSN’s capacity and enhance NASA’s deep space communications capabilities for decades to come. Once online in 2026, DSS-23 will be the fifth of six new beam waveguide antennas to be added to the network, following DSS-53, which was added at the DSN’s Madrid complex in 2022.

The DSN allows missions to track, send commands to, and receive scientific data from faraway spacecraft. It is managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California for the agency’s Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) program, which is located at NASA Headquarters within the Space Operations Mission Directorate.

Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech