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In late 2003 and 2004 the US, Europe and Japan will each have missions arriving on Mars while two other spacecraft will be encountering comets and a third comet mission will launch.
Several other missions will have continuing communications needs.
In preparation for this NASA has selected a builder to add an advanced dish antenna, 34 meters in diameter (112 feet), near Madrid in Spain, one of the agency's three Deep Space Network (DSN) sites.
The Deep Space Network is a global system for communicating with interplanetary spacecraft. The new Madrid antenna will add about 70 hours of spacecraft tracking time per week.
NASA has selected Schwartz-Hautmont Construcciones Metalicas SA of Tarragona, Spain, as the successful bidder to construct the new antenna which is to be completed at the Madrid complex by 2003.
The antenna is the biggest piece in about USD54 million worth of improvements that NASA's Office of Space Science, Office of Space Flight and Space Operations Management Office have set as priorities for increasing the Deep Space Network's capabilities by late 2003.
Other parts of the plan would improve the capabilities of existing antennas at all three of the network's tracking complexes in Madrid, Spain, Canberra, Australia and Goldstone near Barstow, California.
"We are getting ready for a crunch period beginning in November 2003," said Rich Miller, head of planning and commitments for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, that manages the network.
The Deep Space Network communicates with spacecraft that are anywhere from near Earth to out past Pluto.
It uses clusters of antennas at the three sites spaced approximately one-third of the way around the Earth from each other so they can cover spacecraft in any direction as the world turns.
Each station has one 70-meter diameter (230-foot) antenna, plus several smaller ones.
Projections for demands on the network during the November 2003 to February 2004 period indicate the greatest need for increasing capacity will be at Madrid.
NASA plans to land two rovers on Mars in early 2003.
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