WALLOPS — NASA last week awarded a multi-million dollar contract for the construction of a new Mission Launch Command Center at its Wallops Island Flight Facility to a Salisbury firm, further confirming Wallops’ importance to the Lower Shore economy.

NASA last week announced it had awarded the $5.6 million contract for the to Harkins Contracting Inc. of Salisbury. The 14,000-plus square-foot facility will serve as the hub for interfacing with and controlling rockets, their payloads and associated launch pad support systems during flight operations at Wallops.

“The Wallops launch range mission set has seen steady growth, transformation and diversification over the years,” said Wallops Flight Facility Director Bill Wrobel this week. “This new MLCC is a critical modernization project that will meet the needs of our operations today and take us well into the future.”

The growth at Wallops has resulted in the creation of hundreds of well-paying tech jobs across the Lower Shore in neighboring Worcester, Wicomico and Somerset Counties and the award of the major contract to a Salisbury firm reconfirms the facility’s commitment to the local economy.

Recent operations underscoring the need for the new command center include commercial cargo resupply flights to the International Space Station. The failed launch of an Antares rocket last fall proved to be a temporary setback, but the facility has rebounded and is on target to get back on track with its launch program to resupply the International Space Station. In addition, Wallops hosts Department of Defense missions and NASA’s Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE), the first lunar mission to launch from Wallops.

The launch command center currently in use was built in the 1950s to accommodate discrete, quick-turnaround missions consistent with Wallops’ operations at the time, which included Project Mercury tests and suborbital rocket flights. Now that Wallops has taken on a major role in NASA’s launch program, the need for a new MLCC is greater than ever.

“The current command center has served us well over the years, but doesn’t have the capacity to meet the needs and requirements for advancing our nation’s goals and objectives in space,” said Wrobel.