Magnetic Tape Data Recovery
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is hereby soliciting information from potential sources for the recovery of unique scientific data from magnetic tapes that are well past their expected media life.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) Goddard Earth Science Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) is seeking capability statements from all interested parties, including all socioeconomic categories of Small Businesses and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU)/Minority Institutions (MI), and members of the underserved communities as defined by Executive Order 13985, Advancing Racial Equity And Support For Underserved Communities Through The Federal Government, for the purposes of determining the appropriate level of competition and/or small business subcontracting goals for the Earth Science Magnetic Tape Data Recovery procurement. The Government reserves the right to consider a Small 8(a), Women-owned (WOSB), Service Disabled Veteran (SD-VOSB), Economically Disadvantaged Women-owned Small Business (EDWOSB) or HUBZone business set-aside based on responses received.
The GES DISC project within Code 619 at the Goddard Space Flight Center has been tasked with recovering unique scientific data from magnetic tapes that are well past their expected media life. The recovery of this data will extend the earth science data record for many types of measurements back through the early 1960s. In many cases these tapes are fragile, and the strength of the imbedded signal significantly degraded. In addition, the early drives on which these tapes were written were manually aligned and differences in alignments between drives could also make the tapes difficult to read. The data is on a variety of tape media which includes: 7-track tapes, 9-track tapes, 3480 tapes, and 8 mm tapes.
The expected capabilities of the recovery process include at a minimum:
- Recover/transcribe data from tape to binary (8-bit byte) data file.
- Read the entire length of the media to ensure all possible data is recovered.
- Read the reel media at reduced speeds to reduce stress and friction.
- Handle media tracking issues, such as those resulting from degraded signal strength or alignment issues.
- Handle the problems of old media, including, but not limited to, sticky tapes and dry-rotted plastic hubs, including capability to bake the tapes to remove excess moisture.
- Include an inventory list showing the mapping between NASA tape number and recovered file, including digital picture of each media and labels.
- Provide a .csv inventory file of the individual file marks recovered from each tape to clearly identify the beginning and end of individual files on the media, number of records per file, number of bytes per record, and end of tape marker.
- Upon written permission from NASA after successful recovery, tapes shall be formally disposed. At a minimum, this shall include removal of all labels and rendering the media unreadable.
Interested firms having the required technical capabilities to meet the above requirement described herein should submit a capability statement of no more than five (5) pages indicating the ability to perform all aspects of the effort. The response should include experience and past performance in the area of magnetic tape data recovery.
Responses must include the following:
1) Business name and address.
2) Size of business, average annual revenue for past 3 years and number of employees, ownership, whether they are large, or any category of small business, number of years in business, affiliate information, parent company, joint venture partners, potential teaming partners, prime contract (if potential sub) or subcontractor (if potential prime).
3) Past performance information covering the past five years (highlight relevant work performed). Provide a brief description of the topic/effort; the value of the action; if your company was the prime contractor or the subcontractor; and the point of contact (name of the company/Agency, customer's name, phone number, & email address).
No solicitation exists; therefore, do not request a copy of the solicitation. If a solicitation is released, it will be synopsized on SAM.gov. Interested firms are responsible for monitoring this website for the release of any solicitation or synopsis.
All responses shall be submitted electronically via email to Cassandra K. Moore, Code 178, Email: Cassandra.K.Moore@nasa.gov no later than May 5, 2023. Please reference 80GSFC23AA004 in any response.
This synopsis is for information and planning purposes and is not to be construed as a commitment by the Government nor will the Government pay for information solicited. Respondents will not be notified of the results of the evaluation. Respondents deemed fully qualified will be considered in any resultant solicitation for the requirements.
80GSFC23AA004 National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Space Center
4/20/23, 1:37 PM