Satellite News

Australian telecommunications provider Optus said its Optus D2 satellite, which was launched on 5 October last year, has been made operational after completing a series of in-orbit tests.

SES Sirius announced that the Sirius 4 communications satellite is now in operation and has taken over all transmissions from Sirius 2 and Sirius 3. Since it was launched on 18 November 2007, all operations have been carried out according to plan.

The launch of Ekspress-AM44 and Ekspress-MD1 may be delayed again according to a source close to the development.

Boeing has delivered DirecTV 11, the second of three new Boeing-built satellites for DirecTV, Inc., to the Sea Launch Home Port in Long Beach, California/USA.

The half-official announcement last Saturday regarding the impending re-entry of a U.S. spy satellite into the Earth’s atmosphere created a deluge of media reports over the weekend. Their content ranged from “we’re about to be hit by [a satellite] the size of a bus” (The Scotsman) to “Why the spy satellite won’t fall on your head” (New Scientist).

Boeing announced the successful on-orbit handover of the first of six Wideband Global SATCOM (WGS) satellites to the U.S. Air Force. The spacecraft was launched on 10 October 2007 aboard an Atlas V.

Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) said it recently conducted the first multi-engine firing of its Falcon 9 medium to heavy lift rocket at its Texas Test Facility outside McGregor.

Rocket: Proton M/Briz M; Payload: Ekspress-AM33; Date: 29 January 2008, 0018 UTC; Site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Contact with the spacecraft was established nine hours after lift-off.