Satellite News

The NASA and Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. Green Propellant Infusion Mission (GPIM) will fly three U.S. Defense Department experimental hosted payloads when it launches in 2016. GPIM’s mission will validate a non-toxic fuel for future satellite missions, which could replace hydrazine and provide additional performance benefits.

Measat Satellite Systems Sdn. Bhd. announced an agreement with iSAT Africa Ltd. Fzc. (“iSAT”) for capacity on the Africasat-1a satellite.

Basic build-up of the Ariane 5 for Arianespace’s sixth heavy-lift flight of 2014 is complete for a mission scheduled from French Guiana in early December with two geostationary orbit relay satellites.

Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems, Inc. announced that it successfully completed the development of the Cubesat Proximity Operations Demonstration (CPOD) vehicles and has officially received the approval to continue into the Vehicle Assembly Integration and Testing (AI&T) Phase.

NASA has chosen proposals from 10 universities to study CubeSat concepts that could enhance a Europa mission concept currently under study by NASA.

Preparations for Arianespace’s sixth Ariane 5 mission in 2014 are gearing up with two separate milestones marked this week in French Guiana: arrival of one of the flight’s two satellite passengers – DirecTV-14 – and the assembly start-up for its heavy-lift launcher.

The next Soyuz rocket lifting off from French Guiana will reportedly carry four O3b satellites and not, as previously planned, two Galileo spacecraft.

Preparations for the third landing of the X-37B, the U.S. Air Force’s unmanned, reusable space plane, are underway at Vandenberg Air Force Base.