Satellite News

Rocket: Proton M/Briz M; Payload: ExoMars 2016 [Trace Gas Orbiter (TGO), Schiaparelli]; Date: 14 February 2016, 0931 UTC; Launch site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The launch and subsequent flight performed nominally.

Rocket: Soyuz-2-1b; Payload: Resurs-P No. 3 [Resurs P3]; Date: 13 March 2016, 1856 UTC; Launch site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The remote sensing satellite was accurately placed on a 279 x 452 km x 97.3 degrees orbit 9 minutes, 21 seconds after lift-off. However, one of the satellite’s solar panels apparently did not deploy correctly.

Payload preparation activity for Arianespace’s Soyuz Flight VS14 is underway in French Guiana following the separate deliveries of this upcoming mission’s primary satellite passenger – Sentinel-1B – and the first of three additional payloads that will join it, the Microscope spacecraft.

Space Systems Loral (SSL) announced that the JCSAT-14 satellite, which it designed and built for Sky Perfect JSAT, has arrived at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, where it will launch aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle.

NASA’s Game Changing Development (GCD) programme has selected four proposals to develop solar array technologies that will aid spacecraft in exploring destinations well beyond low-Earth orbit.