Satellite News

Rocket: Soyuz-FG; Payload: Soyuz TMA-20M [ISS 46S]; Date: 18 March 2016, 2126 UTC; Launch site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The crewed vessel reached orbit nine minutes after lift-off as planned.

The next spacecraft to be orbited for Europe’s Copernicus Earth observation programme – Sentinel-1B – is now undergoing pre-launch checkout at the Spaceport, readying it for the 22 April lift-off on Arianespace’s upcoming Soyuz flight from French Guiana.

China’s first dark matter detection satellite has completed three months of in-orbit testing and found 460 million high energy particles in a 92-day flight, officials said.

On behalf of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), NASA has awarded a sole source contract modification to Northrop Grumman for two Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder instruments for NOAA’s Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) Polar Follow On / JPSS-3 and JPSS-4 Missions.

The European Space Agency (ESA) has awarded Indra a contract to develop the fourth version of the intermediate frequency modem IMBU Mk4, or Integrated Modem and Baseband Unit, which plays a key role in checking and verifying communications across the agency’s ESTRACK network, used to communicate with and monitor satellites and space missions. Indra will deliver the first of the ten ordered units in 2017.