Satellite News

KBR, Inc. announced that its global government services business, KBRwyle, has been awarded a US $48 million indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity (IDIQ) contract by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) to construct, deploy and commission the next generation Space Geodesy (SG) Satellite Laser Ranging (SLR) ground systems.

Thales Alenia Space announced the successful completion of static mechanical validation tests of the first full-scale photovoltaic modules specially designed for its Stratobus autonomous stratospheric airship.

Rocket: Chang Zheng 3B/YZ1; Payload: Beidou-3M15, Beidou-3M16 [Beidou-39, Beidou-40]; Date: 15 October 2018, 0423 UTC; Launch site: Xichang Satellite Launch Centre, China. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) confirmed the mission to be a success four hours later, following direct insertion of the satellites into their intended medium Earth orbits (MEO).

The cause of Chandra’s safe mode on 10 October has now been understood and the Operations team has successfully returned the spacecraft to its normal pointing mode.

Luxembourg-based Kleos Space S.A. announced the signature of a second Memorandum of Understanding with Airbus Defence and Space, as both companies investigate opportunities to collaborate for the manufacture In-Space of structural elements.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in United States has chosen Thales to develop and build an operational ground station in the southwest part of the country, at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico, to track Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) satellites operating in medium Earth orbit (MEO).

At approximately 1355 UTC on 10 October 2018, NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory entered safe mode, where the telescope’s instruments are put into a safe configuration, critical hardware is swapped to back-up units, the spacecraft points so that the solar panels get maximum sunlight, and the mirrors point away from the Sun.

NASA continues to work toward resuming science operations of the Hubble Space Telescope after the spacecraft entered safe mode due to a failed gyroscope (gyro) on Friday, 5 October.