Satellite News

On 21 November 2015, communications signals from and contact with Amos-5. the telecommunications satellite designed and built by Academician M.F. Reshetnev Information Satellite Systems for Spacecom, were lost. On the day when the satellite ceased functioning ISS-Reshetnev Company set up a commission to search for possible causes of the satellite’s failure which was headed by Yuriy Maximov, deputy general director for quality at ISS-Reshetnev.

The Russian satellite Kanopus-ST, which failed to separate from its carrier rocket’s Volga upper stage, re-entered Earth’s atmosphere on Tuesday.

An interdepartmental commission at Russia’s Plesetsk spaceport has admitted that the Kanopus-ST satellite launched on 5 December was lost as it did not separate from its carrier rocket’s Volga upper stage.

Spacecom said is currently employing all of its capabilities and those of its partners to re-establish communication with the Amos 5 satellite and at this point, does not have further information regarding the cause of this anomaly.

Contact has been lost with communications satellite Amos 5, starting at 0445 UTC on 21 November, its operator, Spacecom, said in a statement. The company did not rule out a total loss of the spacecraft.

The ORS-4 mission on an experimental Super Strypi launch vehicle failed in mid-flight shortly after lift-off at 0345 UTC on 4 November from the Pacific Missile Range Facility off Barking Sands, Kauai, Hawaii. Details were not immediately available. The target orbit was 413 km x 489 km x 97.4 degrees.

In October 2014, Orbital ATK’s Antares rocket suffered an anomaly during launch from Pad 0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia that resulted in the loss of the rocket and its cargo and damage to the launch pad. Orbital ATK immediately convened an Accident Investigation Board (AIB). NASA established an independent review team that has now released its review of the accident.

The International Launch Services (ILS) Failure Review Oversight Board (FROB) concluded its work, concurring with the most probable cause and the associated corrective action plan which were identified by the Russian Interagency Commission (IAC) as a result of the Proton launch vehicle failure carrying the Centenario spacecraft on 16 May.