Satellite News

The build-up of Ariane 5’s dual-passenger configuration is underway at French Guiana, where this mission’s upper satellite is now encapsulated in the launcher’s payload fairing.

Orbital ATK is teamed with United Launch Alliance (ULA) to launch NASA’s Solar Probe Plus (SPP) mission on ULA’s Delta IV Heavy rocket. A fully integrated third stage provided by Orbital ATK will give the spacecraft the high-energy boost needed to send it on its mission to study the Sun’s outer atmosphere.

Citing Interfax news agency, The Moscow Times reports that university students in Russia’s Far East could be put to work by the state to finish construction of the delay-ridden Vostochny cosmodrome.

SpaceX is now targeting Monday, 13 April to launch the next commercial resupply services mission to the International Space Station. Launch of the Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft is targeted for approximately 2033 UTC from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

On 31 March at 1347 UTC, a Rokot launch vehicle outfitted with a Briz-KM upper stage successfully injected four Russian satellites – Gonets-M 21, 22 and 23 and a military satellite – into the target orbit.

Rocket: Rokot/Briz-KM; Payload: three Gonets-M, Kosmos 2499 or 2504; Date: 31 March 2015, 1348 UTC. The three Gonets-M communications satellites were accompanied by an unspecified military satellite.

China launched a new-generation satellite into space for its indigenous global navigation and positioning network on 30 March 2015.

Rocket: Chang Zheng 3C/YZ-1; Payload: Beidou-3 M1 (?); Date: 30 March 2015, 1352 UTC; Launch site: Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China. The rocket appears to have lifted off as planned, but further details were not immediately available.