Satellite News

Rocket: Soyuz-2.1b/Fregat; Payload: Gonets-M No. 30, 31, 32, Kosmos-2548 (ERA-1); Date: 3 December 2020, 0114 UTC; Launch site: Plesetsk, Russia. The satellites were deployed into 1,486 km x 1,505 km x 82.50 degrees orbits.

Chinese rocket manufacturer, China Rocket Co., Ltd., and the municipal government of Haiyang in east China’s Shandong Province signed a contract pledging to build a 163-hectare production base for solid-propellant rockets.

Rocket: Soyuz-ST-A; Payload: FalconEye 2; Date: 2 December 2020, 0133 UTC; Launch site: Sinnamary, French Guiana. The satellite was placed in a 597 km x 599 km x 97.87 degrees Sun-synchronous orbit.

EUMETSAT has joined the signatories of the “joint statement on the institutional exploitation of Ariane 6 and Vega C” in favour of a European preference for launchers on institutional missions in Europe, initiated by the European Space Agency (ESA) in October 2018.

Momentus Inc., a commercial space company offering in-space infrastructure services, and Gilmour Space Technologies, a hybrid rocket company based in Queensland, Australia, announced a new agreement for launch and orbital transport services.

Rocket: Falcon 9; Payload: 60 Starlink satellites (15th batch of operational satellites); Date: 25 November 2020, 0213 UTC; Launch site: Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, USA.

Rocket Lab has announced Japanese Earth-imaging company Synspective as the sole customer for Rocket Lab’s 17th Electron launch, and its seventh mission of the year.

A faulty part from a third-party supplier was discovered in Russia’s Soyuz-ST-A rocket at the Guiana Space Center, but emergencies were prevented thanks to the incorporated control system, according to Dmitry Rogozin, head of Russia’s State Space Corporation Roskosmos.