Satellite News

China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC), as the prime contractor, will be responsible for the design, manufacture, assembly, test and launch of Pakistan’s PakSat-1R satellite, with its subcontractors for satellite, launch vehicle, and launch operations.

MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. announced that its Montreal operation has signed a contract in excess of C$10 million with EADS Astrium to provide an information solution for the Alphasat I-XL mission to augment its Broadband Global Area Network service for telephone and Internet.

Qualification testing of single board computer (SBC) engineering models for one of the most powerful computing systems ever flown in space has been completed by Northrop Grumman Corporation with subcontractor Maxwell Technologies.

Rocket: Pegasus; Payload: IBEX (Interstellar Boundary Explorer); Date: 19 October 2008; Site: Kwajalein Atoll, Marshall Islands. Following a one-hour preplanned positioning flight, the Pegasus rocket was released from Orbital Science’s L-1011 carrier aircraft at approximately 1747 UTC.

Arianespace announced that SES has committed to three new primary launch services using Ariane, under the Multi Launch Agreement (MLA) signed in June 2007.

Spacehab Inc. announced that its Astrotech subsidiary was awarded a US$1.17 million contract from Alliant Techsystems in support of ATK’s planning and assembly of Ares I-X first stage hardware to be flown during the 2009 test flight for the development of NASA’s Ares I launch vehicle.

Rocket: Soyuz-FG; Payload: Soyuz TMA-13 (17S); Date: 12 April 2008, 0701 UTC; Site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The manned transport spacecraft was accurately placed on the target orbit for another mission to the International Space Station.

Orbital Sciences Corporation has completed final testing on the SES New Skies NSS 9 commercial communications satellite, the company announced. With its statement, the company seemed to indirectly reject reports that the delivery of the satellite was delayed.