Satellite News

With the launch of MetOp now set for 7 October at 1628 UTC, the MetOp-A satellite is out of storage and preparations for launch are well underway at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

NASA has delayed shuttle Atlantis’ landing by a day because of bad weather expected at the landing site. The agency also wants time to examine video of an object that may have accidentally flown out of the shuttle’s cargo bay.

On 14 September 2006 a ceremony took place at the facilities of Snecma Propulsion Solide (SPS) in Bordeaux, France, to mark the occasion of the delivery of the first nozzle for the P80 solid rocket motor. The P80 is the first stage of the Vega small launcher.

Rocket: Soyuz FG; Payload: Soyuz TMA 9; Date: 18 September 2006, 0408 UTC; Launch Site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The Soyuz TMA-9 manned transport spacecraft was accurately placed on the target orbit for the Expedition 14 mission to the International Space Station. Space shuttle Atlantis has meanwhile undocked from the station.

Rocket: Soyuz U; Payload: Kosmos 2423; Date: 14 September, 1339 UTC; Launch Site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. The classified military satellite was released into its planned orbit eight minutes after lift-off.

MetOp-A, the first in a new European series of three meteorological operational satellites designed to monitor the Earth’s atmosphere from polar orbit, is now to be launched on Saturday, 7 October from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.

Rocket: Chang Zheng 3A; Payload: Zhongxing 22A (Chinasat 22A); Date: 12 September 2006, 1602 UTC; Launch Site: Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China. The satellite was successfully deployed into geostationary transfer orbit.

Alliant Techsystems , Lockheed Martin , and Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, a business unit of United Technologies , announced that they have teamed together in preparation for NASA’s Ares I Upper Stage procurement, planned for early 2007.