Satellite News

The U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center’s seventh Wideband Global satellite communication spacecraft arrived at the Shuttle Landing Facility at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on 28 May.

QinetiQ has delivered four electric propulsion thrusters to the European Space Agency (ESA), to be used on the BepiColombo mission to Mercury.

ABB has won a contract to supply the main component, a Michelson interferometer, for the satellite of the GOSAT-2 mission that will enable the Japanese government to continue and enhance spaceborne measurement of major greenhouse gases.

MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. has signed a contract for C$11 million with the Canadian Space Agency to design and develop upgraded camera systems for the Mobile Servicing System (MSS). The contract includes an option for the build and test of flight cameras.

The fourth Space Based Infrared System Highly Elliptical Orbit payload was shipped on 13 May from Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems in Azusa, California, by Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, the SBIRS prime contractor.

The world’s first spacecraft thruster with a platinum combustion chamber and nozzle made by 3D printing has passed its baptism of fire with a series of firings lasting more than an hour and 618 ignitions.

So far, the Rosetta orbiter has received no new signals from the Philae lander on the surface of Comet 67P/C-G since the last signal receipt on the evening of 14 June. Teams at ESA, DLR and CNES have agreed to a new orbiter trajectory that will optimise the opportunities for lander-to-orbiter communication.

Indra has been awarded a contract for the deployment in Papeete (French Polynesia) of a new Telemetry, Tracking and Command (TT&C) Station, which will expand the ground segment of the European global positioning system, Galileo.