Satellite News

The LEOSWEEP project (‘Improving Low Earth Orbit Security With Enhanced Electric Propulsion’), coordinated by the engineering and technology group SENER, has been selected during the last call of the European Commission’s 7th Framework Program. SENER will lead a consortium of 11 institutions comprised of companies, research centres and universities of the EU and Ukraine that will work jointly on the project during three years.

Progress M-21M (a.k.a. Progress 53) docked to the aft port of the International Space Station’s Zvezda service module at 2230 UTC on 29 November, delivering almost three tons of food, fuel, supplies and holiday gifts for the Expedition 38 crew. However, docking had to be performed manually.

The critical manoeuvre to place India’s Mars Orbiter Spacecraft in the Mars Transfer Trajectory was successfully carried out on 30 November (UTC).

Visiona Tecnologia Espacial S.A. and Telebras formally signed a contract to supply the Defense and Strategic Communications Geostationary Satellite (SGDC) system. The BRL1.3 billion (US$556 million) contract provides for the system to be delivered by the end of 2016.

Reaching a significant milestone for ESA’s magnetic field mission, the Swarm satellites have completed the critical first phase of their new mission.

The first Full Operational Capability (FOC) satellite in the future European navigation system Galileo has passed the most difficult of all the environmental impact tests. Over a period of four weeks, the satellite known as “Doresa” was tested in the thermal vacuum chamber at European Test Services ETS, completing the tests with great success, as the OHB team reported from Nordwijk in the Netherlands.

A milestone in developing Europe’s contribution to NASA’s Orion crew vehicle, expected to take human crews beyond Earth orbit later this decade, has been set for next May. The period until then will allow for an in-depth design analysis for the proposed European hardware.

The integration of Sentinel 1A environmental satellite, built by Thales Alenia Space for European Space Agency (ESA), is being finalised in the company’s clean rooms in Rome.