Satellite News

With Europe’s next fleet of meteorological satellites under development, a ceremony held today in Italy was an important milestone: the signature of an industrial contract for the provision of four novel lightning imagers.

Arianespace’s year-opening Ariane 5 mission has been given the “go” for lift-off on 7 February following a launch readiness review for this dual-passenger, heavy-lift flight from the Spaceport in French Guiana. The lift-off is scheduled as soon as possible within the 2136 – 2220 UTC launch window.

The Lockheed Martin team developing the U.S. Air Force’s Global Position System III satellites has completed a key flight software milestone validating the software’s ability to provide reliable and effective command and control for the GPS III satellites planned for launch into orbit.

Andrews Space announced that they have been funded by the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command to design and deliver a Kestrel Eye Block 2 Earth imaging spacecraft as part of the Army’s Kestrel Eye programme.

Northrop Grumman Corporation accepted delivery of the aft-optical system (AOS) from teammate Ball Aerospace, marking the completion of all flight optics for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope.

After a “wheel rest” safe mode that began on 17 January 2013, NASA’s Kepler spacecraft returned to science data collection on 28 January 2013. During the 10-day resting safe mode, daily health and status checks with the spacecraft using NASA’s Deep Space Network were normal.

Reusing hardware originally built to test parts of NASA’s QuikScat satellite, the agency plans to launch the ISS-RapidScat instrument to the International Space Station in 2014 to measure ocean-surface wind speed and direction.

ITT Exelis received a US$3.2 million follow-on contract from the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL), Kirtland Air Force Base, New Mexico, to provide upgraded satellite remote sensor systems.