Latest Satellite Stories
HERNDON, Va., Aug. 22, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- VT iDirect, Inc. (iDirect), a company of VT Systems, Inc. (VT Systems), today announced that THAICOM Public Company Limited and iDirect have signed a cooperation agreement that will provide IPSTAR's customers with an alternative integrated solution based on the iDirect ground system platform using the THAICOM 4 broadband satellite. iDirect is a world leader in satellite-based IP communications technology. (Logo:...
[ Watch The Video ( BepiColombo Vertical Vibration Test ) ] [ Watch The Video ( BepiColombo Vibrating Horizontally ) ] Mimicking the intense vibrations experienced by a satellite during launch, the engineering model of the BepiColombo mission to Mercury has been subjected to similar forces at ESA’s spacecraft test facilities. A major design issue for spacecraft arises from the intense environment experienced during launch, ranging from vigorous vibrations to deafening noise. It is...
NASA has selected the Norwegian Space Centre (NSC) of Oslo, Norway, for combined data support services for NOAA's Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) Program. This is a firm-fixed price contract with a value of about $22 million, which includes one base year and four one-year options to extend performance. This contract permits usage of the Svalbard Satellite Station ground station and other NSC data services resources to support the JPSS Program requirements for three missions: Global...
Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online Russian space agency Roscosmos has been dealt another major blow to its faltering space program after a Monday launch of its Proton-M rocket failed to lift two satellites into orbit. The Telkom 3 satellite, belonging to PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia, and a Russian satellite -- Russian Express MD2 -- failed to reach orbit after launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan Monday night, due to a malfunction of the Briz-M booster...
Lawrence LeBlond for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online After traveling nearly 5,000 miles from Thales Alenia Space in Rome, Italy, the next Galileo navigation satellite arrived at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana August 7 to begin preparations for an October launch into orbit. The satellite, enclosed in a protective, air-conditioned container, was accompanied by a four-person team from Thales, plus two representatives, one each from Astrium and the European Space Agency (ESA)....
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The European Space Agency's latest weather satellite has capture its first image of the Earth, the agency said. The MSG-3 satellite captured the first image using the Spinning Enhanced Visible and Infrared Imager (SEVIRI) instrument. The satellite launched on July 5, and ESA said it is performing well and on its way to taking over operational service after six months of commissioning. ESA said it was responsible for the initial...
ARLINGTON, Va., July 30, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- ATK (NYSE: ATK) today announced an expanded product line of small, agile satellite buses designed for a wide range of missions in civil, national security and commercial applications. Designed to meet the growing demand for affordable small spacecraft with dependably fast delivery, ATK's family of agile buses are built for both near-term and long-term markets. ATK's demonstrated expertise in the small satellite industry with nearly...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online China just keeps on keeping on with its space program, sending off its Tianlian I-03 satellite into orbit on Thursday. The satellite launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan province, according to Xinhua news agency. Tianlian I-03 flew aboard a Long March-3C carrier rocket to space, and it will be joining up with two other satellites that are already waiting for it to arrive in orbit. The satellite will...
Lee Rannals for redOrbit.com - Your Universe Online The European Space Agency (ESA) announced on Tuesday that it has retired its GIOVE-B experimental navigation satellite. The satellite initiated a thruster firing yesterday, raising GIOVE-B's orbit by about 18 miles, taking it steps closer to a satellite graveyard up in orbit. More thruster firings will take place in the next three weeks, so that by mid-August the experimental satellite will be 372 miles above its original orbit....
Transactions Support Thousands of American Jobs WASHINGTON, July 23, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Export-Import Bank of the United States (Ex-Im Bank) approved two separate transactions totaling more than $1.2 billion to finance the export of American-made telecommunications satellites to Mexico and Australia. (Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20110414/MM83673LOGO) Approximately 750 U.S. aerospace jobs will be directly supported in Washington State, California,...
Latest Satellite Reference Libraries
Satellite -- A satellite is an object that orbits another object. With sufficient tangential velocity, the object does not collide with the primary object it orbits, but maintains a distance from that object as the rate at which it falls towards that object is similar to the rate that it travels away, thus the object orbits the primary object and becomes a satellite. In other words: gravitational force serves as the centripetal force needed to make the object circle the primary...
NEAR-Shoemaker Mission -- The Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous - Shoemaker (NEAR Shoemaker), renamed after its launch in honor of Gene Shoemaker, is an unmanned spacecraft designed to study the near-Earth asteroid Eros from close orbit over a period of a year. The primary scientific objectives of NEAR were to return data on the bulk properties, composition, mineralogy, morphology, internal mass distribution and magnetic field of Eros. Secondary objectives include studies of regolith...
Lagrangian Point -- In Lagrangian mechanics, a Lagrangian point (or L-point) is one of five positions in space where the gravitational fields of two bodies of substantial but differing mass combine to form a point at which a third body of negligible mass would be stationary relative to the two bodies. Bodies at the L-point will not move relative to the parent bodies if they are not perturbed by other gravitational forces. They are sometimes also referred to as libration points. The...
Orbit -- An orbit is the path that an object makes around another object under the influence of some force. The classical example is that of the solar system, where the Earth, other planets, asteroids, comets, and smaller pieces of rubble are in orbit around the Sun; and moons are in orbit around planets. These days, many artificial satellites are in orbit around the Earth. Understanding orbits There are a few common ways of understanding orbits. -- As the object moves, it...
![Flying Steady: Mission Control Tunes Up Aqua\](/media/gallery/a-train-satellite-aqua/thumbs/thumbs_aqua_render_lrg.jpg "Flying Steady: Mission Control Tunes Up Aqua\")
