Eutelsat W2A–Протон-М/Бриз-М –03.04.09–20:24 ЛМВ –Байконур

Автор Salo, 28.02.2009 16:36:07

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Salo

"Были когда-то и мы рысаками!!!"

mare



Вован

Байконур надолго - навсегда

anik

http://www.space.com/spacenews/

"KOUROU, French Guiana — The 12-meter-diameter S-band antenna aboard the Eutelsat W2A satellite launched April 4 has suffered an anomaly that may reduce its ability to provide service across Europe as required by its regulatory license, one of two granted May 14, according to industry officials"

Dude

Еще бы, первый раз развернули 12м, как тут без аномалий...
Главное, что бы на Протон стрелки не повернули.

anik

Цитироватьhttp://www.space.com/spacenews/

"KOUROU, French Guiana — The 12-meter-diameter S-band antenna aboard the Eutelsat W2A satellite launched April 4 has suffered an anomaly that may reduce its ability to provide service across Europe as required by its regulatory license, one of two granted May 14, according to industry officials"

Полный вариант сообщения:

ANTENNA PROBLEM CLOUDS PROSPECTS FOR SOLARIS MOBILE S-BAND VENTURE
http://www.space.com/spacenews/spacenews_summary.html#BM_1

KOUROU, FRENCH GUIANA — The 12-meter-diameter S-band antenna launched April 4 aboard the Eutelsat W2A satellite has suffered an anomaly that may reduce its ability to provide the services required by its regulatory license, one of two granted May 14 to competing ventures, according to industry officials.

The antenna, built by Harris Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., was successfully deployed in orbit April 9. But in-orbit tests in the last four weeks have uncovered a hardware glitch whose full consequences are not yet known, according to Solaris Mobile, the company that was formed to market S-band satellite links to government and commercial users in Europe.

Dublin-based Solaris, a joint venture of Europe's two biggest satellite operators, SES of Luxembourg and Eutelsat of Paris, issued the following statement May 15 in response to Space News inquiries: "The antenna was deployed successfully with all deployment telemetry parameters nominal. The coverage and radiated power are degraded with respect to predictions, but the S-band antenna works in both transmit and receive modes. The root cause of the anomaly has not been identified.

"It may not be possible to deploy all of the anticipated commercial services. It may be required to adapt quality of service to the level of power that will be available. It will take another few weeks before we have a clearer picture. Solaris Mobile remains confident in its ability to meet [European Commission regulatory] requirements. ... The anomaly has been communicated to insurers."

In a coincidence of the calendar, the Brussels, Belgium-based European Commission on May 14 announced that it had selected Solaris and Inmarsat of London as winners of the competition to provide S-band services in Europe. Bids by TerreStar Networks of Reston, Va., and ICO Global Communications, also of Reston, were rejected.

Industry officials said it might be possible to coax the Harris antenna into full service by the orbital equivalent of "shaking" the satellite in an attempt to correct the faulty hardware, which they declined to identify.

Harris spokesman Jim Burke said May 14 that Harris would defer comment on the matter to its customer, Solaris Mobile. Burke also declined to comment on whether the issue will delay the scheduled June 24 launch here of TerreStar's TerreStar-1 satellite, intended to provide S-band mobile communications in North America. TerreStar-1 was built by Space Systems/Loral of Palo Alto, Calif., and carries an 18-meter-diameter Harris-built antenna.

Industry officials said Harris and Loral have determined to their satisfaction and that of their customer that TerreStar-1's antenna, whose development has caused previous launch delays, is free of the issue affecting the Solaris antenna. TerreStar-1 arrived at Europe's Guiana Space Center spaceport here May 15.

TerreStar General Counsel Douglas Brandon said in a May 14 interview that while the company has had limited information about the W2A problem because of non-disclosure agreements between the various parties, TerreStar is confident that Harris and Loral would not have permitted the satellite's shipment without having verified that a similar problem would not occur with TerreStar-1.

The conventional telecommunications payload that is the W2A satellite's main mission is not affected by the anomaly. The W2A satellite was built by Thales Alenia Space of France and Italy.

As winners of the European Commission's S-band licenses, Inmarsat and Solaris will divide 30 megahertz of uplink and 30 megahertz of downlink capacity in S-band over the 27-nation European Union.

The commission reiterated that the two winners were to have satellites in orbit within 24 months of the May 14 license date. How the commission might react to a Solaris service that is unable to reach all 27 European Union nations, or unable to fill its advertised product offer, is unclear. Also unclear is whether Inmarsat, which has selected Thales Alenia Space as its S-band satellite prime contractor but has yet to approve any substantial metal-cutting on the satellite, will be able to meet the commission's May 2011 deadline.

Inmarsat spokesman Christopher McLaughlin said May 14 that Inmarsat's initial contract with Thales Alenia Space would permit Inmarsat's EuropaSat S-band spacecraft to be in orbit within the commission's deadline. McLaughlin reiterated Inmarsat's position that the company would expect to have investment partners before committing to the full project investment. Inmarsat, he said, will not go it alone as far as capital investment in EuropaSat.

In its announcement of the two winning license applications, the European Commission said it made its decision with the help of outside experts based on the "technical and commercial development of these mobile satellite systems."

It is now incumbent on the European Union's 27 member states to assure that Inmarsat and Solaris are granted "the right to use the specific radio frequencies identified in the commission's decision. ... These providers have been authorised to use their satellite systems all over Europe for 18 years from the selection decision. This is consistent with national practice in the sector and should allow investment to be recouped by satellite providers."

The two companies whose bids were rejected said they were not yet abandoning their efforts.

ICO Global initiated legal proceedings in September in the European Court of First Instance that challenge the commission's entire selection process, even as the company participated in it.

"ICO has spent years clearing the S-band worldwide, has an operational satellite using this frequency band and is registered in the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) Master International Frequency Register (MIFR)," ICO Acting Chief Executive Michael Corkery said in a May 14 statement. "We believe the just-concluded EU process jeopardizes years of international cooperation and coordination that has governed satellite communications worldwide. ICO will continue assessing its options in defending its international legal rights."

TerreStar Europe, a London-based subsidiary of TerreStar Corp., said May 14: "We are extremely disappointed with the Commission's order, as it appears not to have fully appreciated the significant advantages TerreStar Europe would have brought to the commission's member states by leveraging ... assets of our parent, TerreStar Corp. ... TerreStar Europe will review the full decision when available and determine its appropriate next steps."

anik

TERRESTAR-1 LAUNCH SLIPS AS INSURERS REQUEST MORE INFO
http://www.space.com/spacenews/spacenews_summary.html#BM_2

PARIS — Insurance underwriters covering TerreStar Networks Inc.'s $200 million policy for the launch and first year of operations of the TerreStar-1 satellite have requested additional information on a similar satellite's in-orbit antenna problem before signing off on the upcoming launch, according to industry officials.

Reston, Va.-based TerreStar, whose mobile communications satellite has been at Europe's Guiana Space Center launch site in French Guiana awaiting a late-June launch, has agreed to delay the launch until the first half of July as a result.

The 6,700-kilogram TerreStar-1, built by Space Systems/Loral of Palo Alto, Calif., features an 18-meter-diameter S-band antenna built by Harris Corp. of Melbourne, Fla., that is launched in folded position before deploying, umbrella-style, once in orbit.

A 12-meter version of the same antenna was launched in April aboard Eutelsat's W2A telecommunications satellite. The S-band antenna is designed to support a mobile communications service planned by Solaris Mobile of Dublin, a joint venture of Eutelsat and SES of Luxembourg.

The W2A antenna was deployed in orbit without incident April 9 but ground teams since have discovered a problem that is likely to limit its power and the geographic reach of the Solaris Mobile service unless it is corrected.

In the weeks since the issue was disclosed, neither Eutelsat nor Solaris has been able to determine the root cause of the anomaly, industry officials said.

Space Systems/Loral and Harris approved the shipment of TerreStar-1 to the French Guiana launch site May 15, having verified to their satisfaction that the satellite's antenna did not need to be reworked in light of the W2A problem.

But in the intervening four weeks, having received no clarifications on what happened on W2A, at least one of the underwriters backing the TerreStar-1 insurance package has asked that the TerreStar-1 launch be delayed.

Because Eutelsat and W2A prime contractor Thales Alenia Space of Cannes, France, announced a trouble-free deployment of the antenna, attention has focused on a possible manufacturing defect that somehow escaped detection during pre-launch testing, and on the launch itself.

The W2A satellite was launched aboard an International Launch Services (ILS) Proton Breeze M rocket from Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

In response to Space News inquiries, Reston, Va.-based ILS on June 11 released the following statement from Jim Bonner, the company's chief technology officer: "ILS and [Proton builder Khrunichev of Moscow] have evaluated the flight results of the W2A launch and determined the launch environments were within ICD [interface control document, or users' manual] specification and well below [spacecraft] test levels. There are no launch vehicle-related anomalies from the prior flight and the Proton Breeze M is a 'Go' for launch of Sirius FM5."


Eutelsat spokeswoman Vanessa O'Connor said June 12 that the board of inquiry looking into the W2A antenna issue has not concluded its work and has not yet determined what happened. Because of that, O'Connor said, Eutelsat has been unable to give its own insurers a clear picture of the anomaly.

"These are very complex antennas and it's not surprising that, as of today, the commission of inquiry has been unable to find the root cause," O'Connor said.

TerreStar General Counsel Douglas Brandon said June 11 that the company is confident it will be cleared to launch TerreStar-1 by mid-July even if the Eutelsat W2A investigation has not isolated the cause of the problem.

"It makes people more comfortable that we allow a little more time," Brandon said. "Arianespace [the launch services provider] has told us there is no problem with a launch in early July, so there is no large cost to waiting a bit longer."

Industry officials said the U.S. space technology export regulatory regime, known as ITAR — International Traffic in Arms Regulations — slows the flow of information about hardware failures any time U.S. gear is involved.

To discuss possible failure scenarios with satellite insurers — most of whom are not American — Harris would need special authorizations specifying exactly what the company can say. In some cases, Harris would need U.S. State Department representatives present in the room in which a discussion of the W2A antenna occurs.

TerreStar paid its underwriters $28.1 million for a $200 million policy covering TerreStar-1's launch and its first year of in-orbit operations. The policy includes $50 million in coverage of TerreStar's ground-based beam-forming system, which allows TerreStar to adjust the satellite's coverage from the ground.

zandr

ЦитироватьT.S. Kelso  @TSKelso
EUTELSAT 10A, launched 2009-04-03, has completed a full circuit of the GEO belt since circularizing its orbit well above GEO graveyard altitude o/a 2023-11-21. As it appears to have been decommissioned, the CelesTrak SATCAT has been updated: https://celestrak.org/NORAD/elements/graph-geo.php?CATNR=34710.
В конце ноября ушёл на кладбище.