Launch

China launched a BeiDou-3 satellite into Geostationary Orbit (GEO) for the first time, from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center. Launched on a Long March-3B carrier rocket, it is the 41st of the BeiDou navigation system, and will work with 16 other Beidou-3 satellites already in-orbit. It is also the first BeiDou-3 satellite in high orbit,...

Airbus will deliver the first European Service Module (ESM) for NASA’s Orion spacecraft from its aerospace site in Bremen, Germany on Nov. 5 2018. An Antonov cargo aircraft will fly the ESM to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. This is the result of four years of development and construction, and is a key milestone...

Harris provided Lockheed Martin with its sixth of ten navigation payloads contracted for the U.S. Air Force’s GPS III satellite program. The GPS III navigation payload features a Mission Data Unit (MDU) with a 70 percent digital design that links atomic clocks, radiation-hardened processors and powerful transmitters – helping enable signals to be more accurate than...

Telesat’s Telstar 18 Vantage High Throughput Satellite (HTS) is fully operational at 138 degrees East and has entered commercial service. Telstar 18 Vantage was launched by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Sept. 10, and aims to serve growing demand for mobility, enterprise and telecom services across the...

  Space engineers have teased images taken in-orbit by the RemoveDebris satellite, marking another successful Active Debris Removal test by the international project. RemoveDebris carried out a test of its onboard vision-based navigation (VBN) system on Oct 28. The test saw the RemoveDebris spacecraft release a target cubesat, and then take images of the descending...

The first attempt to launch a rocket into space by the Chinese company dubbed “China’s SpaceX” by state-owned media has failed, while China successfully sent an ocean-observing satellite into space. “China’s SpaceX” saw a complete loss of its small satellite payload, but Landspace Technology Corporation enters China’s history books as the first privately-licensed company to...

U.S. orbital launch provider Rocket Lab has signed a contract with fast-growing Internet of Things (IOT) startup Fleet Space Technologies to launch two satellites that will form the foundation of a global IOT communications constellation. The two Proxima satellites are the first of a fleet of small, low-cost satellites that will provide internet connectivity for...

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) successfully delivered the KhalifaSat satellite into orbit today, via the H-IIA launch vehicle F40. KhalifaSat was manufactured by the United Arab Emirates’ (UAE) Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center (MBRSC). The launch vehicle trajectory was executed as planned, and at about 24 minutes after liftoff, separation of the KhalifaSat satellite was confirmed. This mission was performed...

Russia’s Roscosmos space agency successfully launched a Soyuz 2.1B rocket from its Plesetsk launch facility on October 25 carrying a Russian military satellite. The Soyuz launch was the first since Russia aborted a manned mission from the Baikonur cosmodrome to the International Space Station on October 11, during which two astronauts were forced to eject from their Soyuz-FG...

Viasat selected SpaceX to launch one of its ViaSat-3 satellite missions. The Viasat mission is scheduled to launch in the 2020 – 2022 timeframe from the Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA‘s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The mission will launch aboard a Falcon Heavy rocket. According to the release, Viasat chose the SpaceX Falcon Heavy...