Artist impression of SKA1 MID in South Africa. Photo: SKA

[Via Satellite 03-11-2015] Yahsat’s satellite broadband division YahClick received a contract to provide connectivity for the Square Kilometer Array (SKA) in South Africa. SKA is a massive project to build the world’s largest radio telescope, with a large swath of it being built across South Africa and its eight African partner countries. The amount of data anticipated from the telescope over the course of a year will be 70 times the amount of information that moves across the Internet.

Protection requirements from the Astronomy Geographic Advantage (AGA) Act demand that telecommunication services are provided in a “radio astronomy friendly” manner. Southern Africa is a prime location of the telescope array due to its lack of radio signals that would otherwise cause interference.

YahClick will connect the research project using Ka-band spot beans. Additionally, the SKA Organization has sponsored an initial 300 terminals for the local community. The full SKA is expected to be operational by 2025, with construction starting in 2017 or 2018 and partial operability by 2020. The remainder of the collective observatory is planned for New Zealand and Australia.