Arianespace is finalising the pre-launch checks on Eutelsat’s latest satellite, its Quantum craft, which is scheduled to launch from Kourou in French Guiana on July 30th. Eutelsat’s Quantum is one of a pair of satellites being prepared for launch on the same Ariane-5 rocket. The other is Star OneD2 for Embratel of Brazil. Arianespace has […]
Currently the EU, mostly via the European Space Agency (ESA) and other national space bodies, has totally supported the development of Arianespace’s ‘next generation’ Ariane 6 rocket. However, the development of Ariane 6 (A-6) has been delayed and not helped by Covid restrictions. The original concept was also that A-6 would be significantly cheaper to […]
OneWeb, the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite communications company, today announced the finalists in its open Innovation Challenge 2021 to create new innovations, products, and solutions for small satellite technology. More than 300 Innovators from 19 countries took part in the challenge, in association with the UK Government Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, […]
A successful launch by an Arianespace Soyuz rocket placed 36 OneWeb broadband-by-satellite craft into orbit on July 1st. The launch, OneWeb Flight 8, from the Russian Far East cosmodrome at Vostochny was a complete success. Launch was at 12.48 UTC. The launch means that initial OneWeb connectivity to the planet’s norther latitudes can commence shortly […]
On July 1st a Soyuz rocket is set to launch an additional 36 OneWeb broadband satellites into orbit. The launch will take place from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East, and handled by Arianespace and its local partner Starsem. Timings on launch day are: 13:48 BST / 8:48 AM ET / 4:48 AM Alaska […]
OneWeb’s next batch of low Earth orbiting satellites have arrived at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East. They will now be prepared for launch by Arianespace’s team on site who work with Starsem for integration onto a Soyuz 2.1b rocket. The likely date for launch, subject to the usual weather and technical checks, is […]
The May 29th launch of an additional 36 satellites into their orbital slots means that OneWeb is close to 80 per cent of its needs to launch initial services. The launch took the OneWeb fleet to 218 satellites. OneWeb’s near-term target is to reach those nations and regions north of 50 degrees Latitude well before […]
A Russian Soyuz 2.1b rocket safely delivered 36 OneWeb broadband satellites into orbit on Friday evening, May 28th. The launch was managed by Arianespace. “The launch went according to plan,” Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the Roscosmos space agency, said on messaging app Telegram. They were orbited from Russia’s Vostochny launch site. While the launch […]
The European Union wants its own Low Earth orbiting mega-constellation of satellites for its citizens, and separate from the offerings from Elon Musk, OneWeb or Canada’s Lightspeed. The EU invited a consortium of industry suppliers to come up with a fast-track LEO scheme and Dominic Hayes, spectrum manager for the EU’s space programme at the […]
Arianespace is due to use a Soyuz rocket on May 27th from Russia’s Vostochny Cosmodrome to launch an additional 36 OnWeb Low Earth orbit satellites into its existing constellation. The launch will take OneWeb’s fleet to 218 craft. The satellites will go into a near-Polar orbit at an altitude of 450 kms and the Arianespace […]