Local reports seem to confirm China’s intentions to build and launch 13,000 low Earth orbiting satellites. The mega-constellation would rival the existing Starlink system from SpaceX, the UK and India-backed OneWeb scheme and a planned similar constellation from Amazon’s Jeff Bezos. China’s State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND) has called […]
A Falcon 9 rocket from SpaceX will launch another large batch of Starlink broadband by satellite craft on January 29th. It will be the third SpaceX launch within six days. SpaceX is launching an Italian satellite (January 27th at 11:11 pm EST for launch of COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation FM2 to orbit from SLC-40 in Florida) […]
ArianeGroup Chief Executive André-Hubert Roussel has said the Ariane family of rocket launchers would be fully reusable starting by the end of this decade. His comments follow on from French Economics Minister Bruno Le Maire who has been highly critical of the Arianespace’s current use of non-reusable rockets, including the giant Ariane 5 and smaller […]
A textbook launch by SpaceX saw an additional 49 Starlink satellites placed into their transfer orbits on January 18th. Despite a technical delay the rocket blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center pad at 21.02 Florida time. The Falcon 9’s booster landed some 9 minutes later on the floating drone-ship ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas’. This […]
Bloomberg, in what investment bank Exane/BNPP describes as an “informal survey”, has suggested that Eutelsat and ITV are “most likely takeover” candidates. The bank suggests that ITV has been in the Bloomberg poll fairly frequently over the past ten years. Other companies named as possible takeover targets include KPN, Telecom Italia, Invit, Nokia, ProSiebenSat. 1 […]
There are 1469 SpaceX Starlink satellite working correctly, according to Elon Musk. He tweeted that another 272 are moving toward their operational orbits. However, SpaceX has launched a total of 1993, according to Musk, which suggests that 252 satellites are not working or somehow didn’t make it to orbit. Another 49 craft are scheduled to […]
SpaceX will launch 49 Starlink satellites from Kennedy Space Center today (January 18th). The launch is scheduled for 7.04 Florida time (00.04 UTC), subject to the usual weather considerations. The booster supporting this mission previously launched GPS III-3, Turksat 5A, Transporter-2, and six other Starlink missions. Following stage separation, SpaceX will land Falcon 9’s first […]
It was another routine launch for Elon Musk’s SpaceX on January 13th. A Falcon 9 rocket placed 105 smaller satellites into orbit for a number of clients and universities. Musk’s team, despite facing a number of potential problems that frequently effect other launch providers, have seemingly managed to make the launching of satellites a wholly […]
Analysts at investment bank BNP/Paribas, in a report on the media sector and satellite activity, suggest that the existing market (notably Europe’s two satellite giants SES and Eutelsat) could be affected by the EU’s decision on plans for a European-financed Low Earth orbiting constellation. The bank says: “In 2022, the EU is likely to make […]
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is altering its plan to send another 30,000 satellites in its Starlink mega-constellation into space using its existing Falcon 9 rocket fleet. A SpaceX lawyer, William Wiltshire, in a letter to the FCC explains that progress on the constellation is moving forward better than expected and that SpaceX plans to start launching […]