News on key developments at SupremeSAT, and general news on the Space and Satellite industry from across the web
Rocket: Chang Zheng 4B; Payload: Gaofen-11; Date: 31 July 2018, 0300 UTC;Launch site: Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, China. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073100
NASA and the U.S. Air Force have certified Russia’s RD-180 engines for Atlas V carrier rockets to used for manned spaceflight by U.S. astronauts, Igor Arbuzov, director general of Russia’s major rocket engine manufacturer JSC NPO Energomash, was quoted as saying. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073101
Northrop Grumman Corporation announced that its "S.S. J.R. Thompson" Cygnus spacecraft successfully completed its ninth cargo supply mission to the International Space Station under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-1) contract. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073102
Intelsat S.A. announced financial results for the three months ending 30 June 2018. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073103
Iridium Communications Inc. reported financial results for the second quarter of 2018. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073104
Eutelsat Communications has signed a multi-year, multi-transponder contract with Media Group Ukraine for broadcasting services on its Eutelsat 9B satellite. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073105
Iridium Communications Inc. announced that the 10 Iridium NEXT satellites launched on 25 July by SpaceX are functioning nominally and have begun the testing and validation process. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073000
Telesat announced that, following a highly rigorous process involving leading satellite manufacturing companies, it has entered into a contract with the consortium of Thales Alenia Space and Maxar Technologies, the owner of SSL, to further develop system designs for Telesat’s LEO constellation. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073001
Saudi Arabia’s Taqnia Space (TSC) has signed a multi-year contract with Eutelsat including incremental multi-transponder wide-beam capacity on the Eutelsat 70B satellite as well as the fifth HTS spotbeam on Eutelsat 3B, on which it already operates the four others. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018073002
Rocket: Chang Zheng 3B/Y1; Payload: Beidou-3M5, Beidou-3M6 [Beidou-33, Beidou-34]; Date: 29 July 2018, 0140 UTC; Launch site: Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China. The twin navigation satellites entered Medium Earth Orbit more than three hours after the launch. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2018072900