July 2019

Rocket: GSLV MkIII-M1; Payload: Chandrayaan-2; Date: 22 July 2019, 0913 UTC; Launch site: Sriharikota, India. The Chandrayaan-2 spacecraft was placed into a 169.7 km x 45,475 km orbit. This was the first operational flight of the GSLV Mk III. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072200

OneWeb Satellites – a joint venture of OneWeb and Airbus – officially opened the world’s first high-volume, high-speed advanced satellite production facility in Florida, USA. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072201

Lockheed Martin has completed building the capsule for NASA’s Orion spacecraft. The crew module capsule for the uncrewed Artemis 1 mission to the Moon has been stacked on top of the Orion service module, which was also recently finished. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072202

Britain said it would scrutinise the acquisition Inmarsat by a private equity-led consortium to examine any potential impact on national security. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072203

Rocket: Soyuz-FG; Payload: Soyuz MS-13; Date: 20 July 2019, 1628 UTC; Launch site: Baikonur, Kazakhstan. After lift-off, the crewed spaceship entered orbit in approximately nine minutes. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072100

Virgin Orbit has been selected by the U.K.’s Royal Air Force (RAF) to provide responsive launch capabilities for a small satellite constellation Operational Capability Demonstrator through a new RAF project named "ARTEMIS." http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072101

China’s Tiangong-2 space lab successfully re-entered the Earth’s atmosphere on 19 July under controlled conditions. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019072102

India’s Chandrayaan2 moon mission will now lift off at 0913 UTC on 22 July, space agency ISRO said, three days after the launch was aborted due to a technical snag in its GSLV-Mk-III rocket. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019071800

The qualification tests of the Vulcain 2.1 engine, which will power the Ariane 6 main stage, were completed during the 26th development test. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2019071801

Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation system is back in service after a six-day outage, its oversight agency said. "Galileo Initial Services have now been restored. Commercial users can already see signs of recovery of the Galileo navigation and timing services, although some fluctuations may be experienced until further notice," the European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Agency…