by David Todd | Jul 23, 2020 | Launches, Reliability Info
The cause of failure of the maiden flight of Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne rocket has been revealed. The air-launched rocket was dropped from its Cosmic Girl Boeing 747 carrier aircraft at 1950 GMT on 25 May. After a four-second drop, ignition of the first stage... 
by David Todd | May 7, 2020 | Reliability Info, Russia, Satellites, Space Insurance
The Russian Satellite Communications Company (RSCC) has confirmed that it has turned off the Ka-band payload of the communications satellite Express AM-6 and transferred its clients to other satellites. The announcement also confirmed that the underlying cause was a... 
by David Todd | Mar 23, 2020 | Reliability Info, Satellites, Seradata News, Technology
While it was the mortality of humans was exercising the minds of most on Earth, it became apparent that something was badly wrong with the 11-year-old Venesat-1 (Simon Bolivar) Venezuelan communications satellite. It was summarily moved to a graveyard orbit in... 
by David Todd | Jan 23, 2020 | Reliability Info, Satellites, Seradata News
The Boeing-built Spaceway 1 spacecraft suffered an anomaly in December that caused “significant and irreversible” thermal damage to its batteries. The spacecraft’s owner DirecTV has informed the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) that it will be retiring the... 
by David Todd | Jan 21, 2020 | Reliability Info, Satellites, Seradata News, Space Insurance
It has been reported that customers on the Thaicom 5 communications satellite have been moved to other satellites following a telemetry issue that is preventing control of the spacecraft. The nearly 14-year-old spacecraft was coming to the end of its design... 
by David Todd | Aug 20, 2019 | Launches, Reliability Info, Satellites, Seradata News, Space Insurance
After the US$416 million loss of the Falcon Eye 1 in a Vega launch failure, it was reported that the Chinasat-18 (Zhongxing-18) satellite has suffered a similar demise – albeit after a successful launch by a Chinese Long March 3B/G2. The launch took place at...
