SSI News
Long March 4B launches Shi Jian 6-05 pair of satellites – thought to be for electronic intelligence
China successfully launched a Long March 4B vehicle at 0011 GMT on 10 December 2021 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in China. The launch vehicle was carrying the Shi Jian 6-05A and 6-05B satellites. While the satellites were announced as officially being used...
GHGSat contracts with SpaceX to launch its next three sats on rideshare mission
Canadian company GHGSat, a newspace company pioneering satellite-based greenhouse gas emission monitoring, has contracted with SpaceX for the launch of its next three satellites. The satellites are being built by the University of Toronto's Space Flight Laboratory and...
Andesat orders small GEO sat from Astranis for Peru
Astranis has won another contract for its upcoming MicroGEO small geostationary satellite platform. The order from Peruvian company Andesat – part of Grupo Andesat based in Chile – is its first for a GEO sat. Announced on 7 December, the order is reportedly worth...
Rocket Lab launches another two BlackSky satellites for its final 2021 mission
Rocket Lab has completed the second of three contracted missions for Earth imaging company BlackSky on 9 December. The launch saw the Electron rocket carrying a pair of BlackSky satellites lift-off from its launch site on the North Island, New Zealand, at 0002 GMT....
NASA IXPE telescope mission is finally launched by a Falcon 9
A Falcon 9v1.2 Block 5 rocket successfully launched the IXPE - Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer mission for NASA on 8 December 2021. The launch took place at 0600 GMT from the former Space Shuttle Pad 39A in Cape Canaveral. The reusable first stage B1061 (on its...
Private Chinese firm completes second launch of its Ceres-1 small rocket
Launching from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, China, the second flight of the Ceres-1 (Gushenxing-1) rocket has placed five payloads into LEO. Lifting off at at 0412 GMT, 7 December the rocket carried the satellites to a near 500 km, sun-synchronous orbit....
Rocket Lab to launch three SAR satellites for Synspective of Japan
Japanese company Synspective Inc has selected Rocket Lab to launch three of its Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellites. The announcement, on 8 December, states that its second satellite StriX-β will be the first included in this deal. Using the Rocket Lab Electron...
Soyuz 2-1a rocket launches Soyuz MS-20 on space tourist mission to ISS
A “vanilla” (no Fregat upper stage) Soyuz 2-1a rocket was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, near Tyuratam in Kazakhstan at 0738 GMT on 8 December 2021. The rocket carried the Soyuz MS-20 crewed spacecraft on its way to docking with the International Space Station...
Airbus selected to build ARIEL astronomical mission for ESA
European Space Agency (ESA) has selected Airbus DS to design and manufacture its fourth "Medium-class" Cosmic Vision mission. The Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey (ARIEL) mission is an exoplanet survey telescope, set to launch in 2029. ARIEL...
Atlas V 551 launches STP-3 mission with STPSAT-6 aboard
A ULA operated Atlas V 551 rocket successfully launched the US Space Force STP 3 mission which involved the STPSAT-6 technology test satellite. The launch used five GEM-63 solid rocket boosters as well as a single standard RL10C-1 engine on the Centaur upper stage....
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