New EGNOS satellite contract

Date: 1/3/2010

Source: RIN

The EC has awarded a contract to SES satellite fleet operator to host a navigation payload aboard an SES spacecraft already under construction. SES will place an L-band European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS) navigation payload on its Astra 5B direct-broadcast television satellite, under construction by Astrium and scheduled for launch in mid-2013.

This follows a 2009 contract for an identical navigation payload to be placed on SES’s Sirius 5 satellite, under construction by Space Systems/Loral and scheduled for launch in late 2011. The two payloads will be the core orbital asset of Europe’s EGNOS service. Currently, the EGNOS service is provided by an ageing mobile communications satellite operated by Inmarsat of London and by Europe’s Artemis data-relay satellite. Both of these spacecraft are scheduled to be retired in the next three years.

ITS Radar International will continue to monitor EGNOS

Key words: Galileo