September 2019
Extending the life of geostationary orbit satellites
... servicing, the rise of spacecraft such as MRV and MARV will compel satellite manufacturers to include robotic servicing ports on the next generation of communications satellites. Like USB ports on computers, these universal ports will allow for both...
April 2020
Satellite mega-constellations pose threat to ground-based astronomy
...situation may worsen drastically if several companies execute their plans to fill LEO with overwhelming quantities of communications satellites. If these plans are fulfilled, the current number of artificial objects purposely placed in orbit may more...
October 2020
Essential role of satellites in disaster and pandemic management
... responses. Healthcare centres used real-time imagery of patients, transmitted through a satellite moderator, and processed to the communication satellite platform before it went back to the control centre for assessment. Furthermore, ‘telemedicine...
January 2021
Safeguarding space - lessons from decommissioning in the energy industry
... the big question remains - how can the removal of satellites from orbit be encouraged among the global space community? A well-documented collision between the Iridium communications satellite and a defunct Russian military spacecraft in 2009 caused...
November 2021
Space insurance and the future of risk management
... that the first space-related insurance policy was written as long ago as 1965 - for the Intelsat I communications satellite (colloquially known as ‘Early Bird’) launched in April of that year. Although it covered only third-party liability and...
December 2021
The rise of the UK space economy
... in which they reside, but there are also significant potential societal benefits to providing low-cost communications, satellite broadband and other services to less-well developed regions that ground-based infrastructure cannot support. However...
