{"id":11428,"date":"2022-06-29T23:49:18","date_gmt":"2022-06-29T15:49:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/spacex-closes-out-first-half-of-2022-with-on-target-launch-for-ses\/"},"modified":"2022-06-29T23:49:18","modified_gmt":"2022-06-29T15:49:18","slug":"spacex-closes-out-first-half-of-2022-with-on-target-launch-for-ses","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/spacex-closes-out-first-half-of-2022-with-on-target-launch-for-ses\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceX closes out first half of 2022 with on-target launch for SES"},"content":{"rendered":"
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SpaceX\u2019s 27th mission of the year lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 5:04 p.m. EDT (2104 GMT) Wednesday. Credit: Michael Cain \/ Spaceflight Now \/ Coldlife Photography<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

SpaceX closed out the first half of 2022 on Wednesday with its 27th mission of the year, powering a commercial television broadcasting satellite into orbit for SES on a Falcon 9 rocket as the company is poised to break its annual launch record in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n

The Falcon 9 rocket delivered the SES 22 communications into an elliptical, or oval-shaped, transfer orbit on the way to an operating perch in geostationary orbit, where the spacecraft will circle Earth over the equator, matching its velocity to the planet\u2019s rotation.<\/p>\n

SES 22, built by Thales Alenia Space, is the first of five new C-band television broadcasting satellites SES plans to launch this year. All will take off from Cape Canaveral, with three assigned to two SpaceX Falcon 9 missions \u2014 including SES 22 launched Wednesday \u2014 and two satellites booked to fly on a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket in the late August or September timeframe.<\/p>\n

The satellites will help SES reconfigure its television broadcast services to a narrower segment of the C-band radio spectrum after the Federal Communications Commission approved a plan to repurpose some of the spectrum previously used for television and radio programming to terrestrial 5G cellular broadband networks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are thrilled with the successful launch of SES 22, thanks to our partners at Thales Alenia Space and SpaceX,\u201d said Steve Collar, CEO of SES. \u201cThe launch of SES 22, together with other upcoming C-band satellite launches scheduled this year, will enable us to continue providing the high-quality services that our customers have been accustomed to over the last several decades, while freeing up spectrum that will enable the US to rapidly unlock the promise of 5G.\u201d<\/p>\n

The mission began with an on-time liftoff from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station 5:04 p.m. EDT (2104 GMT) Wednesday. Nine Merlin 1D engines, burning kerosene fuel, steered the 229-foot-tall (70-meter) launcher east from Florida\u2019s Space Coast and fired for two-and-a-half minutes.<\/p>\n

The booster engines shut down and the first stage separated from the Falcon 9\u2019s upper stage, which continued into orbit with the SES 22 spacecraft.<\/p>\n

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A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifts off with the SES 22 communications satellite. Credit: SpaceX<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The booster stage \u2014 known as tail number B1073 in SpaceX\u2019s fleet of reusable rockets \u2014 extended titanium grid fins and maneuvered itself into a tail-first orientation for re-entry. Braking burns with the Merlin engines slowed the rocket for a vertical landing on extendable legs aboard a drone ship positioned more than 400 miles (about 670 kilometers) downrange in the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n

The landing completed the booster\u2019s second trip to space, following a debut flight in May carrying a batch of SpaceX Starlink internet satellites.<\/p>\n

The upper stage of the Falcon 9 rocket ignited its single Merlin engine for two burns, first to reach a preliminary parking orbit, then send the SES 22 satellite to a higher altitude and into an orbit closer to the equator.<\/p>\n

The Falcon 9 rocket deployed its payload into an on-target orbit ranging between 192 miles and 22,137 miles (310-by-35,627 kilometers), according to publicly available U.S. military tracking data. The satellite, weighting about 3.5 metric tons (7,700 pounds) at launch, was separated from the rocket about 33 minutes after liftoff in an orbit inclined 16.5 degrees to the equator.<\/p>\n

SES, based in Luxembourg and one of the largest traditional geostationary satellite operators, confirmed the new satellite was functioning as designed and communicating with ground controllers after Wednesday\u2019s launch.<\/p>\n

SES 22 will unfurl its solar panels and antennas, and perform a series of orbit-raising burns with a liquid-fueled engine to circularize its orbit at geostationary altitude over the equator. The geostationary orbit gives satellites a fixed view of the same geographic region of the planet, and allows ground-based antennas to point at the same position in the sky.<\/p>\n

\u201cSES 22 is a C-band satellite, so it\u2019s part of our program of C-band clearing in the U.S.,\u201d said Christophe De Hauwer, SES\u2019s chief strategy and development officer. \u201cIt\u2019s a C-band only satellite. It will be launched to 135 degrees west (longitude), which is the location we are replenishing, from where we will provide mostly TV and radio services over the U.S., but also some data services over the country.\u201d<\/p>\n