{"id":13913,"date":"2018-03-30T01:36:32","date_gmt":"2018-03-29T17:36:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/iridium-boss-senses-shift-in-spacex-rhythm-with-another-launch-set-for-friday-2\/"},"modified":"2018-03-30T01:36:32","modified_gmt":"2018-03-29T17:36:32","slug":"iridium-boss-senses-shift-in-spacex-rhythm-with-another-launch-set-for-friday-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/iridium-boss-senses-shift-in-spacex-rhythm-with-another-launch-set-for-friday-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Iridium boss senses shift in SpaceX rhythm with another launch set for Friday"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
The Falcon 9 rocket set to launch Iridium\u2019s fifth batch of new-generation voice and data relay satellites stands on its launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

On the eve of the Iridium\u2019s fifth launch with SpaceX, the mobile telecom satellite operator\u2019s chief executive says he no longer has to wait for SpaceX\u2019s rockets to be ready. Instead, Iridium\u2019s satellite team is racing to keep pace churning spacecraft off their assembly line.<\/p>\n

That is a different tune than Iridium was singing as recently as last year, when launch pad bottlenecks and SpaceX\u2019s rocket production schedule were the main drivers in setting launch dates for the company\u2019s upgraded satellite fleet.<\/p>\n

Matt Desch, Iridium\u2019s CEO, has returned to California\u2019s Central Coast for the fifth launch of the company\u2019s new-generation \u201cIridium Next\u201d message relay satellites.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all familiar to me,\u201d Desch said in a phone interview Wednesday. \u201cWe know where we want to stay. We know what it\u2019s like to visit the pad and to watch the launch. I know that I\u2019ll feel pretty much the same way I always do at T-minus 20 minutes in the countdown. That is an extraordinary experience to know that so much is riding on such a short period of time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ten more Iridium Next satellites are closed up inside the nose of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket awaiting liftoff at 7:13:51 a.m. PDT (10:13:51 a.m. EDT; 1413:51 GMT) Friday from Space Launch Complex 4-East at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.<\/p>\n

Each of the 1,896-pound (860-kilogram) satellites carries an L-band antenna for voice and and data connections to the telephones and data terminals on the ground. The spacecraft are fitted with Ka-band cross-link radios to bounce voice and data messages from satellite to satellite in orbit, ensuring the network can reach Iridium\u2019s more than 900,000 subscribers anywhere on the globe.<\/p>\n

The Iridium Next satellites, built in partnership by Thales Alenia Space and Orbital ATK in an assembly line fashion in Gilbert, Arizona, will maintain and upgrade Iridium\u2019s aging network offering uninterrupted global messaging and telephone service, and introduce new higher-bandwidth applications, such as video. They also host instrumentation to track airplanes and ships.<\/p>\n

Four successful SpaceX missions have lofted 40 satellites since January 2017, most recently in December. Like the launch that closed out last year, Friday\u2019s mission will be powered by a previously-flown Falcon 9 first stage booster, the same vehicle that shot 10 Iridium Next satellites into space in October.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m trying to make this as routine as possible, but it\u2019s very hard to during the launch,\u201d Desch said. \u201cI\u2019m excited, as always. I think it\u2019s going to be the same incredible feeling when we get through it, and then it\u2019ll be, let\u2019s get the next one done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iridium and SpaceX hoped to launch a new batch of satellites on Falcon 9 rockets every two months, starting with the second Iridium Next deployment flight in June 2017. Friday\u2019s mission will be the fourth launch by Iridium and SpaceX in nine months, not far off their schedule.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m satisfied. It\u2019s meeting our needs,\u201d Desch said of the launch cadence. \u201cWe really are focused on completing our Iridium Next constellation this year. I\u2019d like it completed in the third quarter if possible. What I\u2019m really pleased with is that SpaceX has stepped up this year so far. I saw a quote from (SpaceX president and chief operating officer) Gwynne (Shotwell) last week saying it\u2019s nice that she\u2019s waiting on her customers versus the other way around. I think that, at least as it relates to us, is true. We\u2019ve just got to get the satellites ready.<\/p>\n

\"\"
Artist\u2019s illustration of the Iridium constellation. Credit: Thales Alenia Space<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cUnlike last year, when we might have been waiting for SpaceX, I think this year I\u2019m trying to make sure my suppliers are delivering fast enough to go as quickly as possible,\u201d Desch said.<\/p>\n

Late last year, technicians at the Iridium Next satellite factory near Phoenix were outpacing SpaceX\u2019s rocket and launch pad availability, completing spacecraft and storing them until they were ready for transport to the California launch base.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve had a bit of a slowdown over the last couple of months over some parts availability,\u201d Desch said. \u201cThat seems to be picking back up. I\u2019m in a bit in a race condition to make sure that we get finished with the final two launches as early as possible. It\u2019s still happening this year, and I don\u2019t think there\u2019s any risk of it not finishing by, say, late summer. That\u2019s been the focus. It\u2019s nice that I\u2019m not really begging SpaceX to move faster.\u201d<\/p>\n

An example case: The upcoming flight was supposed to take off Thursday, but trouble with a piece of ground equipment used to test the Iridium satellites before launch forced a 24-hour delay to Friday.<\/p>\n

Desch decided in October to begin flying Iridium satellites on Falcon 9 rockets with reused first stages.<\/p>\n

At the time, he said made the change after receiving assurances the previously-flown boosters were no more risky \u2014 and perhaps less so \u2014 than a newly-built rocket. The switch to reused rockets also kept Iridium\u2019s launch campaigns on schedule \u2014 it was clear that waiting for new boosters from SpaceX\u2019s factory would delay the upgraded network\u2019s deployment, Desch said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019d be in a different place if we were using new rockets,\u201d Desch said.<\/p>\n

The next Iridium satellite launch after Friday, set for early May, will also fly on a reused booster. Only five Iridium Next payloads will ride to orbit on that mission, a shared flight with two U.S.-German gravity research probes.<\/p>\n

Rocket assignments for the seventh and eighth Iridium Next launches \u2014 the final two of the current program \u2014 have not been confirmed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s still primarily schedule,\u201d Desch said. \u201cThere\u2019s a little bit of savings in each rocket. When you\u2019re looking at a $3 billion program, you wouldn\u2019t be doing this to get a few million dollars, here or there, in savings. I\u2019m not saying those aren\u2019t appreciated and noted, but the reason I don\u2019t spend a lot of time talking about them is that wasn\u2019t the top driver for us.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"
Matt Desch, Iridium\u2019s CEO. Credit: Space Foundation<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

More than half of the 66 Iridium Next satellites required to fully replace the company\u2019s Block 1 spacecraft are now in service.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you look at the service, every customer is getting a new satellite about 60 percent of the time,\u201d Desch said.<\/p>\n

Iridium ordered 81 satellites from the Thales Alenia Space\/Orbital ATK team, including 15 spares. SpaceX is under contract to launch 75 of the satellites, and launch plans for the remaining six have not been finalized.<\/p>\n

Like the previous four Iridium Next launches, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will soar to the south from Vandenberg Air Force Base after liftoff Friday, aiming for a 388-mile-high (625-kilometer) polar orbit.<\/p>\n

The Falcon 9\u2019s second stage will ignite two times to place the satellites in the correct orbit, then release the spacecraft one-by-one about one hour after launch.<\/p>\n

The liftoff from Vandenberg, a military base on the Pacific coast northwest of Los Angeles, is timed to place the 10 Iridium Next satellites into Plane 1 of the constellation. The network\u2019s 66 active satellites are spread out in six orbital planes, providing uniform coverage worldwide.<\/p>\n

SpaceX does not plan to land the Falcon 9\u2019s first stage on Friday\u2019s mission, a strategy the company has followed in recent months to clear older-generation boosters from its recovered inventory. The upgraded \u201cBlock 5\u201d version of the Falcon 9, designed for multiple reuses, is scheduled to debut late next month.<\/p>\n

A ship SpaceX has modified to try to catch the Falcon 9 rocket\u2019s payload fairing \u2014 the shroud that protects the Iridium satellites during launch \u2014 has been tracked heading a downrange zone in the Pacific Ocean, suggesting engineers hope to retrieve part of the shroud. An experiment in February to try and catch the fairing, which separates from the rocket in two halves, after launch resulted in a near-miss.<\/p>\n

Friday\u2019s launch will mark the sixth Falcon 9 flight of the year, and SpaceX\u2019s seventh mission overall in 2018, including the demo flight of the Falcon Heavy rocket in February.<\/p>\n

SpaceX officials at the beginning of the year said their manifest had up to 30 missions booked for 2018. Eighteen Falcon 9 rockets launched last year, a record for the company in one calendar year.<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Falcon 9 rocket set to launch Iridium\u2019s fifth batch of new-generation voice and data relay satellites stands on its launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. On the eve of the Iridium\u2019s fifth launch with SpaceX, the mobile telecom satellite operator\u2019s chief executive says he no longer has to wait for SpaceX\u2019s rockets […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[291,479,530,2193,3003,25,2899,311],"class_list":["post-13913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-commercial-space","tag-falcon-9","tag-iridium","tag-iridium-next","tag-iridium-next-mission-5","tag-launch","tag-orbital-atk","tag-reusability"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13913"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13913\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}