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Communications Science Technology

Intelsat Loses Another Satellite 256

Posted by timothy from the space-is-a-harsh-realm dept.
Alarash writes "Intelsat reported a few days ago that its IS-804 Satellite is lost in space. According to the press release, the '[...] satellite experienced a sudden and unexpected electrical power system anomaly on January 14, 2005, at approximately 5:32 p.m. EST that caused the total loss of the spacecraft.' The satellite was in charge of the South Pacific's media delivery. As a reminder, Intelsat-7, another satellite from Intelsat, got lost a couple of months ago."
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Intelsat Loses Another Satellite More

Intelsat Loses Another Satellite

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  • Technical info (Score:5, Informative)

    by JS_RIDDLER ( 570254 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:19AM (#11393642)
    All links are from their site. Here is a image of the coverage area of the satellite:

    http://www.intelsat.com/resources/coveragemaps/sat _foot.aspx?name=804&loc=174&spot=global [intelsat.com]
    Here is some technical data on the satellite:
    http://www.intelsat.com/resources/coveragemaps/sat _foot_details.aspx?name=804&loc=174 [intelsat.com]

    Also here is some Satellite Basics :
    http://www.intelsat.com/resources/satellitebasics. aspx [intelsat.com]

  • Conspiracy! (Score:5, Funny)

    by mOoZik ( 698544 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:20AM (#11393648) Homepage
    This seems too consistent to be a random failure. Wasn't there some sort of a mystery as to what caused the last one? I propose that the satellites are slowly being hijacked and will soon be used against us, a la Independence Day! They'll collectively broadcast crappy reality shows to every corner of the world and none of us would be able to stop them! AHH! AHHHH!

    • Re:Conspiracy! (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Some say this has already happened.

    • Explanation (Score:4, Informative)

      by jaavaaguru ( 261551 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @07:00AM (#11393783) Homepage
      It's reasonably likely that Metal Whiskers [wikipedia.org] can caused this. Nasa also has more information [nasa.gov] about this pehnomenon. Both links I've provided have nice pics.

      • Not an Explanation (Score:5, Funny)

        by maggard ( 5579 ) <michael@michaelmaggard.com> on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @10:31AM (#11395502) Homepage Journal
        It's reasonably likely that Metal Whiskers can.
        No, it's not likely, reasonably or otherwise.

        "Metal whiskers", vacuum deposition, etc. are well recognized issues in satellite construction. After a few thousand birds at many millions a pop the industry is quite savvy about avoiding these.

        The impending EU ban on lead in consumer products has no effect on the satellite industry (they're exempt; Li'l Jr. is unlikely to be teething on Intelsat 9008b and most of it's components aren't off-the-shelf but specialized radiation-hardened product runs).

        But thank you for reading the previous /. story [slashdot.org] on this and now trendily applying it to everything trying to sound knowledgable.

        "My code won't compile" " Metal whiskers! "

        "My candidate lost!" " Metal whiskers! "

        "Erectile dysfuntion" (all together now) " Metal whiskers! "

      • That's a very interesting phenemenon. Thanks for the links!

        It's neat to know we haven't quite figured everything out yet, even about simple things like this =)

    • Re:Conspiracy! (Score:3, Informative)

      by Max von H. ( 19283 )
      First of all, the two sats were not manufactured by the same companies and are different in design, so it's not like a recurrent problem in a series of satellites.

      Secondly, the first sat was recovered on dec. 3 as stated here: http://www.intelsat.com/aboutus/press/release_deta ils.aspx?year=2004&art=20041203_01_EN.xml&lang=en& footer=82

    • possumsat (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Doc Ruby ( 173196 )
      Others have suggested that some of these "lost" satellites are merely being delivered to the CIA, NSA, DIA or other covert agency (perhaps not American). Especially if they're backups, silent until needed in a crisis, they'd be probably impossible to easily detect as working. And it's much more expensive for antisatellite weapons to target every "dead" satellite in orbit on the chance that a few are just playing dead for a new master.

      • Re:possumsat (Score:3, Interesting)

        by AviLazar ( 741826 )
        Lets rule out American organizations. Why?:
        With the funding they get and the clout they possess, they can have any number of satellites without our knowledge floating around in space. Hell they are probably watching your pr0n collection over your shoulder RIGHT now!

        As for foreign countries - if they are capable of hijacking a satellite, you would think they would be capable of sending one up on their own. Not like "evil" countries don't already have their own satellites.
        • Americans don't even ask about covert government activities anymore. No, this technique is a way to attempt to keep spy satellites secret from foreign countries and "enemy" corporations. Their functions can be generic, even exactly suitable for their cover story - the secret is that they'll spring to life with video/data coverage in the hands of a different viewer, should they be actually deployed later.

          • Re:possumsat (Score:3, Insightful)

            by AviLazar ( 741826 )
            And while in the hands of evil people this can be bad I am of the mindset that most of our government do actually have our overall interests at heart. So while it might be "scary" to think that a TV sat is a spy sat, it is good to know we have such things around too. They might save us at some given time - or potentially catch a criminal.

            Now, another reason I am not particularly worried about spy satellites is because I don't exactly do illegal activities. That and I do not have a window on my roof, I

    • Terrorists (Score:3, Funny)

      by shotfeel ( 235240 )
      No conspiracy, it was terrorists.

      The Department of Homeland Security is currently seeking information on two men with "strange accents" who recently purchased a laser pointer from a local Office Depot.

      The two men were overheard discussing which laser pointers were the most powerful and could "shoot the farthest." The two also paid cash for the laser pointer, leaving no paper trail.

      This follows disturbing recent events in which terrorists on the ground tried to down commercial aircraft by blinding the pil


  • Welcome our new satellite-eating overlords.

  • Conspiracy Theory (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Suchetha ( 609968 ) <suchetha@@@gmail...com> on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:21AM (#11393653) Homepage Journal
    maybe someone doesn't want communications to happen. i think a powerful enough radio beam could fry the satellite. ideas?

    could this be a test bed for the newest extortion?? "give us the money or your satellite gets it"

    Suchetha

    • Re:Conspiracy Theory (Score:4, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:29AM (#11393684)
      I can only think of ONE group that has both the motive and means to cut off our communications and that is

      • Re:Conspiracy Theory (Score:5, Funny)

        by maxwell demon ( 590494 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @07:00AM (#11393784) Journal
        I can only think of ONE group that has both the motive and means to cut off our communications and that is

        Since you don't tell what goup it is, I'll have to guess. The fact that you post as AC and finally decided not to post it anyway strongly suggests you actually meant

        THE SLASHDOT CROWD

        Yes, that makes sense. After all, the slashdot crowd is well known of killing web servers (the so-called slashdot effect). They use a site tarned as "news for nerds, stuff that matters" to efficiently communicate the targeted servers for the DDoS attacks. It's only a logical next step from killing websites to killing satellites. Therefore everyone on slashdot is suspect. Oh, wait ...

    • Re:Conspiracy Theory (Score:3, Informative)

      by hcdejong ( 561314 )
      You'd need an insanely powerful radio transmitter to fry a satellite. Read up on EMP.
      Using a missile (like the old American ASAT program) would be more feasible.

      • I know that the US military have done semi-successful trials of this sort of anti-satellite technology so it must be feasible.

        Playing with some numbers gives me this however:
        Height of Satellite: 35,000km.
        Powerful Laser peak pulse: 250,000w.

        Power of laser on reaching satellite =
        2.5x10^5 / (3.5x10^7)^2
        2.0x10^-9 watts.

        Fractions of milliwatts does not sound much to me, but pulsing hundreds of times per second, and kept up for a few minutes would start to heat things up yes? How fast can a satel

        • Re:Correct my physics! (Score:3, Interesting)

          by Detritus ( 11846 )
          The Sun puts out 1368 W/m^2 at Earth's orbit, so I don't think your hypothetical laser would even be noticed.
        • Sorry, but if you divide a power by the square of a length, then you don't get a power, but power per area (also known as energy flux).

          Your calculation would be right if
          a) the laser had an opening angle of 45 degrees (so radius of covered area equals distance of light),
          b) the satellite had a cross section of exactly 1 square meter and
          c) there would be vacuum between you and the satellite.

          Now b is not impossible, but a would imply a rather badly focused beam. OTOH c would imply reduced power.

          According to

          • That is, a 2.5 megawatt laser would generate the same energy flux at the satellite as a 80W lightbulb would.

            Errr ... I should actually have used the review button.
            This sentence is obviously missing something. It should read:
            That is, a 2.5 megawatt laser from the surface of earth would generate the same energy flux at the satellite as a 80W lightbulb would from a distance of 1 meter.

            Also in the previous sentence, s/80W light bulb/80W light bulb at the distance of 1 meter/.

            Ah, and I just noticed that I for


            • That is, a 2.5 megawatt laser from the surface of earth would generate the same energy flux at the satellite as a 80W lightbulb would from a distance of 1 meter..

              The nice thing about admitting your ignorance publicly, is that you have to do it less often as you go on. Thanks to those who've explained how to work it out.

              It's looking pretty darn unlikely then that anyone even could have targeted a satelite with such a weapon. I was never suggesting that this had occured, but I remembered the US militar
        • I have no idea what you're calculating. Let's do the unit analysis (it's easy): 2.5*10^5W / (3.5*10^7m)^2 = 2.0*10^-9W/m2 (not W, as you proposed).

          Assuming that a laser beam is sufficiently well focused to cover no more than the area of the satellite, and that the atmosphere makes no difference, the full 250kW will be delivered to the satellite. Both assumptions are questionable of course.


        • Correct my physics!

          Ok, I'll give it a go. Lasers are not point sources - the formula you used is for an isotropic radiator, not a beam source. You'd need to know the divergence of the laser to calculate the power/m2 at the satellite. Also, your peak pulse power is off by about a factor of 10-20 (or more...)

          Say the beam half-angle divergence of your 250 kW laser is 1 milliradian (mrad) (pretty crappy). At 35,000 km, the beam will be at least 35*tan(0.001)*2 = 70 km wide. That's only 65 uW/m2. Not even brig

      • You'd need an insanely powerful radio transmitter to fry a satellite. Read up on EMP.

        A laser will do just fine. On October 17, 1997, we fired a laser from White Sands at an unused Air Force satellite. We originally intended to blow it to bits with a laser blast but other countries asked us not to out of fear of us littering the satellite belt with more garbage. We did this 7 1/2 years ago. Around Nov 28, 1998 a flurry of articles appeared indicating that China was readying an anti-satellite laser, so theo

    • The easiest method to ruin a satellite, in concept at least, is to simply burn it out with a targeted beam of microwaves. In this case, it's a communications satellite so you wont have any trouble knowing where it is. You point and turn the power on. Satellite says: "ARRGH! I'm blind!"

      Alright, it's not an A-level physics project, but its far simpler than earth-to-orbit missiles and needing so little time to operate, you could be done long before anyone figured out what you were up to. You wouldn't even
    • Or perhaps the test for a Anti-Satellite weapon before it is used against military satellites.

  • Who are Intelsat? (Score:5, Informative)

    by barcodez ( 580516 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:24AM (#11393664)
    Well I didn't know so for others here is a summary of Intelsat [wikipedia.org]

    • I'm honestly curious: why would you link to wikipedia instead of to Intelsat [intelsat.com] itself?

      This came up in a discussion last week: someone had linked to a wikipedia entry for Tripwire (the company) instead of linking to Tripwire.com. Wouldn't it make more sense to get information directly from the source (and form one's own opinion) instead of reading the material at Wikipedia (which is essentially someone else's opinion)?

      • Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @08:43AM (#11394266)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • Re:Why link to wikipedia?? (Score:4, Insightful)

        by iantri ( 687643 ) <iantri@gmxSTRAW.net minus berry> on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @09:43AM (#11394809) Homepage
        Wikipedia is not "someone's opinion"; it is supposed to be neutral, and factual.

        A company's own website can't make that claim.

        • So how do you know that it's not the people from the company itself who created the wikipedia page?

        • Wikipedia is not "someone's opinion"; it is supposed to be neutral, and factual.

          Yes, it is supposed to be neutral and factual, but the people doing the editing are not necessarily specialists; they don't even need to be particularly knowledgeable. "Anyone can edit", right? That's what it says here [wikipedia.org]. Without a decent vetting process, it is a bunch of people contributing to articles regardless of their qualification to do so.

          I'm not saying Wikipedia is a bad idea. It's an interesting collaborative
        • Wikipedia is not "someone's opinion"; it is supposed to be neutral, and factual.

          Yes, Wikipedia is supposed to be neutral and factual, but very often it isn't, and from what I've read more often than not it is someone's opinion. I've read a dozen or so Wikipedia articles on the industry I'm in that were obviously written by outsiders with strong opinions, rather than people who actualy have the facts. Fact-checking and vetting are two very good things that Wikipedia lacks. I don't blame Wikipedia

    • Re:Who are Intelsat? (Score:4, Funny)

      by maxwell demon ( 590494 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @08:33AM (#11394209) Journal
      From Wikipedia: Intelsat maintains it headquarters in Bermuda
      Bermuda? And then anyone wonders that their satellites disappear?

  • Sunspot (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:26AM (#11393668)
    Could this possibly be related to the huge coronal mass ejection i read about Jan 15 sorry no story link but it found a picture
    http://www.spaceweather.com/images2005/16jan05/mid i140.gif [spaceweather.com]

  • Maybe the other one called ? (Score:3, Funny)

    by Maavin ( 598439 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:26AM (#11393670)
    Could it be that Intelsat-7 found something interesting while being AWOL and called his friend to come and see it, too ?

  • sigh (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Damn it, I told you not to post a link to one of the satellites on /. again! Do you hear me?!

  • Gratuitously Off-Topic... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Ford Prefect ( 8777 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:27AM (#11393673) Homepage
    ... but still space-related:

    New Titan panorama from Huygens! [esa.int] Complete with a worryingly Earth-like 'coastline' - I don't think anyone's decided if the dark areas actually contain any liquid or not, but still utterly intriguing. ;-)

    Oh, and now back to our scheduled broadcast. Satellite losses, not good. Big investment and all that, and long lead-time to launching replacements. Whatever!

  • I for one . . . Nah, no I don't (Score:3, Funny)

    by CharonIDRONES ( 656891 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:28AM (#11393678)
    *puts on tin foil hat*
    I'm safe, right?
    RIGHT?!
    Run for the hills! AAHH!
    *becomes another insane /.er living in the hills with a tin foil hat on*

  • Cause? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ceeam ( 39911 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:29AM (#11393681)
    Is it because of increased Solar activity? Can the real cause be ever discovered? If it's because of the Sun, can we have protective magnetic fields (akin to Earth's own) generated around our space vehicles in emergency? Like - if we ever go to Mars won't it be better to have active shielding instead of thick lead plating? (I know nothing)

    • Re:Cause? (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Detritus ( 11846 )
      Some spacecraft have experienced problems with static electrical charges building up on the spacecraft. These can cause damage or catastrophic failure. See this [asu.edu].

  • Perhaps they should have used AMDsat (Score:5, Funny)

    by Tony Hoyle ( 11698 ) <tmh@nodomain.org> on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:32AM (#11393692) Homepage
    Or even Cyrixsat... altough that would have probably overheated long before now :)

  • Possible Reasons for satellite loss (Score:3, Funny)

    by Rob Carr ( 780861 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:34AM (#11393698) Homepage Journal
    1. Bad luck
    2. Systemic design flaw
    3. Target practice for satellite-destroying technology
    4. Giant space-bat's radar fried satellites

    I'd bet on 1 or 2, 3 is an outside possibility, and 4 the result of eating cold pizza for breakfast. It's worth noting that (as near as I can tell from SpaceWeather.com [spaceweather.com], there were no solar flares when the second satellite was lost. So if the satellite was lost to a design flaw, at least it's not due to poor protection from solar flares.

    • I heard the work experiance kid lost it.
    • Could it have been the tin-whiskers [slashdot.org] phenomena? I could imagine a tin-whisker growing out, shorting across two critical circuits and there you have it, one dark satellite.

      I got asked by a customer recently how come satellites can stay up there for 20+ years without failure and their PC can blow a power supply after 3 months of use. I said "Your power supply didn't cost 3 million dollars."

      "Oh."

    • Re:Possible Reasons for satellite loss (Score:4, Informative)

      by NardofDoom ( 821951 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @08:39AM (#11394241)
      Let me be the first of many to point out that terrestrial bats don't have radar, just so nobody is confused. They have sonar, like dolphins, only in the air and while flying. It would be like you running through the forest at night screaming at the top of your lungs and listening for the echo to keep from running into trees.

      Space bats, however, would have to have radar or lidar because sound cannot travel in space.

  • Poll options (Score:5, Funny)

    by eclectro ( 227083 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:36AM (#11393701)

    1) Solar Flux
    2) Those darn Russians
    3) Sensor installed upside down
    4) Kids with laser pointers
    5) Meteorite
    6) Tax purposes
    7) Unfriendly UFO
    8) Overheating
    9) Autodestruct after two-weeks of reruns
  • I think it may be related with a geomagnetic storming from a sun.
    read more [arrl.org] in news: [spaceref.com]
    The large and dynamic active sunspot region, numbered by NOAA as Region 720, has produced several strong solar events. Five large solar flares produced moderate (R2) to strong (R3) radio blackouts since 15 January. The largest of these solar eruptions, an X3.8 on the GOES-12 x-ray sensor, occurred today at 17/0659 UTC (near local midnight MST). Short-wave radio communications through the sunlit hemisphere of Earth experie

  • Another satellite down? (Score:4, Funny)

    by node 3 ( 115640 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:45AM (#11393727)
    Do I have to do everything around here?

    Just a moment while I get my old PowerBook so I can upload the virus to the alien ship.

    Bastards keep trying to take them over so they can communicate around the Earth (they traveled like 6 million light-years to get here and they didn't know the Earth was round?).

    Does this affect my broadband connection? Noooo. I don't even know why I bother...

  • How about JCSAT-1B? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:47AM (#11393731)
    Hmmm, curious. I'm assuming that this is NOT the same as the Japanese JCSAT-1B, operated by JSAT (a Japanese company). It has gone "out" as of today. Latest news is that a thruster broke down and it changed directions a bit. All communication channels are currently out cold. FYI, JCSAT-1B was built by Boeing. 3 satellites going out in just a couple months? Makes you think, no?
    • Speaking of that scene ... why don't we ever hear about the satellite that is filming the capture? Or are the images provided by a high-powered telescope on the moon?

  • Found another possible reason the satellites died (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Rob Carr ( 780861 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @06:57AM (#11393773) Homepage Journal
    Intelsat only insures satellites worth $150 million [msn.com] or more. These sats were worth $73 million each, so they weren't insured.

    For those of us who moved out of our parent's basement, it's a far too-well known phenomenon.

    • Well, there could be another reason... Quoth the same article:

      "Under the terms of the Transaction Agreement and Plan of Amalgamation for the sale of Intelsat dated August 16, 2004, among Intelsat, Ltd., Intelsat (Bermuda), Ltd., Zeus Holdings Limited (Zeus Holdings), Zeus Merger One Limited and Zeus Merger Two Limited, the total loss of the IS-804 satellite gives Zeus Holdings the right to not consummate the acquisition of Intelsat. Zeus Holdings has advised Intelsat that it is evaluating the impact of th

  • Ooops! (Score:2, Funny)

    by tompercival ( 318073 )
    "To lose one satellite may be regarded as a misfortune... to lose both seems like carelessness".
    • The actual problem can be traced back to
      IntelSat's adoption of a MS Java-based
      ground control system (from Lockheed M&DS).
      The WinXP platforms have been upgraded to
      SP2 without their IT security officer's
      approval. During the brief time that the
      computers were exposed to MS Update on the
      internet, they were compromised.

      A consortium of the Russian mob and the
      North Koreans (AKA SPECTRE) are now trying
      to blackmail IntelSat/Lockheed, one comm
      satellite at a time. Right now they are
      only shutting them down, but t

  • Evil Accountants? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by FEEBLE*BMX ( 695853 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @07:02AM (#11393793)
    So let me get this straight. Their satellite fries and they just transfer everyone over to unused bandwidth on their other satellites. Then they declare a $73 million dollar loss on their taxes. Does this fall into fiscal 2004 or 2005?

  • Where to look (Score:5, Funny)

    by dave-tx ( 684169 ) <.moc.liamg. .ta. .todhsals+80891fd.> on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @07:06AM (#11393808)
    Just keep an eye out on ebay - like all "missing" merchandise, it'll show up eventually. Shipping charges will be a bitch, though.

  • They were both described as electrical anomalies, but...

    anomaly - Deviation or departure from the normal or common order, form, or rule.

    Clearly this is becoming, for them, the rule.
  • ...You Only Live Twice. remember, that huge space cucumber eating US and CCCP space ships? That's what it was!
  • I am attaching an article from the Wall Street Journal describing how although this is the first major failure of an Intelsat satellite, the other two major satellite manufacturers in the US have "seen their reputations tarnished by a spate of commercial-spacecraft malfunctions." Given that these are multimillion dollar products and are incredibly critical to the world these days, it is surprising to me that there would be such significant quality control problems.
    Also, I'm surprised that I don't see more

  • The ultimate poison pill (Score:3, Insightful)

    by linuxtelephony ( 141049 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @09:58AM (#11395030) Homepage
    From the article: "...the total loss of the IS-804 satellite gives Zeus Holdings the right to not consummate the acquisition of Intelsat. Zeus Holdings has advised Intelsat that it is evaluating the impact of the IS-804 failure."

    Could it be this is their way of getting out of the acquisition of Intelsat by Zeus Holdings? Two satellite failures in about 3 months time is a pretty high failure rate.

    Or, I wonder if it could be the tin whiskers reported earlier causing unexpected power failures.
  • Neither this satellite nor the previous one mentioned got lost.

    They were considered a loss because they malfunctioned and are no longer usable. They weren't "lost in space". Intelsat still knows exactly where they are.

  • Outsourcing bid (Score:4, Funny)

    by still cynical ( 17020 ) on Tuesday January 18, 2005 @10:30AM (#11395486) Homepage
    They're just trying to prove that the private sector can do what NASA does for less money. This was just proof-of-concept. For the full demo they'll slam another one into a planet.
  • Intesat reported a few days ago that its IS-804 Satellite is lost in space.

    Dr. Smith strikes again... [lostinspacetv.com]
  • The "total loss" of a US$73 million ($106.19 million) satellite on Saturday morning left several Pacific Islands and Scott Base in Antarctica without telephone communications to the outside world.

    Story here. [nzherald.co.nz]

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