An AMC-14 satellite was launched Saturday on a Proton/Breeze M rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, but it failed to reach proper orbit because of a problem with a burn in the fourth stage of the rocket.
Instead, the satellite, built by Lockheed Martin [LMT], wound up short of the correct geostationary transfer orbit.
SES Americom implied in a statement that the satellite may not be a total loss, despite that.
“While we are not in a position to comment on the possible causes of this launch anomaly, the satellite is healthy and is operating nominally in a stable orbit under the control of Lockheed Martin. SES and Lockheed Martin engineers are currently exploring various options for bringing AMC-14 into its proper geostationary orbit,” said Martin Halliwell, president of SES Engineering.
In all of the various scenarios to redirect the spacecraft, onboard fuel will have to be used to propel the satellite to its correct orbital position, thereby reducing its service life, according to SES. The SES investment in AMC-14 is insured for partial and total loss.
“We are confident that the engineering teams at Lockheed Martin and SES will find a way to place AMC-14 into the correct orbit in a manner that our customer’s requirements can be met,” said Edward Horowitz, President and CEO of SES. “We cannot, at this time, speculate on the impact of the orbit raising activities on both the in-service date and the service life of AMC-14. We will provide additional information in due time.”
Lockheed Martin built the satellite for SES Americom, an SES company. The rocket is provided by International Launch Services.
AMC-14 was to be located at orbital location 61.5 degrees West Longitude.
The bird was to provide direct-to-home broadcast services across the continental United States, Mexico and Central America for EchoStar Communications Corp., which leased the entire capacity of AMC-14.
Based on the Lockheed Martin A2100AX platform, AMC-14 features 32 high-power Ku-band transponders in the BSS frequency band, each utilizing 24 MHz bandwidth. The spacecraft antenna is designed for operation over two separate orbital arcs: 61.5 degrees West Longitude to 77 degrees West Longitude, or 110 degrees West Longitude to 148 degrees West Longitude, providing SES flexibility.
AMC-14 also carries a demonstration receive active phased array payload that allows coverage to be reshaped on orbit. The spacecraft incorporates the highest levels of redundancy on core components such as amplifiers, receivers, command and control components and on-board computers, according to Lockheed Martin.
AMC-14 was expected to provide more than 15 years of service life, if a portion of its fuel weren’t being used instead for lifting the satellite into the proper orbit. This is the 17th Lockheed Martin-built A2100 series spacecraft designed, built and launched for SES companies.