Eutelsat’s W2 satellite has been place in secure standby mode following a technical anomaly that occurred on the evening of January 27.
The company has offloaded all services on W2 to three other satellites that have been aligned at its 16E orbital slot….
Eutelsat’s W2 satellite has been place in secure standby mode following a technical anomaly that occurred on the evening of January 27.
The company has offloaded all services on W2 to three other satellites that have been aligned at its 16E orbital slot. Eutelsat is currently working with manufacturer Thales Alenia Space to assess the extent of the technical anomaly.
The Eurobird 16 satellite was already located there, and the Sesat 1 spacecraft was moved there from its original 36E orbital slot at short notice, reaching 16E on January 28.
The third satellite to be utilised is the W2M spacecraft, which was initially considered a failed mission when one of its main payloads malfunctioned just after it was launched in December 2008.
Eutelsat corporate communications director Vanessa O’Connor told SatelliteFinance that W2M was actually moved to 16E earlier this month, well in advance of the W2 anomaly.
“We did extensive analysis of what performance we could consider for W2M, as it is in orbit and operational,” she said. “There were enough positive conclusions for it to be used commercially but with less capacity than originally planned.”
Eutelsat secured an insurance claim after W2M’s payload failure in 2008, and its re-entry into service has been negotiated with the insurers. O’Connor said that the satellite will operate on a revenue sharing basis that the insurers have capped.
W2 itself is fully amortised and will not be the subject of any insurance claim if the anomaly is not rectified. The satellite launched in 1998.
W2’s age was a factor in moving W2M to 16E, as the idea was that it would provide in-orbit redundancy until the launch of W2’s replacement satellite, the high-capacity W3B, in late 2010.
