Advanced Television

Bulgaria’s debut satellite delayed

June 19, 2017

By Chris Forrester

SpaceX had planned to launch June 19th BulgariaSat-1 aboard a refurbished, ‘flight-proven’ 1st stage Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida. However, a faulty valve in the rocket has had to be swapped out and the re-scheduled launch is likely to be June 23rd or 24th.

The rocket’s pre-used 1st stage was flown back on January 14th to launch 10 smallish Iridium telecoms satellites from Vandenberg Air Base in California and recovered on a floating barge on the Pacific. The landing barge is called “Just Read The Instructions”.

The launch, when it takes place, is also set for a recovery of the rocket’s 1st stage. This time the barge (named: “Of Course I Still Love You”) is in the Atlantic and where the controlled landing will be attempted.

BulgariaSat-1 was built by Space Systems/Loral which contracted with SpaceX for the launch. BulgariaSat-1 is communications satellite which will be used for DTH transmissions over the region including Serbia.

The rocket’s 9 Merlin 1D engines were tested June 15th ahead of the launch.

The next Florida launch for SpaceX is set for early July when an Intelsat ‘Epic’ satellite (35e) is scheduled.

Categories: Articles, DTH/Satellite