Space Tug heads for launch
August 15, 2022
By Chris Forrester
Washington State-based Spaceflight Industries’ subsidiary Andrews Space is readying its Shrpa so-called Space Tug, or satellite orbital recovery craft.
Its latest version (Sherpa LTC-2) is a chemically powered satellite and was delivered on August 10th to SpaceX’s facility at Cape Canaveral in Florida ahead of a launch in September. The craft had already been delivered but a fuel leak developed which required the satellite to be shipped back to its manufacturing base near Seattle.
SpaceX is reportedly going to integrate the Sherpa within one of its own Starlink broadband launches.
SpaceX will deploy the Sherpa about 310 kms above the Earth where the craft will then fire up its own thrusters and orbit at about 1000 kms.