Arabsat loses BADR-6
February 9, 2023
By Chris Forrester
Arabsat has confirmed that it has lost services from BADR-6. Saudi Arabia-based Arabsat says that the satellite suffered a complete outage late on January 6th.
Arabsat’s technicians moved television and broadcasting services from the craft at one of the company’s ‘hot spots’ (26 degrees East) to nearby satellites. Despite various reactivation measures, BADR-6 could no longer be revived on Monday night, say reports.
“Arabsat experts and its engineering team immediately engaged with customers and smoothly implemented a restoration plan to bring DTH services back successfully,” the company said in a statement. “With state-of-the-art technology and backup solutions, Arabsat always assures service reliability to the end users with high standards. we express regret for the disruption of our customers and viewers’ experience.”
Arianespace launched BADR-6 in 2008. The satellite was built by (the then) EADS Astrium and Alcatel Space with 24-C-band and 16 Ku-band transponders. Amongst other channels it carried CNN’s International service.
Arabsat has BADR-7 (also known as Arabsat 6B) on colocation at 26 degrees East. BADR-7 was launched in 2015. BADR-7 was built by Thales Alcatel Space. Also on hand is an older craft, BADR-5, which also saw channels transferred.