Artist’s rendition of a satellite – 3dsculptor/123RF Stock Photo
This week we’re looking at the latest innovation from SpaceX who are offering a new dedicated satellite rideshare mission for those looking for a mid-inclination orbit. The first launch had a number of Earth Observation (EO) satellites in its payload.
SpaceX Bandwagon Rideshare
On Sunday, April 7th, SpaceX launched its first rideshare mission, putting satellites into mid-inclination orbits at about 45 degrees. A zero degrees inclination orbit means the satellite orbits the equator and 90 degrees is a polar orbit passing over North and South poles, while a 45 degree orbit offers better coverage over low and mid latitudes areas such as Africa and Asia, and is more beneficial for Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) than optical missions, as it is not a sun-synchronous orbit.
Bandwagon-1 took off from the Kennedy Space Centre on a Falcon 9 rocket with a payload of 11 satellites. SpaceX have reported that mid-inclination orbits are the second most requested orbits after sun-synchronous. At the 2023 Small Satellite Conference, an annual event held at Utah State University, SpaceX announced its intention to respond to this demand by introducing a dedicated rideshare mission – which is Bandwagon. The launch, this week, is expected to be the first of two this year, with two more planned for 2025.
Amongst the payloads on this rideshare were several EO ones, predominantly Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) launches. These were:
- 425 Project radar satellite for the South Korea’s military. These high resolution SAR satellites were developed by a consortium including Korean Aerospace Industries, Hanwha Systems Corp & Thales Alenia Space. This is second of 425 project satellites to be launched, following an optical/infra-red one in 2023, and there are expected to be another three launched to form the constellation. Their main purpose is reported to be monitoring North Korea.
- Capella Space’s Acadia-4 X-band SAR. This American company is developing an intended 30 strong SAR constellation, and despite the name, this is only the second of this generation of Capella satellites in orbit.
- QPS-SAR-7, also known as Tsukuyomi 2, for the Japanese organisation Institute for Q-shu Pioneers of Space Inc (iQPS), this is a small high-resolution X-band SAR offering a spatial resolution of below 0.5 metres, and is third in an intended constellation of 24 satellites within the next three years .
- TSAT 1A is an EO satellite developed by the Indian company Tata Advanced Systems Limited in collaboration with Argentinian company Satellogic. The satellite was built in India, and based on Satellogic’s ÑuSat. It is expected to offer high-resolution multispectral optical data with a spatial resolution of less than a metre.
In addition to these EO satellites, the remaining payload consisted of:
- 6 x HawkEye 360 radio-frequency geolocation satellites in two clusters of three microsatellites, known as Clusters 8 and 9.
- Centuri-6 built by Tyvak International for Australia’s Fleet Space Technologies. The data from this satellite will be focused on supporting mineral exploration, together with airborne radio telephone communication via a satellite (SATCOM) services.
Too Many SAR satellites?
In writing this blog, particularly surrounding the SAR satellites that were, generally, early launches from an expected much bigger constellation, it reminded me of an really interesting article released this week entitled ‘Why hasn’t the Earth observation industry taken off?’ written by Adam Keith for GIM International. The whole article is well worth a read, but it was a section on the myth of oversupply of the EO market that came to mind, where Adam wrote:
‘… EO ‘oversupply’…. is simply not true. There may be a lot of new companies, but most do not have many satellites …. Perhaps a case could be made for 1m multispectral data being available from multiple sources. But lower-cost SAR is only just getting there, hyperspectral and emissions monitoring companies are just starting.’
Conclusion
Adam’s view, supports the increasing launches of SAR satellites, and shows that the EO market has still got development and maturity growth within it. It will be interesting to see how this develops, which companies can take advantage of the developing data sources, and which ones struggle to adapt.
