Mentor 6 on April 16, 2024. Click image to enlarge A number of SIGINT satellites in geosynchronous orbit have been moving lately. A small roundup: There is the brand new SIGINT satellite Mentor 10 (USA 353, 2024-067A) that is slowly drifting westwards to its operational position by ~1.35 degrees per day, since its launch and initial insertion at longitude 100 E on April 9. This was discussed in this previous blogpost.  But an earlier Mentor (also known as ADVANCED ORION), Mentor 6 (2012-034A), has also been moving recently, from longitude 55.6 E to 51.1 E. This move happened som ..read more

click image to enlarge. Image (c) by @mickeywzx, used with permission It appears that Mentor 10 (USA 353), the payload of NROL-70, which launched on 9 April 2024 at 16:53 UTC, has been found on orbit by Twitter user @mickeyWZX, who is located at Baihuashan Observatory (MPC code P13) in the suburbs of Beijing.  It is a bright object, reportedly about mag. +7.6, which conforms to the expectation of an ADVANCED ORION, a SIGINT satellite class known as 'Mentor' among independent trackers. These objects are the largest and brightest geosynchronous satellites in the sky with a typical ..read more

click image to enlarge Earlier this year, I blogged about the detection of a series of small orbit raising manoeuvers performed by the new North Korean military optical reconnaissance satellite Malligyong-1 (2023-179A). I also wrote a small piece on it for The Space Review published on 4 March 2024. I have now completed a follow-up analysis, which appeard in The Space Review last week (8 April 2024). You can read it here. In that follow-up analysis, I reconstructed the times and locations of each of the five small manoeuvers. And found that they match evening passes over North Korea ..read more

click to enlarge On 12 April 2024 near 16:00 UTC, the Russian Armed Forces test-fired an unarmed ICBM from Kapustin Yar, targetting the test range at Sary Shagan at a distance of some 2000 km. The missile was likely a TOPOL-M. In the image above, I have modelled the likely trajectory, assuming apogee at 1000 km altitude as in previous tests. Below is Russian MoD footage of the launch:   The missile launch was widely seen as a bright comet-like object in the sky, in Russia as well as in the Middle East, with reports from as far south as a.o. Iran and Iraq. As many there where i ..read more

click map to enlarge An odd Navigational Warning has appeared, for "space debris" along a 420-km trackline over the Gulf of Biscaye, from a point some 37 km southwest of Concarneau on the southern coast of Bretagne to a point some 20 km west of the French missile test base DGA Essais de Missiles near Biscarosse, southwest France. The Navigational Warning is for April 10 and 11, 2024, from 10:00 to 14:30 UTC (12:00 to 16:30 CEST). I do not think this Navigational Warning is really about "space debris", but rather believe some sort of missile test is concerned.  The southern ..read more

NROL-70 launch trajectory. Click map to enlarge   On 28 March 2024, if weather cooperates (see update at bottom of post), ULA will launch NROL-70 from SLC-37 at Cape Canaveral, carrying a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).  NROL-70 will be the last launch of ULA's iconic Delta IV Heavy rocket. Navigational Warnings for the launch (plotted on the map above) indicate a launch to Geosynchronous orbit. The launch window opens at 17:40 UTC and runs to 22:51 UTC. Back-up dates are March 29 to April 1.  The classified payload is likely Mentor 10 ..read more

click map to enlarge In the early hours of March 21, at 6:40 UTC, Rocketlab will launch an Electron rocket from Launch Complex 2 on Wallops, Virginia. The launch, designated NROL-123 and nicknamed "Live and Let Fly", will carry three small classified experimental payloads into Low Earth Orbit for the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) .  Navigational Warnings suggest (initial) launch into a ~47.5 degree inclined orbit. The launch trajectory will pass very close to Bermuda (see map above). According to the Rocketlab Press kit, payload release is 54 minutes after launch, after a ..read more

click map to enlarge Starship Flight Test 3 (see this earlier pre-launch post) was largely a success. Starship FT 3 launched from Boca Chica at 13:25 UTC (March 14, 2024) and was successfully inserted on a sub-orbital trajectory. The stage separations went well, coasting went well, and so did various other attempted milestones (such as briefly opening the cargo bay doors in space).  There were a few small mishaps: an attempt to make a controlled water-landing of the first stage went awry, and so did the final controlled reentry attempt of Starship itself over the Indian Ocean. B ..read more

click map to enlarge Pending FAA approval (i.e., the launch date might well be postponed), SpaceX aims to launch Starship Flight Test 3 this week. Navigational Warnings issued indicate a window opening at 12:00 UTC on March 14, 2024. The flight trajectory differs from the previous two ill-fated test flights (which both disintegrated early in flight, see an earlier post here concerning FT 2).  FT 1 and FT 2 targetted a splashdown near Hawaii after slightly less than one full orbital revolution. FT 3 however has a much shorter flight path, aiming to splash down in the Indian Ocean ..read more

PAN on March 4, 2024 (click image to enlarge) UNID near PAN on March 8, 2024 (click image to enlarge) In the evening of March 8 I did some observations to check upon the drifting PAN/NEMESIS-1 satellite. To my surprise, there was another object there that is not in the current catalogue (as of 10 March 2024). It wasn't there yet when I imaged the area 4 days earlier, in the evening of March 4, as can be seen by comparing the two images above. Most likely this UNID is some commercial geosynchronous satellite that has been relocated without the 18th STS having caught that move ..read more