Swedish Space Corporation

On May 15, the microgravity rocket MASER 11 took off from SSC’s facility Esrange Space Center with four scientific experiments onboard.

The SSC MASER rockets take scientific experiments to space to provide them with around six minutes of weightlessness, so called microgravity. By nearly eliminating the effect of gravity from chemical, biological and physical processes, valuable scientific research can be performed.

MASER 11, financed by the European Spa-ce Agency, carried experiments performed by European scientists. SSC had the prime responsibility for the development of the four experiment modules: CDIC-2, a physi-cal experiment regarding immiscible liquids, SOURCE T2, an experiment on fluid behavi-our in tanks, BIOMICS, a study of blood cell movements, and XRMON which studied me-tal foam. For XRMON, X-ray equipment was used for the first time ever in space.

SSC was also responsible for the launch and all service systems onboard.

The launch and flight were perfect, and 15 minutes after launch, the payload landed smoothly in a parachute to be recovered by helicopter.

MASER 11 reached an altitude of 252 km. All experiments worked well and could be followed in real time via video ima-ges and data sent to the ground.

Successful flight for MASER 11

For the first time, the Brazilian rocket motor VSB-30 was used for MASER. It has earlier been used for four German Texus rockets from Esrange.

ssc newsJune 2008

Since the official inauguration of Spaceport Sweden in January 2007, thorough investigations have been performed to evaluate the requirements for tourist space travel from Kiruna. At a press meeting in April 2008, representatives from Spaceport Sweden pre-sented its conclusions and next steps and the presi-dent of Virgin Galactic presented the recently unvei-led designs of the prototype commercial space ship, SpaceShipTwo. The meeting was also attended by future Virgin Galactic astronauts.

Initially, Virgin Galactic plans to operate from the Mojave Desert (California), New Mexico and Kiruna. Around 250 firm reservations have been made this far. From Kiruna, SpaceShipTwo will take tourists to 120 km altitude, offering a beautiful view of northern Europe. Flights from the US are planned to start in 2010. Operations from Sweden may start in 2011.

Spaceport Sweden is a co-operation between SSC, ICEHOTEL, Kiruna Airport and Kiruna’s business development company Progressum. Read more on www.spaceportsweden.com

ROCKETS AND BALLOONS

Travel-sickness study on Texus rocket Progress for space tourism from Sweden

In May, a balloon flight was performed at Esrange to make technical tests in preparation for the student balloon BEXUS, which will be launched in October.

The balloon also tested solar panels which may be used for possible coming balloon flights around the north pole.

The BEXUS program offers opportunities for Euro-pean student experiments to be flown on stratosphe-ric balloons. It is conducted by SSC and the Ger-man Aerospace Center DLR jointly, and, of course, in close cooperation with European students.

Test balloon flight prepares for BEXUS

In February, two Texus rockets were launched from Esrange Space Center - Texus 44 and Texus 45. .

In particular, one of the experiments onboard Texus 45 caught media’s attention – the study of 72 cichlid fish as they entered into weightlessness. The aim was to study motion sickness and investigate why certain individuals get sick and others don’t.

Texus is a sounding rocket programme for research in microgravity, carried out jointly by DLR, EADS Astrium, Kayser-Threde and SSC. Texus 44 was fi-nanced by ESA and Texus 45 by DLR. The rockets reach around 270 km altitude and provide 6 minutes of microgravity.

Technical test flight at Esrange

Virgin Galactic’s carrier plan WhiteKnightTwo and rocket plane SpaceShipTwo

The Texus 44 payload being recovered by helicopter

Prisma to be launched in 2009SSC has signed a contract with the Russian com-pany Kosmotras regarding launch of the Pris-ma satellites. They will be launched onboard a Dnepr launcher in June 2009, either from Baikonur in Kazakhstan or from Yasni in southern Russia. The French climate research satellite Picard will proba-bly be launched on the same launcher.

The Prisma project comprises two satellites which will demonstrate new technologies for formation fly-ing and close interaction between space vehicles. Such technologies will be useful in future scientific space projects as they enable many small vehicles to form large telescopes or antennas in space. This makes great demands on precision, sophisticated sensor technology and advanced systems for me-asurements, navigation and control.

The technologies in Prisma are mainly developed in Sweden, with contributions from Germany, Den-mark and France. SSC is the prime contractor and responsible for project management, satellite de-sign and most of the development, integration and test activities. The satellites will be controlled from SSC’s facility Esrange Space Center. The project is mainly financed by the Swedish National Space Board, with contributions from the space agencies of Germany and France.

SSC is the prime contractor for the SMART Orbital Life Extension Vehicle (SMART-OLEV). SMART-OLEV is a ”space tug” system designed to dock with telecommunications satellites to take over their at-titude and orbit control functions. This will especially be useful when a satellite runs out of propellant. The SMART-OLEV vehicle can to prolong a satellite’s li-fetime by around 12 years.

The project is run by the company Orbital Satel-lite Services (OSS) which in turn is owned by SSC, German Kayser-Threde and Spanish SENER.

OSS now presents the concept to satellite operators around the world and many of them see great po-tential in these innovative services. In the beginning of June, a successful Preliminary Design Review was held. OSS anticipates the first SMART-OLEV vehicle to be launched in 2011.

To view a video of the SMART-OLEV at work, go to www.orbitalsatelliteservices.com

SSC is part of a consortium assigned by ESA to develop a European Small Geostationary Satellite platform for telecommunication missions. The pro-ject, Small GEO, will support European space in-dustry in broadening its product range to compete effectively on the commercial market for small tele-communication platforms.

SSC is responsible for electric propulsion and attitu-de and orbit control systems. The German company OHB Technology is the prime contractor and head of the consortium, which also includes LuxSpace (Luxembourg) and Oerlikon Space (Switzerland).

In late April, the Preliminary Design Review was started, aiming to be completed by mid-June.

The first Small GEO satellite is scheduled to be launched for the Spanish satellite operator Hispasat in 2011.

Improving European competitiveness in space

Life saver SMART-OLEV

SATELLITES AND SATELLITE SYSTEMS

HISPASAT AG1 satellite in stowed and deployed configuration

SMART-OLEV docking with a satellite

Prisma

Important role in the Galileo system

SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS

MARITIME SURVEILLANCE SYSTEMS

SSC has full control of SIRIUS 4

The second Galileo test satellite, GIOVE B, was launched on 27 April. Using its stations in Sweden, Australia, Chile and on Hawaii, PrioraNet supported the launch and the satellite’s early orbit phase, and will continue to provide routine support to the custo-mer, Telespazio, for two years.

PrioraNet provided the same services for the launch and initial phase of the first test satellite, GIOVE A, which was launched in December 2005.

Apart from its role in the PrioraNet joint network, SSC also expects to support Galileo during the next 20 years by hosting the system’s first dedicated sa-tellite station. A large antenna has been erected at the Esrange Space Center and the infrastructure is presently being established. Esrange will be one of two sites supporting the Galileo in-orbit validation phase, comprising four satellites.

SSC to control ASTRA 5A

Finnish Border Guard chooses SSC’s maritime surveillance system

PrioraNet provides global coverage of satellites in any orbit. It includes facilities owned by SSC and USN as well as stations owned by affiliate partners world-wide.

The latest additions to the PrioraNet are the San-tiago Satellite Station and the station at Poker Flat, Alaska. As mentioned, SSC has agreed to purchase the Santiago station, and USN has purchased the assets of Honeywell’s Datalynx division, including the Alaskan station.

Read more on www.prioranet.com

SSC has signed an agreement with the University of Chile in Santiago regarding the purchase of Cen-tro de Estudios Espaciales, including the complete Santiago Satellite Station.

The Santiago station well complements the servi-ces performed by SSC at the Esrange Space Cen-ter and within the frames of the PrioraNet network, which is run jointly with the Unviersal Space Net-work, USN.

SSC to purchase Santiago Satellite Station

Joint efforts in PrioraNet

Swedish Space Corporation (SSC)P.O. Box 4207, SE-171 04 Solna, SwedenTel +46 8 627 62 00 Telefax +46 8 98 70 69 www.ssc.se This newsletter is issued 3-4 times/year. Subscribe by sending an e-mail to info@ssc.se

Satellite engineers in the SIRIUS 4 control room

Finnish Border Guard aircraft

SES ASTRA has chosen SSC to control their te-lecommunications satellite ASTRA 5A, formerly known as SIRIUS 2 and operated by SES SIRIUS. The satellite has recently been assigned to SES ASTRA and moved from 5 to 31.5 degrees East to serve the dynamic markets in Eastern Europe and the Middle East.

Since January, SSC has full operational responsi-bility for SIRIUS 4, SES SIRIUS’s telecommunica-tions satellite which was launched in November last year. SSC will control the satellite through its entire lifetime, around 15 years.

SSC has been selected to enter into contract ne-gotiations with the Finnish Border Guard. The procurement involves the upgrade of one Dornier aircraft with SSC’s maritime surveillance system, and an option to upgrade a second aircraft.

The aircraft are used for maritime patrol such as identifying oil spills in the Baltic Sea as well as sur-veying ship traffic and conducting search and res-cue operations.

MSS 6000 is the latest generation of SSC’s mariti-me surveillance system, which have been installed in a variety of airplanes in countries all around the world, e.g. in Sweden, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Greece, USA and Canada.