Names | VS-1, VIASAT-IOM |
---|---|
Mission type | Communication |
Operator | Viasat Inc. / Telesat |
COSPAR ID | 2011-059A |
SATCAT no. | 37843 |
Mission duration | 15 years (planned) 12 years, 2 months, 19 days (elasped) |
Spacecraft properties | |
Bus | LS-1300 |
Manufacturer | Space Systems/Loral |
Launch mass | 6,740 kg (14,860 lb) |
Dry mass | 3,650 kg (8,050 lb) |
Start of mission | |
Launch date | 19 October 2011, 18:48:58 UTC |
Rocket | Proton-M/Briz-M |
Launch site | Baikonur 200/39 |
Contractor | International Launch Services |
Orbital parameters | |
Reference system | Geocentric |
Regime | Geostationary |
Longitude | 115.1° west |
Perigee altitude | 35,783 kilometres (22,235 mi) [1] |
Apogee altitude | 35,802 kilometres (22,246 mi) [1] |
Inclination | 0.00 degrees [1] |
Period | 1436.10 minutes [1] |
Epoch | 25 January 2015, 04:39:48 UTC [1] |
Transponders | |
Band | 56 Ka-band |
Coverage area | Contiguous United States, Alaska, Hawaii, Canada |
ViaSat-1 is a high throughput communications satellite owned by Viasat Inc. and Telesat Canada. [2] [3] Launched October 19, 2011 aboard a Proton rocket, it held the Guinness record for the world's highest capacity communications satellite with a total capacity in excess of 140 Gbit/s, more than all the satellites covering North America combined, at the time of its launch. [4]
ViaSat-1 is capable of two-way communications with small dish antennas at higher speeds and a lower cost-per-bit than any satellite before. [5]
The satellite is positioned at 115.1 degrees West longitude geostationary orbit point, with 72 Ka-band spot beams; 63 over the U.S. (Eastern and Western states, Alaska and Hawaii), and nine over Canada.
The Canadian beams are owned by satellite operator Telesat and are used for the Xplornet broadband service to consumers in rural Canada. The US beams provide fast Internet access called Exede, Viasat's satellite Internet service. [6]
ViaSat-1 is part of a new satellite system architecture created by Viasat Inc. The objective is to create a better satellite broadband user experience, [7] making satellite competitive with DSL and wireless broadband alternatives for the first time. [8]
A satellite constellation is a group of artificial satellites working together as a system. Unlike a single satellite, a constellation can provide permanent global or near-global coverage, such that at any time everywhere on Earth at least one satellite is visible. Satellites are typically placed in sets of complementary orbital planes and connect to globally distributed ground stations. They may also use inter-satellite communication.
Satellite Internet access or Satellite Broadband is Internet access provided through communication satellites. Modern consumer grade satellite Internet service is typically provided to individual users through geostationary satellites that can offer relatively high data speeds, with newer satellites using Ku band to achieve downstream data speeds up to 506 Mbit/s. In addition, new satellite internet constellations are being developed in low-earth orbit to enable low-latency internet access from space.
Telesat, formerly Telesat Canada, is a Canadian satellite communications company founded on May 2, 1969. The company is headquartered in Ottawa.
The Anik satellites are a series of geostationary communications satellites launched for Telesat Canada for television, voice and data in Canada and other parts of the world, from 1972 through 2013. Some of the later satellites in the series remain operational in orbit, while others have been retired to a graveyard orbit. The naming of the satellite was determined by a national contest, and was won by Julie-Frances Czapla of Saint-Léonard, Québec. In Inuktitut, Anik means "little brother".
SES S.A. is a Luxembourgish satellite telecommunications network provider supplying video and data connectivity worldwide to broadcasters, content and internet service providers, mobile and fixed network operators, governments and institutions.
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Astra 1E is one of the Astra communications satellites in geostationary orbit owned and operated by SES. It was launched in October 1995 to the Astra 19.2°E orbital slot initially to provide digital television and radio for direct-to-home (DTH) across Europe.
Viasat is an American communications company based in Carlsbad, California, with additional operations across the United States and worldwide. Viasat is a provider of high-speed satellite broadband services and secure networking systems covering military and commercial markets.
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Tooway satellite broadband Internet service available across Europe. The first version of the service was launched in 2007 via two Eutelsat geostationary satellites, Hot Bird 6 and Eurobird 3, respectively at the 13° and 33° East orbital positions.
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Nimiq-5 is a Canadian communications satellite, operated by Telesat Canada as part of its Nimiq fleet of satellites. It is positioned in geostationary orbit at a longitude of 72.7° West of the Greenwich Meridian. As of July 2015, EchoStar Corporation leases the satellite's entire capacity to provide high-definition television direct-to-home broadcasting for Dish Network Corporation. When accessed using a multi-satellite receiver such as the VIP722k and a multi-satellite dish/LNB combo, such as the Dish-300, Dish-500, or Dish-Turbo 1000.4, the satellite is referred to by the on-screen diagnostics as Echostar 72 W.
High-throughput satellite (HTS) is a communications satellite that provides more throughput than a classic FSS satellite for the same amount of allocated orbital spectrum, thus significantly reducing cost-per-bit. ViaSat-1 and EchoStar XVII do provide more than 100 Gbit/s of capacity, which is more than 100 times the capacity offered by a conventional FSS satellite. When it was launched in October 2011 ViaSat-1 had more capacity than all other commercial communications satellites over North America combined.
ViaSat-2 is a commercial communications satellite launched June 1, 2017 and went live late February 2018. It was advertised to be the world's highest capacity communications satellite with a throughput of 300 Gbit/s, exceeding that of HughesNet EchoStar XIX, which launched in December 2016. It is the second Ka-band satellite launched by ViaSat after ViaSat-1. The satellite provides internet service through ViaSat to North America, parts of South America, including Mexico and the Caribbean, and to air and maritime routes across the Atlantic Ocean to Europe.
Xplore Inc. is a Woodstock, New Brunswick-based rural internet service provider. It is the largest rural focused broadband service provider in Canada.
ViaSat-3 is a planned global constellation of three geostationary Ka-band communications satellites, the first of which was launched in 2023 by Viasat, Inc. The satellites are intended to provide broadband connectivity with speeds of 100-plus megabits per second to homes, business and enterprise internet users, commercial, government and business aircraft, as well as government and defense markets, maritime and oceanic enterprises in the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific.