AMC-6, formerly GE-6, is a commercial broadcast
communications satellite
A communications satellite is an artificial satellite that relays and amplifies radio telecommunication signals via a Transponder (satellite communications), transponder; it creates a communication channel between a source transmitter and a Rad ...
owned by
SES Launched on 21 October 2000, from
Baikonur Cosmodrome
The Baikonur Cosmodrome is a spaceport operated by Russia within Kazakhstan. Located in the Kazakh city of Baikonur, it is the largest operational space launch facility in terms of area. All Russian Human spaceflight, crewed spaceflights are l ...
in
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan, officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a landlocked country primarily in Central Asia, with a European Kazakhstan, small portion in Eastern Europe. It borders Russia to the Kazakhstan–Russia border, north and west, China to th ...
, AMC-6 became the fifth hybrid
C-band /
Ku-band satellite in the
GE Americom
SES Americom was a major commercial communications satellite, satellite operator of North American geosynchronous satellites based in the United States. The company started as RCA Americom in 1975 before being bought by General Electric in 1986 ...
fleet. The satellite provides coverage to the continental
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
, the
Caribbean
The Caribbean ( , ; ; ; ) is a region in the middle of the Americas centered around the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, mostly overlapping with the West Indies. Bordered by North America to the north, Central America ...
islands, southern
Greenland
Greenland is an autonomous territory in the Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark. It is by far the largest geographically of three constituent parts of the kingdom; the other two are metropolitan Denmark and the Faroe Islands. Citizens of Greenlan ...
, and
Latin America
Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...
. Located in a
geostationary orbit
A geostationary orbit, also referred to as a geosynchronous equatorial orbit''Geostationary orbit'' and ''Geosynchronous (equatorial) orbit'' are used somewhat interchangeably in sources. (GEO), is a circular orbit, circular geosynchronous or ...
parallel to the eastern United States coastline, AMC-6 provides service to commercial and government customers, and is used as an
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the Global network, global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a internetworking, network of networks ...
platform due to its wide coverage, scale and redundancy. Some of its capabilities include
Very-small-aperture terminal (VSAT) networking,
satellite news gathering and Ku-band transceiver service.
Launched as GE-6, it was renamed AMC-6 when SES took over GE Americom in 2001, forming
SES Americom. This merged with
SES New Skies in 2009 to form
SES World Skies.
Rainbow 2
Rainbow Media announced in November 2004, that it will utilize 16 transponders on the AMC-6 satellite, which
VOOM refers to as Rainbow 2.
References
External links
AMC-6 website*
*
*
{{Orbital launches in 2000
Communications satellites in geostationary orbit
Satellite television
Spacecraft launched in 2000
SES satellites
AMC-06