AsiaSat 1 was a

Hong Kong Hong Kong)., Legally Hong Kong, China in international treaties and organizations. is a special administrative region of China. With 7.5 million residents in a territory, Hong Kong is the fourth most densely populated region in the wor ...

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 ...

, which was owned, and was operated, by the Hong Kong–based Asia Satellite Telecommunications Company. It was originally launched in February 1984 as Westar 6, but following a booster motor failure it was retrieved and returned to Earth in November of that year by

Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle is a retired, partially reusable launch system, reusable low Earth orbital spacecraft system operated from 1981 to 2011 by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as part of the Space Shuttle program. ...

mission STS-51-A. After being sold to

AsiaSat Asia Satellite Telecommunications Company Limited (AsiaSat) is a Hong Kong–based commercial operator of communications satellites founded in 1988. It is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Asia Satellite Telecommunications Holdings Limited (AsiaSat ...

and refurbished, it was relaunched in April 1990, and positioned in

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 ...

at a

longitude Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east- west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek lett ...

of 100.5° East. It spent its operational life at 100.5° East, from where it was used to provide fixed satellite services, including broadcasting, audio and data transmission, to

Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...

and the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five Borders of the oceans, oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean, or, depending on the definition, to Antarctica in the south, and is ...

Westar 6

As Westar 6, the satellite was built by Hughes Space and Communications. It was based on the HS-376 satellite bus. At launch it had a mass of , and a design life of thirteen years. It carried twenty four C-band transponders. After launch from the Space Shuttle as part of mission

STS-41-B STS-41-B was NASA's tenth Space Shuttle mission and the fourth flight of the . It launched on February 3, 1984 and landed on February 11, 1984, after deploying two communications satellites. It was also notable for including the first untethere ...

its

PAM-D The Payload Assist Module (PAM) is a modular upper stage designed and built by McDonnell Douglas (Boeing), using Thiokol Star-series solid propellant rocket motors. The PAM was used with the Space Shuttle, Delta, and Titan launchers and carrie ...

booster rocket misfired, and the satellite was stranded in a useless low orbit. It was retrieved during another Shuttle mission ( STS-51-A) in November 1984, and Hughes was contracted to refurbish it. Westar 6 was eventually sold, for US$58 million, to the AsiaSat consortium and renamed AsiaSat 1.

Re-launch

The launch of AsiaSat 1 was contracted to the China Great Wall Industry Corporation (CGWIC), and used a

Long March 3 The Long March 3 (), also known as the Changzheng 3, CZ-3 and LM-3, was a Chinese orbital carrier rocket design. They were all launched from Launch Area 3 at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center. It was a three-stage rocket, and was mostly used ...

launch vehicle A launch vehicle is typically a rocket-powered vehicle designed to carry a payload (a crewed spacecraft or satellites) from Earth's surface or lower atmosphere to outer space. The most common form is the ballistic missile-shaped multistage ...

. The launch was conducted from Xichang Launch Area 3 (LA-3) at the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre at 13:30:02 UTC on 7 April 1990.

Mission

Asiasat 1 was replaced by AsiaSat 3S in May 1999. It remains in a graveyard orbit.

References

{{Orbital launches in 1990 Spacecraft launched in 1990 AsiaSat satellites Satellites using the HS-376 bus Spacecraft launched by Long March rockets

Westar 6

Re-launch

Mission

See also

References