Mexsat-3, also known as Mexsat Bicentenario or simply Bicentenario, is the first of three

Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...

satellites forming the

MEXSAT The Mexican Satellite System, also known as MEXSAT, is a network of three satellites bought by the Mexican government's Ministry of Communications and Transportation. The three satellites are named Mexsat-1, Mexsat-2, and Mexsat-3. Subsequently, ...

telecommunications network, and is named to commemorate the bicentennial of the

Independence of Mexico Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...

. It was launched on 19 December 2012 to serve the other two satellites in the network, Mexsat-1 and Mexsat-2, as a fixed satellite service. It was manufactured by the company

Orbital Sciences Corporation Orbital Sciences Corporation (commonly referred to as Orbital) was an American company specializing in the design, manufacture, and launch of small- and medium- class space and launch vehicle systems for commercial, military and other governmen ...

and was launched from

Kourou Kourou (; ) is a commune in French Guiana, an overseas region and department of France in South America. Kourou is famous for being the location of the Guiana Space Centre, the main spaceport of France and the European Space Agency (ESA). It ...

French Guiana French Guiana, or Guyane in French, is an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department and region of France located on the northern coast of South America in the Guianas and the West Indies. Bordered by Suriname to the west ...

, and currently occupies the orbit 114.9° West.

Objectives

The Ministry of Communications and Transportation said in a statement that the new satellite would provide fixed

broadband In telecommunications, broadband or high speed is the wide-bandwidth (signal processing), bandwidth data transmission that exploits signals at a wide spread of frequencies or several different simultaneous frequencies, and is used in fast Inter ...

services for access to the

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 ...

, digital high-quality

satellite telephony A satellite telephone, satellite phone or satphone is a type of mobile phone that connects to other phones or the telephone network by radio link through satellites orbiting the Earth instead of terrestrial cell sites, as cellphones do. Therefor ...

videoconferencing Videotelephony (also known as videoconferencing or video calling) is the use of audio signal, audio and video for simultaneous two-way communication. Today, videotelephony is widespread. There are many terms to refer to videotelephony. ''Vide ...

, remote medical care and education via television. It said that Bicentenario would provide services for emergency care "before, during and after emergencies". The satellite was equipped with instruments for transmitting and receiving electromagnetic signals in the C and K_u bands.

Launch

The French company

Arianespace Arianespace SA is a French company founded in March 1980 as the world's first commercial launch service provider. It operates two launch vehicles: Vega C, a Small-lift launch vehicle, small-lift rocket, and Ariane 6, a Medium-lift launch vehicl ...

launched an

Ariane 5 Ariane 5 is a retired European heavy-lift space launch vehicle operated by Arianespace for the European Space Agency (ESA). It was launched from the Guiana Space Centre (CSG) in French Guiana. It was used to deliver payloads into geostationar ...

rocket carrying the Mexsat-3 satellite from the

Guiana Space Centre The Guiana Space Centre (; CSG), also called Europe's Spaceport, is a spaceport to the northwest of Kourou in French Guiana, an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas region of France in South America. Kourou is located approxim ...

near

at 18:50 local time (21:50 GMT) as part of a previously signed contract. The rocket reached the 100 kilometre mark (the distance from Earth which can be considered an orbit) in the first three minutes. The satellite was placed in a high

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 ...

36,000 kilometres above the surface. The former deputy secretary of communications at the Ministry of Communications and Transportation, Hector Olavarria, revealed via

Twitter Twitter, officially known as X since 2023, is an American microblogging and social networking service. It is one of the world's largest social media platforms and one of the most-visited websites. Users can share short text messages, image ...

after the launch that "in about thirty minutes we will know of the satellite's arrival in orbit". Signals were successfully received shortly afterwards.

References

External links

* * {{Orbital launches in 2012 Satellites of Mexico Spacecraft launched in 2012 2012 in Mexico Satellites using the GEOStar bus

Objectives

Launch

See also

References

External links