EADS Astrium awarded Korea??s 1st geostationary multifunctional sat contract

EADS Astrium has been awarded a contract from the Korea Aerospace
and Research Institute, KARI, to design and manufacture the first
Korean multi-function geostationary satellite ?®COMS?∆. The highly
advanced COMS satellite has three payloads; one for meteorology, one
for ocean observation and one for communications. COMS will provide
meteorology data to end-users around the globe, oceanography data for
the Korean peninsula and experimental communications services in
Ka-band, all from its orbital locations 116? and 138? East. COMS is the
third Earth observation spacecraft designed and manufactured for the
Asia-Pacific region by EADS Astrium confirming the company??s leading
position in the market.
 
As prime contractor for COMS, EADS Astrium
will be responsible for the design and build of the satellite including
both the meteorology and ocean imagers – the communications payload
will be provided by KARI in Korea, as a Customer Furnished Equipment.
 
?ÿ COMS provides continuous image
monitoring with the extraction of high resolution meteorological data
from its multi-spectral imager. It will give early warning of hazardous
weather conditions including storms, floods, sandstorms, etc and
provide data on the long-term changes in sea surface temperatures and
cloud patterns. Earth observation data from COMS will be relayed to a
processing station. Once processed, the data will be resent via the
COMS satellite to weather forecasters, Earth observation centres etc
around the world.
 
?ÿ COMS will also carry an Ocean Imager to
monitor marine environments around the Korean peninsula and provide
data (on chlorophyll etc) to assist the fishing industry in the region.
It will also monitor both long and short-term changes to the marine
ecosystem.
 
?ÿ The communications payload on-board
COMS will allow ?®in-orbit verification?∆ of advanced communication
technologies and will support experiments covering wide-band
multi-media communication services.
 
The spacecraft will have a launch mass of
2.4 tonnes and a spacecraft power of 2.5kW at end of life. The
satellite, operating from geostationary orbit, will provide services
for a minimum of seven years. COMS is primarily based on EADS Astrium??s
Eurostar E3000 spacecraft platform ?± the latest version of the
company??s highly successful Eurostar communications satellite family.
Four Eurostar E3000 spacecraft are already operating in geostationary
orbit. Seven more are in production.
 
COMS is KARI??s first geostationary
satellite and will provide Korea with its own meteorology and ocean
data thus giving increased independence. COMS is part of a 15-year
Korean space plan begun in the 1990s, and followed systematically ever
since.
 
Antoine Bouvier, CEO of EADS Astrium,
said: ?®I am delighted that we have won this contract for Korea??s first
multi-mission geostationary satellite. It demonstrates KARI??s
confidence in EADS Astrium and builds on the success already achieved
with the Korean observation satellite Kompsat 2 due for launch in
November this year. I am confident that these contracts will pave the
way for further successful, long-term cooperation with KARI.?∆ KARI
(www.kari.re.kr) leads the development of Korean space programs and
technologies and has extensive space experience through the development
of Kompsat-1 and Kompsat-2. EADS Astrium is Europe??s leading satellite
system specialist. Its activities cover complete civil and military
telecommunications and Earth observation and meteorology systems,
science and navigation programmes, and all spacecraft avionics and
equipment.
 
EADS Astrium is a wholly owned subsidiary of EADS SPACE, which is dedicated to providing civil and defense space systems.
 
In 2004 EADS SPACE had a turnover of ?—2.6 billion and 11,000 employees in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Spain.
 
EADS is a global leader in aerospace, defence and related services.
In 2004, EADS generated revenues of ?—31.8 billion and employed a workforce of more than 110,000.
 
Info extracted from www.eads.net
EARSC
Author: EARSC



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