Meteor-M 1

Spacecraft n°:

Russia spacecraft n°:

Launch data: Designation  35865 / 09049A Launch date  17 Sep 2009 - 15:55 UT Launch site  B, LC-31/6 Launch vehicle  Soyuz-2-1b / Fregat Mission  Government: Meteorology LEO Polar Earth orbit on: Perigee / Apogee  817 x 822 km Eccentricity  3.48E-04 Inclination  98.8 deg Period  101.28 min

Spacecraft data: Prime contractor  VNIIEM (Russia) Platform   Operator  Russian Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring (ROSHYDROMET) Mass at launch  2755 kg Dry Mass   kg Basic shape   Dimension (m)   Solar array   Stabilization   DC power   Design lifetime  5 yrs

The Meteor-M satellite at the end of the assembly. Credit: VNIIEM

Mission details:

• Will gather data for weather forecasts, monitor Earth's ozone layer and radiation conditions in upper atmosphere, information on ice floes for maritime shipping.
• The first Meteor-M satellite was launched on Sep 17. Replacing the old Meteor-3M satellite, the upgraded satellite carries a new generation of weather instruments for the Russian Hydrometeorological Service and is built by VNII EM. Several small satellites were deployed on the same launch. Launch vehicle was the Soyuz-2-1b with a Fregat upper stage.
• The Soyuz-2-1b third stage reached a 185 x 198 km x 98.8 deg orbit at 1604 UTC. The Fregat stage separated and made two burns at around 1606 and 1652 UTC to an 814 x 820 km orbit, where it deployed the 2755 kg Meteor-M and the small 7 kg Blits satellite at 1653 UTC. Blits, built by NII Pretsizionnogo Priborostroeniya (NIIPP) of Moscow, is a spherical glass lens to be used for laser geodesy.
• At 1745 UTC, three more satellites were ejected from the adapter truss on Fregat: Sterkh No. 12L, the second dedicated search-and-rescue satellite for the Russian Space Agency; Universitetskiy/Tat'yana-2, a 90 kg space physics research satellite built by students at MGU (Moscow State University); and UGATUSAT, a small 35 kg remote sensing satellite for the Ufimskiy Gosudarstvenniy Aviatsionniy Tekhnicheskiy Universitet (Ufa State Aviation Technical University) in Bashkortostan, a Russian autonomous republic.
• Fregat then made two further burns at about 1746 and 1835 UTC to descend to 490 x 504 km where it deployed Sumbandila, a South African imaging satellite, and deployed the Lavochkin/Astrium IRIS experment, two rigidizing masts carrying dummy solar arrays, in a test of inflatable structure technology. The Fregat was expected to make a final burn to deorbit itself on Sep 18, but was still in a 491 x 503 km orbit as of Sep 23.