Almost exactly 10 years after the final FMs were supplied to EADS Astrium UK the SKYNET series of Military communications satellites continues to make the news as flight 5A transitions to its new slot 94.8GHz east over the Asia Pacific, where it is expected to begin operations later in 2015.
The move will provide Airbus’s military telecommunications reach, in X- and UHF-band, to near-global coverage. TRAK supplied a several thousand flight model ferrite isolators, circulators and switches into the 7 of the eight SKYNET 4 & 5 satellites remaining in orbit, the capacity of which Airbus leases to the British government under a long-term contract.
The image above depicts an X-Band Isolator similar to that supplied in large numbers into the SKYNET 4 & 5 programs. In total TRAK has supplied over 150,000 Space Qualified Passive RF components since the first was delivered in 1993.