Mission type Communication Bus Spacebus 4000C3 Power 10800 Launch date 8 December 2012 Band 46 J band (IEEE Ku band) | COSPAR ID 2012-070A Launch mass 5,250 kg Longitude 55° East | |
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Mission duration 15 years (planned)11 years (expected after launch failure) Similar Yamal‑401, Yamal‑300K, Ekspress AT1, Horizons‑2, Ekspress AM6 | ||
Yamal-402 is a Russian geostationary communications satellite. It was launched on 8 December 2012, 13:13:43 UTC from Site 200/39 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. It was built by Thales Alenia Space, and is based on the Spacebus 4000C3 satellite bus. It is equipped with 46 J band (IEEE Ku band) transponders. It has a design life of 15 years, but reducing to 11 years expected after launch partial failure.
Launch problem
In February 2009, Gazprom Space Systems announced a contract with Thales Alenia Space for two satellites: Yamal-401 and Yamal-402. This was the first time a foreign supplier would build a satellite for internal Russian market. After much lobby from local industry, the contract for the bus and integration of Yamal-401 is cancelled and awarded to ISS Reshetnev, but Thales is allowed to keep the payload supply.
On November 6, 2012, the satellite arrives at the launch site of Baikonur. On December 8, 2012 13:13:43 UTC a Proton-M/Briz-M launches Yamal-402 to a geostationary transfer orbit. The same day, Khrunichev Center and International Launch Services reported an anomaly during the launch in which the Briz-M stage failed 4 minutes before scheduled shut down on its fourth burn.
On December 10, specialists from Thales Alenia Space carried out maneuvers to bring the satellite into its designated orbit after a premature separation from Briz-M. On 15 December 15, Yamal-402 was taken to its planned geostationary orbit at the altitude of 36,000 km following a series of four adjustment operations. The satellite lost 4 years of fuel to compensate for lower than expected orbit injection.