Luch 5B ( meaning ''ray'' and sometimes

transliterated Transliteration is a type of conversion of a text from one script to another that involves swapping letters (thus '' trans-'' + '' liter-'') in predictable ways, such as Greek → , Cyrillic → , Greek → the digraph , Armenian → or ...

as Loutch-5B) is a Russian Luch relay satellite which transmits data from the

Russian Orbital Segment The Russian Orbital Segment (ROS) is the name given to the components of the International Space Station (ISS) constructed in Russia and operated by the Russian Roscosmos. The ROS handles Guidance, Navigation, and Control for the entire Station. ...

of the

International Space Station The International Space Station (ISS) is the largest modular space station currently in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project involving five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA ...

, and from other satellites in

low Earth orbit A low Earth orbit (LEO) is an orbit around Earth with a period of 128 minutes or less (making at least 11.25 orbits per day) and an eccentricity less than 0.25. Most of the artificial objects in outer space are in LEO, with an altitude never mor ...

. It is in

geosynchronous orbit A geosynchronous orbit (sometimes abbreviated GSO) is an Earth-centered orbit with an orbital period that matches Earth's rotation on its axis, 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds (one sidereal day). The synchronization of rotation and orbital ...

Luch

Luch 5B is one of three Luch relay satellites.

Luch 5A Luch 5A ( meaning ''ray'' and sometimes transliterated as Loutch-5A) is a Russian Luch relay satellite which transmits data from the Russian Orbital Segment of the International Space Station, and from other satellites in low Earth orbit. It is ...

was launched on 11 December 2011 and

Luch 5V Luch 5V ( meaning ''ray'' and sometimes transliterated as Loutch-5V) is a Russian Luch relay satellite which transmits data from the Russian Orbital Segment of the International Space Station, and from other satellites in low Earth orbit. It cur ...

was launched on 28 April 2014. They are dual purpose satellites with both military and civil uses, and are similar to those in the US

Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System The U.S. Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) is a network of American communications satellites (each called a tracking and data relay satellite, TDRS) and ground stations used by NASA for space communications. The system was desig ...

. Luch 5B was built by

JSC Information Satellite Systems JSC Information Satellite Systems Reshetnev (russian: Информационные спутниковые системы имени академика М. Ф. Решетнёва, Informatsionnye sputnikovye systemy imeny akademika M. F. Reshetnyov ...

using the Ekspress-1000A bus. It has 4 S and

Ku band The Ku band () is the portion of the electromagnetic spectrum in the microwave range of frequencies from 12 to 18 gigahertz (GHz). The symbol is short for "K-under" (originally german: Kurz-unten), because it is the lower part of the ori ...

channels with repeaters manufactured by

Thales Alenia Space Thales Alenia Space () is a Franco-Italian aerospace manufacturer. A joint venture between the French technology corporation Thales Group (67%) and Italian defense conglomerate Leonardo (33%), the company is the largest satellite manufacture ...

and other equipment manufactured by

Sumitomo The is one of the largest Japanese ''keiretsu'', or business groups, founded by Masatomo Sumitomo (1585-1652) around 1615 during the early Edo period. History The Sumitomo Group traces its roots to a bookshop in Kyoto founded circa 1615 by Masa ...

. The Ku band antenna operates at up to 150

Mbit/s In telecommunications, data-transfer rate is the average number of bits (bitrate), characters or symbols (baudrate), or data blocks per unit time passing through a communication link in a data-transmission system. Common data rate units are multi ...

and the S band antenna at up to 5 Mbit/s. The satellite also has a "laser-radio channel". The satellite is designed to relay data from the ISS, satellites in low earth orbit and rocket launch vehicles. Luch 5B is located at 16° W.

Launch

Luch 5B was launched on 2 November 2012 with satellite

Yamal 300K Yamal-300K (Russian: ) is a geostationary communications satellite operated by Gazprom Space Systems and built by ISS Reshetnev on the Ekspress-1000 satellite bus. It was the first switch of satellite supplier in Yamal programme after Gazprom ...

. It was launched from

Baikonur Cosmodrome The Baikonur Cosmodrome ( kk, Байқоңыр ғарыш айлағы, translit=Baiqoñyr ğaryş ailağy, ; russian: Космодром Байконур, translit=Kosmodrom Baykonur, ) is a spaceport in an area of southern Kazakhstan leased to R ...

launchpad 81/24 by a

Proton-M The Proton-M, (Протон-М) GRAU index 8K82M or , is an expendable Russian heavy-lift launch vehicle derived from the Soviet-developed Proton. It is built by Khrunichev, and launched from sites 81 and 200 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kaz ...

rocket with a

Briz-M The Briz-K, Briz-KM and Briz-M (russian: Бриз-К, КM and M meaning ''Breeze-K, KM and M'') are Russian liquid-propellant rocket orbit insertion upper stages manufactured by Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center and used on ...

upper stage. It was launched at 21:04 UTC and after four burns of the Briz-M upper stage it was placed into

geosynchronous transfer orbit A geosynchronous transfer orbit or geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) is a type of geocentric orbit. Satellites that are destined for geosynchronous (GSO) or geostationary orbit (GEO) are (almost) always put into a GTO as an intermediate step f ...

at 06:33 UTC on 3 November. The launch was delayed from 30 August 2012 due to the failure of the launch of

Telkom-3 Telkom-3 is an Indonesian communications satellite which failed to reach its target orbit due to a launch failure on 6 August 2012. It was built by ISS Reshetnev for Indonesian telecommunications provider PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia. It was b ...

and

Ekspress MD2 Ekspress-MD2 is a Russian communications satellite which was lost due to a launch failure on 6 August 2012. Equipped with eight C-band transponders and 1 L-band transponder, it was intended to be located in geostationary orbit at a longitude o ...

in August 2012.

References

{{Orbital launches in 2012 Spacecraft launched by Proton rockets Spacecraft launched in 2012 Satellites using the Ekspress bus Communications satellites of Russia Telecommunications in Russia Roscosmos Communications satellites in geostationary orbit