Super Low Altitude Test Satellite "TSUBAME" (SLATS), Current Status
December 23, 2017 (JST)
National Research and Development Agency
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA)
Approximately at 12:54 p.m. (Japan Standard Time, JST), the JAXA Santiago Ground Station, Chile received the signals from TSUBAME (SLATS; Super Low Altitude Satellite), launched from the JAXA Tanegashima Space Center earlier at 10:26:22 a.m. (JST), December 23, 2017. The signal reception confirms that the satellite’s solar array deployment and attitude control based on the onboard sun sensors have occurred as scheduled.
Next Press Releases
The next press release on SHIKISAI and TSUBAME updates will be issued approximately at 2:00 a.m. (JST), December 24, informing the completion of the satellites’ critical operations phases*.
*Critical operations phase: the phase that follows satellite’s separation from a launch vehicle, solar array deployment, and powering up of instruments for the satellite’s regular operations. The critical operations phase comes to an end at the transition to the satellite’s control mode for nominal operation.