Russia launches 36 UK telecom satellites from Vostochny, aims to provide fast broadband

On December 18, Russia launched a fleet of 36 satellite into the targeted orbit on a Soyuz launch vehicle from the Vostochny Cosmodrome. The historic launch at 12:26 GMT was a part of the UK government and Indian conglomerate Bharti Global’s operator OneWeb’s 648 Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite programme which will provide fast, high-speed, low-latency global connectivity.  Friday’s launch brought the total in-orbit launch to 110 satellites. “Today’s launch is one of many steps we have taken to operationalize one of the world’s first LEO constellations which clearly demonstrates we are on our way to achieving our mission,” Founder and Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, Sunil Bharti Mittal said in a statement. 

The satellite communications company streamed the lift-off live as the satellites detached from the rocket and dispensed within 3 hours 52 minutes in at least nine batches. The launch of the new batch was a contract signed between French company Ariane Space, Russia’s Roscosmos, NPO Lavochkina, and the Center for Operation of Ground-Based Space Infrastructure Facilities.

As the company now prepares for at least 50 more satellite launches to complete the project, it hopes to make the fast internet available to UK customers in 2021 and in India by mid-2022. In the months ahead, all the satellites launched at an altitude of 450 km need to be maneuvered at least 1,200 km above the Earth, which the scientists will monitor.  WebOne informed that these satellites will enable global services in Alaska, Northern Europe, Greenland, Iceland, the Arctic Seas, and Canada in 2021 apart from the just UK. 

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Fast broadband globally

“It’s inspiring to be part of a fast-returning organization refocused on our mission of bringing connectivity to everyone, everywhere. Each launch moves us closer to our goal of building this much needed global, secure, trusted, enterprise-grade broadband network, powered from space. We look forward to offering our commercial services to global users,” OneWeb CEO, Neil Masterson said. According to the  Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, the coronavirus pandemic has created an overwhelming demand for fast broadband service globally. Therefore, OneWeb aims to deliver broadband connectivity to communities, towns, and regions left unconnected or under-connected.

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