Jonathan's Space Report
No. 860 draft 2026 Sep 1 Bromley, UK
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Update:
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Construction on my new Space Library near London is sort-of-proceeding, with, alas, further delays.
Updates at https://www.gofundme.com/f/fund-jonathans-space-report-library-transition
ISS
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Expedition 75 is underway.
On Sep 1 Adenot and Meir, in suits 3003 and 3015, carried out US EVA-99.
They replaced a planar retroreflector antenna on IDA-2, and replaced an EHDC camera at CP3.
They also installed some cables, obtained samples from the ISS exterior to test for
microorganisms, and performed some prep work for maintenance of the AMS experiment.
Depressurization to repressurization was 1231 to 1929 UTC.
Cygnus NG-24 performed an orbit raising burn of 1.2m/s on Aug 27 at 1653 UTC.
Progress MS-33 undocked from the Poisk module at 1518 UTC Sep 7 and was deorbited at 1827 UTC
with entry over the South Pacific at around 1909 UTC.
The Progress MS-35 cargo ship was launched on Sep 16.
Starlink Launches
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Starlink Group 15-23 (27 Ku sats) was launched on Sep 2 by Falcon 9 from Vandenberg.
Starlink Group 15-24 (27 Ku sats) was launched on Sep 6 by Falcon 9 from Vandenberg.
Other F9 launches
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On Sep 10 SpaceX launched the USSF-153 (SBST R-2) mission for the US Space Force Space Based
Sensing and Targeting program, with 23 paylaods codenamed USA 644 to USA 666.
On Sep 13 SpaceX launched three O3b mPOWER communications sats for SES.
On Sep 17 SpaceX launched an unknown number of satellites as part of the US Space Force SBST TH-1 program.
Zhishenxing-1
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The US Space Force did not catalog the Zhishenxing-1 (Pallas-1) test flight
and Galactic Energy have not released any orbital parameters so I regard success of the launch
as still subject to confirmation.
For the time being I am assigning it the 'uncataloged' designation 2026-U05.
I believe it likely that the vehicle reached a 500 km orbit
and then was actively deorbited over the Pacific on the first or second
orbit. The likely entry location is the south Pacific west of Chile, perhaps around 91W 40S,
at around 0250 UTC Sep 1.
However, there does not appear to have been a NOTAM for the reentry area, which
one might expect if entry of the vehicle was expected. This leaves the possibility
that Galactic Energy are mistaken about their data and the vehicle did not
in fact reach the intended, or any, orbit.
In any case, lack of any Space Force cataloged objects after 5 days (at this writing)
makes it unlikely that objects associated with the launch remain in orbit.
I urge Galactic Energy to release a full set of orbital elements for the achieved orbit
as well as the deorbit time and reentry location.
Rocket Lab
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Rocket Lab Electron flight 94 placed Synspective's Strix-9 radar sat in orbit on Sep 2.
Rocket Lab Electron flight 95 placed BlackSky's Global-36 imaging sat orbit on Sep 11.
ISRO
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ISRO launched GSLV Mk II flight F17 on Sep 3, placing the GISAT-1A (EOS-05) imaging satellite in
subsynchronous transfer orbit.
ISAR
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ISAR Aerospace launched the second Spectrum rocket from Andoya on Sep 5, and successfully
reached orbit. This is the first orbital launch from Andoya and the first from western Europe.
Five cubesats were deployed; an additional experiment remained attached to the upper stage.
SAST launches
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SAST launched a CZ-4B from Jiuquan on Sep 10, placing six Yaogan satellites in orbit.
SAST/CACL launched a CZ-12 from Hainan on Sep 17 with the Xingwang Group 25 internet satellites.
Chinese spaceplane
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On Sep 11 US Space Force cataloged a further object (object J)
associated with the Chinese spaceplane. This deployment coincides with a
series of manuevers that began on Sep 4. Object J may be another small
satellite deployment and proximity operations experiment similar to
object H, which was deployed on Jun 21 and was also associated with a
flurry of small orbit adjustments. US tracking data for object H shows
it well within 1 km of the spaceplane from Jul 12 to Aug 31, and I
suspect it may have actually been grappled by the spaceplane during that
period and then redeployed on Sep 1.
I don't have any orbital data yet for object J, and I don't yet rule out that it's actually the *same*
subsatellite as object H.
Avio
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Italy's Avio launched a Vega-C from Kourou on Sep 15 with the EU's
Sentinel-3C ocean color/altimetry satellite and ESA's FLEX vegetation
flourescence monitoring sat, placing them in 820 km orbit. The VESPA+R
payload adapter was jettisoned into a 655 x 818 km orbit.
Chinese commercial launches
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Landspace launched a ZQ-2E on Sep 15 with ten Qianfan internet satellites aboard.
Orienspace launched a Yinli-1 on Sep 15 from the S China Sea with eight Qianfan sats and a EUHT test sat.
EUHT is a Chinese WLAN internet standard; the satellite is owned by Xinan Xian Keji (Nufront Technology).
Expace launched a Kuaizhou-11 on Sep 17 from Jiuquan with the Tianyi-51 and 52 C-band radar satellites
built by Tianyi for Yunnan Geology Group and Xinglianti (Wuxi) Aerospace Tech.
US Space Weapons
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The US government (in the person of SecAF Troy Meink) has announced that
it has deployed space weapons in orbit. Victoria Samson (Secure World
Foundation) has suggested they are likely to be radio jammer weapons
rather than kinetic ASATs, and I agree. My suspicion is that the weapons are on
the 17 secret small satellites deployed to GEO drift orbit since 2022 that I call 'USSF GEO Patrol'.
I emphasize that this is just a guess. But the sats are clearly a deployed system rather than one-off
test vehicles, and treated as highly classified with no orbital data released. UN orbit registration data
have however been provided for the first five, showing them in typical GEO relocation drift.
The GEO Patrol sats were released from LDPE tugs from the USSF-44, USSF-51, USSF-106 and USSF-87 mission.
Here are the details of these satellites:
SSN COSPAR Public name My name Launch Parent Deployed Mission
S56307 2022-144J USA 344 [USSF GEO Patrol 01] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2023 Apr? USSF-44 PL7
S60741 2022-144K USA 399 [USSF GEO Patrol 02] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2024 Aug? USSF-44 PL8
S64289 2022-144L USA 546 [USSF GEO Patrol 03] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun? USSF-44 PL9
S64466 2022-144M USA 547 [USSF GEO Patrol 04] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun? USSF-44 PL10
S64722 2022-144N USA 548 [USSF GEO Patrol 05] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun 30? USSF-44 PL11
S65156 2022-144P USA 551 [USSF GEO Patrol 06] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun 30? USSF-44 PL12
S65157 2022-144Q USA 552 [USSF GEO Patrol 07] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun 30? USSF-44 PL13
S65158 2022-144R USA 553 [USSF GEO Patrol 08] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Jun 30? USSF-44 PL14
S65650 2022-144S USA 556 [USSF GEO Patrol 09] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Sep 17? USSF-44 PL15
S65651 2022-144T USA 557 [USSF GEO Patrol 10] 2022 Nov 1 S54219 2025 Sep 17? USSF-44 PL16
S65724 2024-134H USA 566 [USSF GEO Patrol 11] 2024 Jul 30 S60322 2025 Sep 30? USSF-51 PL4
S66145 2024-134J USA 567 [USSF GEO Patrol 12] 2024 Jul 30 S60322 2025 Oct 20? USSF-51 PL5
S66551 2024-134K USA 568 [USSF GEO Patrol 13] 2024 Jul 30 S60322 2025 Nov 30? USSF-51 PL6
S66552 2024-134L USA 569 [USSF GEO Patrol 14] 2024 Jul 30 S60322 2025 Nov 30? USSF-51 PL7
S67480 2025-173E USA 571 [USSF GEO Patrol 15] 2025 Aug 13 S65161 2026 Jan? USSF-106 PL3
S100643 2026-029F USA 643 [USSF GEO Patrol 16] 2026 Feb 12 S67761 2026 Sep? USSF-87 PL4
S100685 2024-134M USA 667 [USSF GEO Patrol 17] 2024 Jul 30 S60322 2026 Sep? USSF-51 PL8
Table of Recent Orbital (and near-Orbital) Launches
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Date UT Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission INTL. Catalog Perigee Apogee Incl Notes
Aug 27 2011 MTG-I2 Ariane 62 Kourou Weather 198A 248 x 35650 x 6.0
Aug 30 1125 Roman Space Telescope Falcon Heavy Kennedy LC39A Astronomy 199 190 x 1200000 x 33.7
Sep 1 0200 ZSX-1 test flight Zhishenxing-1 Jiuquan Test U05 Unconfirmed
Sep 2 0842 Starlink Group 15-23 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 200 248 x 261 x 70.0
Sep 2 1201 StriX-9 Electron Mahia LC1B Radar 201A 538 x 582 x 38.1
Sep 3 1100? Cesario ION, LEO Comms 156CE
Sep 3 2125 GISAT-1A GSLV Mk II Satish Dhawan SLP Imaging 202A 154 x 30963 x 19.3
Sep? USA 643 LDPE USA 584,GSO Unk 29F
Sep 5 2012 CyBEESat Spectrum Andoya Tech 203 510 x 600 x 97.4
TriSat-S Tech 203
Platform 6 Tech 203
SpaceTeamSat1 Tech 203
FramSat-1 Tech 203
Let It Go Tech 203
Sep 6 1426 Starlink Group 15-24 Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms 204 248 x 262 x 70.0
Sep 10 0900 Yaogan 53-01 to 53-03 Chang Zheng 4B Jiuquan Sigint? 205 513 x 523 x 45.0
Yaogan 56-01 to 56-03 Sigint? 205 513 x 523 x 45.0
Sep 10 1542 USSF-153 (SBST R-2) Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Comms? 206
Sep 11 0328 Global-36 Electron Mahia LC1A Imaging 207A 492 x 507 x 36.0
Sep? USA 667 LDPE USA 396,GSO Unk 24134M
Sep 13 1849 O3b mPOWER 11, 12, 13 Falcon 9 Canaveral LC40 Comms 208 300 x 6660 x 16.9
Sep 15 0121 Sentinel-3C Vega-C Kourou Imaging 209 814 x 824 x 98.6
FLEX EO Sci 209
Sep 15 0626 Qianfan Digui 19 zu Zhuque 2E Jiuquan Comms 210 897 x 907 x 89.0
Sep 15 2200 Qianfan Digui 26 zu Yinli-1 DFHT, East China Sea Comms 211
EUHT JSW Comms 211
Sep 16 1333 Progress MS-35 Soyuz-2-1b Baykonur LC31 Cargo 212A
Sep 17 0032 Xingwang 25 Chang Zheng 12 Hainan Comms 213
Sep 17 0129 USSF-259 (SBST TH-1) Falcon 9 Vandenberg SLC4E Unk 214
Sep 17 0240 Tianyi-51 Kuaizhou-11 Jiuquan Radar 215
Tianyi-52 Radar 215
Table of Recent Suborbital Launches
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Date UT Payload/Flt Name Launch Vehicle Site Mission Apogee/km Target
Aug 27? RVs Yars Plesetsk Test 1000? Kura
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| Jonathan McDowell | |
| Bromley, UK | inter : planet4589 at gmail |
| | twitter: @planet4589 |
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