Spacenews.com reported the mission as follows, “SpaceX launched the first television broadcast satellite under SES’s C-band clearing plan June 29 from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at 5:04 p.m. Eastern carrying the SES-22 satellite, which will help SES reap billions of dollars from vacating C-band frequencies for U.S. 5G networks.
SES-22 separated from the rocket in geostationary transfer orbit about 33 minutes later.
The Falcon 9’s reusable first stage successfully landed on a SpaceX drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean following the launch.
The booster previously supported a mission in May for Starlink, SpaceX’s broadband megaconstellation.
SES-22 is the first to launch of six geostationary satellites that SES ordered to migrate broadcast customers into a narrower swath of C-band.
SES and other C-band holders are in line for $9.7 billion in total from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) if they meet its deadlines for clearing 300 MHz of the spectrum.
The 3,500 kilogram SES-22 satellite was built by Thales Alenia Space, which is also constructing the company’s SES-23 C-band replacement satellite.
Northrop Grumman and Boeing are also building two C-band satellites apiece for SES.
United Launch Alliance is slated to launch two SES C-band replacement satellites in the third quarter of 2022, and SpaceX is due to deploy another two later in the year.
The sixth satellite is being used as a ground spare.”
Please use the following spaceX.com link for a replay of the launch.
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