[Ariane signs South Korea's Kompsat-6 satellite launch contract]
On May 31, Arianespace announced a satellite launch contract with the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) to launch the Earth observation satellite Kompsat-6 using a Vega C carrier rocket, as early as December 2024 from the French Guiana cosmodrome.
Kompsat-6 is KARI's second synthetic aperture radar imaging satellite, which will replace its predecessor, Kompsat-5. The Earth observation satellite will carry two payloads, the SAR instrument (X-band synthetic aperture radar) and the S-AIS (Automatic Satellite Identification System). The SAR payload is a high-resolution, all-weather imager with a wide range of applications in mapping, geographic information systems, environmental and disaster monitoring, and marine and land management. The S-AIS payload is a maritime wireless system used to identify the location, heading, destination, and cargo of large vessels, with the primary purpose of preventing collisions between large vessels, and has additional applications in maritime traffic management.
XSAR has 4 operating modes: High Resolution A, High Resolution B, Standard and Wide with resolutions of 0.5 m, 1.0 m, 3.0 m and 20 m, and widths of 5 km, 10 km, 30 km and 100 km. The instrument operates at 9.66 GHz (X-band), has a wavelength of 320 mm, and an angle of incidence of 20°-60°. It is capable of unipolarization, dual polarization, or quad-polarization (HH, HV, VH, VV) with an onboard storage capacity of 1Tbit. The S-AIS operates in the VHF (very high frequency) band and has 4GB of data memory.
The KOMPSAT-6 satellite will operate in a sun-synchronous orbit with an average altitude of 550 km, an inclination of 98.1° and a repetition period of 28 days.
The Vega C launch vehicle, a new European launch vehicle, made its first launch on July 13, 2022, placing seven satellites into orbit, but during the second launch (first commercial launch) on December 21, the second stage of the rocket failed and two Pléiades Neo imaging satellites were lost.
