Posted: Tue, Apr 24, 2001, 10:03 AM ET (1403 GMT)
A pair of unrelated technical problems temporarily disabled two communications satellites over the weekend. PanAmSat announced Monday that its Galaxy 3R communications satellite lost its primary spacecraft control processor (SCP) at 2:40 pm EDT (1840 GMT) Saturday, causing an outage of its C- and Ku-band transponders for two hours until the backup SCP restored control of the spacecraft. The failure of the SCP is believed to be related to a defect in the Boeing 601 (formerly Hughes HS-601) class of communication satellites that may affect all such satellites built before August 1997. The failure has been implicated in past satellite failures, including the loss of the Solidaridad 1 spacecraft last August. In an unrelated incident, Loral reported late Monday that its Telstar 6 spacecraft was offline for over 24 hours Sunday and early Monday after its primary CPU failed at 3:30 am EDT (0730 GMT) Sunday. Control of the spacecraft was restored at 6:00 am EDT (1000 GMT) Monday when the spacecraft switched to its secondary CPU. Other Loral Skynet and Loral Global Alliance spacecraft handed the communications Telstar 6 would have relayed when it was offline. The cause of the failure of the CPU was not immediately reported, although it is not likely related to the Galaxy 3R failure as Telstar 6 is a Space Systems/Loral 1300 class spacecraft.

Related Links:

•  PanAmSat press release
•  Loral press release