Eutelsat Communications has been advised by Sea Launch of a delay to the planned launch on April 15 of the Eutelsat 3B satellite.
Sea Launch confirmed in a statement that during the final “dry” roll-out phase of integrated launch vehicle processing in support of the Eutelsat 3B mission, a discrepancy in the nominal movement of the cable-mast and the Zenit-2S launch vehicle lateral plate occurred while installing the integrated launch vehicle onto the launch pad.
A decision was made to demate the Payload Unit (comprising the satellite, adapter and fairing) and the Block-DM-Sea Launch in order to resolve the discrepancy, establish the root cause and perform additional checks of the interface between the launch vehicle and Ground Support Equipment connectors.
Once the above tasks have been completed, Sea Launch will advise Eutelsat of the updated schedule and launch day for Eutelsat 3B.
The Eutelsat 3B satellite was not powered on during the operation on the launch vehicle and was unaffected. It remains in a safe configuration.
