Intelsat Satellite Goes Dark, Anomaly Impacts StarBand

[Gregg Lengling]

Intelsat said its Intelsat Americas 7 satellite experienced a sudden electrical distribution anomaly that caused the permanent loss of the spacecraft during the weekend.

The satellite loss impacted users with the StarBand service. Howard Lossing, vice president of marketing for StarBand, said the satellite anomaly has impacted about 20,000 customers, and the company is working hard to restore service to those affected by the outage.

StarBand has capacity aboard another satellite, the AMC-4 spacecraft operated by SES Americom. "We are very thankful that we have more than one satellite," Lossing said.

Also, StarBand is working to secure extra capacity, and is talking with Intelsat and other satellite companies about gaining that orbital space. "We feel that Intelsat should share our moral obligation to serve our customers," Lossing said.

Once extra capacity is obtained, StarBand will rely on its team of certified installers to re-point customer dishes, Lossing said.

The Intelsat Americas 7 satellite, which operated at 129 degrees, launched in September 1999 and covered the continental United States, Alaska, Hawaii, Canada, Central America and parts of South America. The satellite was self-insured by Intelsat. Intelsat said it's working to restore service for the satellite's users, and most have found service aboard other satellites.