Salvage of AMC 14 Cast Aside

[Stan Sherman]

Boeing Patent Shuts Down AMC-14 Lunar Flyby Salvage Attempt

De orbit possible by this friday!

[K9SAT]

That is Sad! Indeed sad!

Boeing Patent Shuts Down AMC-14 Lunar Flyby Salvage Attempt

illustration onlyby Staff Writers
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Apr 10, 2008
Attempts to salvage a wayward GEO comsat have come unstuck in the face of institutional disinterest and an aging patent of questionable validity.

The AMC-14 commercial geostationary satellite was launched in March by a Proton launch vehicle into space just short of its minimum geostationary transfer orbit (GTO).
SES Americom, the world's largest commercial satellite firm, owns the satellite and was to lease capacity on AMC-14 to the Echostar group.
Following the failed launch, SES Americom looked into how they might salvage the satellite in a manner similar to the Asiasat-3 salvage in 1998.
However, SpaceDaily has now learned that a plan to salvage AMC-14 was abandoned a week ago when SES gave up in the face of patent issues relating to the lunar flyby process used to bring wayward GEO birds back to GEO Earth orbit.
Sources have told SpaceDaily that it was possible to bring AMC-14 back via the moon to a stable GEO orbit where the high powered satellite would have been able to operate for at four years and probably longer.
In the face of unrelated legal battles between the current patent owner Boeing and the satellite's owner SES Americom - any efforts to salvage AMC-14 have been cast aside.
Primarily this is because SES is currently suing Boeing for an unrelated New Skies matter in the order of $50 million dollars - and Boeing told SES that the patent was only available if SES Americom dropped the lawsuit.
Industry sources have told SpaceDaily that the patent is regarded as legal "trite", as basic physics has been rebranded as a "process", and that the patent wouldn't stand up to any significant level of court scrutiny and was only registered at the time as "the patent office was incompetent when it came to space matters".
SES has decided not to pursue any legal options against Boeing and wants to collect their insurance policy payout. However, their insurance company was not being fully briefed on the options and at this time is planning to pay the policy out.
Separately, another company has approached the insurers about buying the spacecraft for salvage using the lunar flyby option. Initially, the insurers were surprised as they had no knowledge of this option and suggested that they contact SES Americom directly.
While most satellite insurance policies allow the insurer to take ownership of a satellite when they pay a claim, they rarely do this. The default is instead to leave "ownership" with the operators, who are then legally obliged to safely deorbit the satellite or move the satellite into a GEO parking orbit. At this stage SES Americom is working with a major US space consultancy to rapidly deorbit the satellite - as early as this Friday. SpaceDaily has been told that various attempts by third parties to buy the satellite have been ignored and both parties are "eager to splash the satellite within days".

[jcrandall]

Not good, if the insurance company is willing to pay, and Boeing isn't cooperative, the AMC14 is a dead-duck, pardon the pun.

[RVD420]

That sucks

[jacmyoung]

Well I hope no one held their breadth when we speculated and designed a rescue plan ourselves at the time.

[digiblur]

What did I say when we found the launch went bad?

[Kb Cool]

Oh no,
More HDLITE is on the way and what we have now will get worse. I was hoping with the launch of this sat DISH would up the channel bit rate on this sat.
Still, I wonder if the "another company" that wants to buy this sat from the insurers is DISH?

[CJPC]

If I were Echostar, I would buy the satellite from the insurance company at a bargain basement price, pay Boeing any licensing fees for use of the patent, and be done with it. You would own a satellite good for a few years at a decent price, keep your customers happy too - a win win!

But alas, I am not!

Though, makes me wonder If thy already tried, or they might get ready to do just that...

[Drone35]

Well at least we can quit worrying the fate of AMC-14, God speed and good reddens!

[LASooner]

How do you patent physics?