A Russian military satellite called Luch-2 was found close to a geostationary satellite last month, a maneuver that follows in the footsteps of its predecessor, which has been found several times since 2014 while eavesdropping on other countries’ satellites.
Aldoria, a French startup that tracks satellites in orbit using a network of ground-based telescopes, warned satellite operators in May 2024 that it had detected a “sudden close approach” of Russia’s Luch-2 to a satellite was in geostationary orbit. Luch-2’s maneuver took place on April 12, 2024, about 22,232 miles (35,780 kilometers) from Earth’s surface, the company said in a rack.
Aldoria did not reveal which satellite may have been spying on Luch-2 or exactly how close it came to the object. The minimum distance between the two objects was 10 kilometers, while today (June 3) they are about 20 to 50 kilometers apart, Aldoria PR manager Saloua Moutaufik told Space.com in an email.
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News of this close approach comes shortly after US intelligence officials and the Pentagon accused Russia of militarizing space by placing another military inspector satellite in the same orbit as a US government satellite.
The Russian satellite, Cosmos 2576, “is likely a counterspace weapon likely capable of attacking other satellites in low Earth orbit,” U.S. Ambassador Robert Wood said at a May 20 meeting. UN Security Council Meeting. Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov has denied the Pentagon’s claims as fake news.
Meanwhile, the Russian Luch-2, also known as Olymp-2, launched in secret in March 2024 and in October of that year it moved within 60 kilometers of another geostationary spacecraft. According to autonomous monitoring, he had left this position in early December and was loitering near another satellite Catapult space travela space data analytics company focused on the safety of spaceflight.
On both occasions, Slingshot did not identify the satellites, but company representatives told SpaceNews that the information could be useful to satellite operators concerned about safety in space.
Luch-2’s recent maneuvers are not unprecedented when it comes to the behavior of Russian spacecraft. The satellite’s predecessor, Luch-1, was a known intruder found several times near other countries’ satellites, including in 2015 when the satellite sparked international concern after flying directly between two Intelsat satellites for five months. was parked, sometimes maneuvering to about 20 feet. miles (10 kilometers) from US space vehicles.
Although Intelsat officials said at the time that the Russian satellite did not interfere with their satellite services, this was the first publicly documented incident of a commercial operator being contacted by a foreign military satellite. SpaceNews reports this. In 2018, France accused Russia of using Luch-1 to try to intercept communications from one of the country’s satellites used for military purposes, calling this “not only unfriendly, but also an act of espionage.”
A analysis As of 2020, Luch-1 had jumped between at least 19 different spots around the geostationary belt, according to a U.S. nonprofit think tank. Such maneuvers by Luch-1, which Russia launched in 2014, created “a heightened sense of vigilance within the space.” community,” Aldoria said in the press release last week.
“Luch-2, like its predecessor, has a history of unusual maneuvering near other satellites in geostationary orbit, which has also raised suspicions about its mission,” the company wrote.