In an update, Amazon said it is beginning the final stage of the prototype mission, demonstrating active deorbit.
The most recent Protoflight tests involved the RF communications payload, which includes a combination of parabolic antennas, phased array antennas, and additional innovations that allowed Amazon to send customer data traffic across the network.
The prototype satellites include advanced optical communications payloads which completed multiple successful demonstrations. In the tests in early November last year, the payloads maintained 100 Gbps links over nearly 1-[000 kilometres over an hour. Amazon is planning to include multiple optical terminals on every Kuiper satellite.
The prototype Kuiper satellites are equipped with optical inter-satellite links, which use lasers to transmit data between satellites in orbit. Amazon said they will allow its satellites to form a mesh network and can move data approximately 30% faster than if it travelled via terrestrial fibre optic cables.
“Amazon’s optical mesh network will provide multiple paths to route data through space, creating resiliency and redundancy for users who need to securely transport information around the world,” said Ricky Freeman, vice president of Kuiper Government Solutions. “This is especially important for those looking to avoid communications architectures that can be intercepted or jammed.”
The Project Kuiper team also designed an optics and control system to address the challenges of maintaining a strong signal and maintaining the connection between spacecraft while they are moving at speeds of up to 25 000 km per hour, while compensating for satellite and flight dynamics.
“This system is designed fully in-house to optimise for speed, cost, and reliability, and the entire architecture has worked flawlessly from the very start,” commented Rajeev Badyal, Project Kuiper’s vice president of technology. “These immediate results are only possible because we approached our OISL architecture as one part of a fully integrated system design.”
“The last milestone in our Protoflight mission is deorbiting Kuipersat-1 and Kuipersat-2. As part of our orbital debris mitigation plan and broader commitment to space safety and sustainability, we plan to actively deorbit all satellites within one year of their mission ending, and this final phase in the Protoflight mission will allow us to collect data on the deorbit process as we gradually lower satellites from their initial target altitude,” the company said.
Amazon said it will take the next several months to execute controlled manoeuvres with the propulsion systems onboard in order to deorbit. Amazon said the satellites had a “100% success rate across key mission objectives.”
Amazon is ramping up production for Project Kuiper ahead of full-scale deployment. Satellite manufacturing is underway at a recently opened full-rate factory in Kirkland, Washington. The company is preparing for full-scale deployment during the next few months and to have enough satellites in orbit to begin early customer pilots in the second half of 2024.
