Prospero X-3

The Prospero X-3 satellite (official designation 05580 / 71093A) is the only satellite to be launched by a British rocket.

X-3 was launched on 28 October 1971 from Launch Area 5B (LA-5B) at Woomera, South Australia on a Black Arrow rocket, making Britain the sixth nation to place a satellite into orbit using a domestically developed launch vehicle (after the USSR, USA, France, Japan and China).

The satellite contains a single experiment to test solar cells. A tape recorder is also on board, which failed on 24 May 1973 after 730 plays.

As of 2006, radio transmissions from Prospero can still be heard on 137.560 MHz, ["Coast", 2006/10/26, Series 2 Episode 1, BBC] although it had officially been switched off in 1996 when the UK's Defence Research Establishment decommissioned their satellite tracking station at Lasham, Hampshire.

It is in a low Earth orbit with an expected lifetime of about 100 years.

Technical data

Notes

ee also

*Timeline of artificial satellites and space probes

External links

*http://homepage.powerup.com.au/~woomera/bkarrow.htm Prospero's launch vehicle
*http://www.astronautix.com/craft/prospero.htm
* [http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/spacecraftDisplay.do?id=1971-093A 1971-093A]
*BBC Radio 4 – [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/archivehour/pip/d97r6/ "The Archive Hour – Britain's Space Race"] . 11 August 2007.