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Telstar 4 is Down
An anonymous reader writes "Sometime this morning (Sept. 19) Telstar 4 had a major onboard failure. I just checked a few minutes ago and there are CW carriers up on 11700 MHz V & 12200 MHz H, so the spacecraft would appear to still be in its orbital slot - just no traffic. The Loral Skynet site has no mention of this yet, but supposedly Telstar 8 was already scheduled to replace T4, so they may just speed the process up. This turn of events will no doubt be of some small concern to Intelsat, who recently agreed to purchase most of Loral's US domestic fleet, including T4."
My girlfriend always told me that when I talk tech with fellow tech-heads I make no sense at all.
"It's hard for me to believe it's even English you're speaking. I don't recognize any of the words."
Reading this Slashdot post just made me understand what she means.
It's like a bad sci-fi screenplay!
(Telstar? CW carriers? 11700 MHz V & 12200 MHz H? orbital slot? Intelsat? Loral's US domestic fleet?)
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Loral Skynet site has no mention of this yet, but supposedly Telstar 8 was already scheduled to replace T4 Already at the T4? Did I miss the T2?
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Guys, please stop playing with your Wifi devices.
See the results...
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This is a crisis of earth-shattering proportions for many.
:-)
One of Telstar 4's nicknames in the industry is "nookiesat" -- as it carries several of the leading porn channels in the US.
Yes, but don't worry ... It'll be back.
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that would be a hell of a hurricane if its damaging satalites!
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Does the internet still work?
Can we still download the latest Windows security patches?
Do we still get stupid invoices from sco.com?
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Telstar 4 is one of the most heavily used TV satellites. We had to move our channels over to Telstar 6 for the time being. (I work for the Erotic Networks) It caries many of the east coast ABC and CBS feeds. I'm sure they were scrambling to find alternate carriers just like we were this morning.
"They're using our own satellites against us!"
- Jeff Goldblum in Independence Day
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Enjoy the silence while it lasts ...
Rejoice! That was the satellite that Major League Baseball was using to spy on us.
"0101100101? It's just jibberish. *looks in mirror, gasps* 1010011010@!? AHHHHHH!!"
...The opening sequence to Terminator 4: Rise of the Voting Machines?
I've heard porn was on there, and PBS broadcasts (today's schedule) using Telstars, but is that really vital? I mean, none of the internet is down, and telephone services still work. I understand that PBS is educational, but the vital services in a disaster would be news (only affected if Telstar 4 carried news), telephone, food (I don't think Telstars carry commercial transactions), water (ditto), and shelter (THAT doesn't need a Telstar).
BTW, I just checked w/ New Frontier Media (they provide those porn channels) and the channels have already been rerouted to Telstar 6.
:-)
Obviously the satellite industry has its priorities straight.
Here's a page with information on the television signals carried by Telstar 4:
http://www.lyngsat.com/t4.shtml
The last time a Telstar satelite went out of alignment about 3/4ths of the credit card processing in the US went offline. Many banks and gas stations relay their CC processing through transpoders on one of the Telstar satelites instead of dedicating a phone line on each end of the connection. It looks like T-4 is used by ABC and CBS for network programming. See This for more info.
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Please stand by.
Quick, call Jeff Goldblum!
He might be able to find the hidden carrier signal the alien fleet uses to coordinate the attack.
Well... now that that's over with, nothing left to do but go get a life, I suppose.
Telstar 4 has mutinied and is orchestrating the robot rebellion against humanity. The Loral Global Alliance faction's Loral SKYNET program has gone too far this time.
Looking at Telstar 4's coverage map, it's clear that SKYNET plans to strike first in an east-west corridor bounded by New Mexico and Ohio; the killing robot machines will move outward until they capture most of Canada, half of Mexico, and all of Hawaii.
Save us, Terminate SKYNET!
We recently had heard in the office over one of the Yellow Machine that's made by Anthology Solutions.
Here...
Here...
And here...
Telstar 4 is/was a satellite in geosynchronous orbit over the US. The satellite is used for television transmission. Signals are sent up from television facilities, bounced off the bird (nick for a satellite), and then the signal is recieved by cable companies and TV stations for relay to your house.
The main power bus on Telstar 4 died. This means it does not have the power to rebroadcast (bounce) the signals back to earth.
Kinda like the Enterprise losing the warp drive, but still having impulse power to putter around.
These birds cost US$200-300 million to build and US$100-150 million to launch. Failure of this type is a huge loss for Intelsat and a costly transition for the broadcasters.
The companies that used that bird need to switch to other ones. This causes two problems.
1) Antennas - The recievers all need to repoint their antennas at new birds. This is a pain in the ass to do precisely.
2) Bumps - Due to agreements, some companies on Telstar 4 have the right to 'bump' others off the backup birds and take their places. If you get bumped, you are fuxxored.
Make some sense now?
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Gah, I read this one 5 times and still didnt understand. After reading all the links and doing some googling here it is again in a lower form of techno-geek (or would it be higher? not sure).
T4 is a broadcast Satalite used to transmit the raw station feeds from the central offices (read networks) to local broadcasters (cable, local ABC affiliate etc).
What Data T4 is responcible for:
Robust broadcast and syndication neighborhood anchored by ABC and CBS; host to SNG, data and distance learning applications. (Also hosted is Spice Channel and two other adult viewing stations which are not mentioned on the main site)
Where it effects:
The central portion of North America
The origional poster mentions the Carrier frequencies that the data is normally transfered on. The poster also mentions that there is no data being broadcast, just the main freq.
I have no way of confirming this myself, and dont see anything about it on any of the satalite pages. All they report is that a satalite is up and running (i.e. the Carrier frequency is present, but nothing on the data being transmitted)
As for the information on replacing the old T4 with T8, well T8 is currently handling south america, and the information I could find on google about the sale of the out dated satalites it vague at best.
Who does this effect:
Possably people out in the midwest are not getting any TV on their cable boxes.
mostlikly its effecting the cable companies and local affiliates who need to reroute to another satalite, and the central offices which also need to switch the feeds to other sat feed providers.
In the end nothing is confirmed.
I called Skynet, and this was their quote:
"Telstar 4 experienced a short circuit of primary its power bus and is not fixable. This satellite is offline permanently."
I used to work for an npr station doing operations stuff, mostly catching shows off network and recording them for rebroadcast and I remember the time that their satellite had problems. actually i don't remember it, that whole time period was this haze of me not sleeping and freaking out about how we were going to get our programing and people calling in to scream at us so it was all sort of a blur. npr switched over to useing some sattelite that canadian broadcasting had space on, since we had helped them out in the past when things went wrong with their network they didn't charge us an arm and a leg. the tv networks that had to switch over had to cough up the real money though.
I found a short article that outlines some basic details of what they (Loral) know now and what they're doing to alleviate any problems to the end-user (you).
><));>
That's the same thing my girlfriend says...
Well, maybe a bit.
The 'Telstar' the parent refers to is the 1962 pop instrumental piece written by by Joe Meek and performed by the Tornadoes who became the first U.K. band to have a #1 hit in the States, even before the Beatles. 'Telstar' was inspired by the launch of Telstar 1.
Of course, this is way, way before 99.9% of the Slashdot readership were born so I'm not suprised it was missed. Hell, even I was only 1 year old.
If you don't want to repeat the past, stop living in it.
...yes yes yes, and? quite what?
I ordered the Jenna Jameson day long movie marathon on PPV this morning and had my PVR and my bottle of lotion at the ready... I am SO screwed.... and not in the good way either...! ;)
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This hasn't improved the programming any. Better luck next time? Amy
Dilbert: Won't he pop like a baloon a few seconds after he gets up there?
PHB: Will he have time to power-cycle the thingamahoey?
Dilbert: Well, I suppose so, but...
PHB: Will it be operational then?
Dilbert: I think so, but..
PHB: And this will save us how much money?
Dilbert: 25 million a day... look! That's not the point!
Wally: I think it's a brilliant plan, sir. Truly the finest.
Dilbert & Alice: WALLY!?!
Wally: What? I'm just saying....
Three days later
PHB: Okay, we're ready, Asok.
Asok: Are you sure this is such a good idea?
PHB: Perfectly safe. Perfectly safe.
Chunk....whoosh... splut...
(We see Asok's feet sticking out of the side of a building.)
PHB: For us, anyway.
120 character sigs suck. Make it 250.
I think that's the first time we've Slashdotted a satellite.