Intense solar storm damages Galaxy-15 satellite used by media
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A geomagnetic storm that made no difference to life on Earth damaged a major communication satellite on August 19, reports say.
The storm hit the Galaxy-15 broadcast satellite operated by international satellite firm, Intelsat frying its circuitry and electronics, thus rendering it dud.
The satellite, equipped with 24 C-band transponders that cater to media customers along with L-band payload, was previously used by the US Federal Aviation Administration to relay GPS information to aircraft.
Intelsat is currently offloading its customers to another satellite and efforts are on to regain control of the satellite, according to spacenews.com
Scientists say that the sun is bursting with energy hurtling dangerous flares towards planets.
A geomagnetic storm is a temporary disturbance of the Earth's magnetosphere from a solar wind shock wave and or cloud of magnetic field that interacts with the Earth's magnetic field.
Intelsat spokesperson Melissa Longo reportedly said that the satellite is otherwise operating nominally, keeping earth pointing with all payload operations nominal.
As the Sun was greatly active in the last week, 17 coronal mass ejections were observed during the period, along with 19 solar flares and 11 sunspots. Also reports say that several new sunspots have been observed popping up on the surface.
