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South Africa’s Sumbandila satellite has finally fallen back into the atmosphere

A SumbandilaSat image of Cape Town

A SumbandilaSat image of Cape Town

Photo by Sansa

13th December 2021

By: Rebecca Campbell

Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor

     

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The South African National Space Agency (Sansa) has reported that South Africa’s second satellite, Sumbandila, deorbited on Friday, and almost certainly burnt up in the Earth’s atmosphere. Sumbandila – the name meant ‘pathfinder’ in the Venda language – was the country’s first ‘official’ satellite, having being commissioned by the then Department of Science and Technology in 2005. (SumbandilaSat, as it was also known, was preceded by SunSat, which was an initiative of Stellenbosch University.)

Originally known as the ZASat pathfinder demonstrator programme, Sumbandila was developed and assembled by Stellenbosch University and the now defunct private-sector small satellite company SunSpace (which had been spun-out of the university, following the SunSat project). SumbandilaSat was a technology demonstrator programme. Delivered during the third quarter of 2006, it was finally launched into space from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on September 17, 2009.

In orbit, Sumbandila functioned successfully for almost exactly two years. Sansa’s Space Operations complex at Hartesbeesthoek, west of Pretoria, provided monitoring and satellite support. During that time, the satellite sent back 1 128 usable high-resolution images. These included images of the Fukushima nuclear power plant disaster, and the aftermath of a major tornado in the US. Its images helped with fire campaigns in the Kruger National Park and flood monitoring in Namibia. The satellite’s images were not only fed into local research programmes but also into the European Union’s then Global Monitoring for Environment and Security programme (subsequently renamed Copernicus).

Unfortunately, Sumbandila was launched at the very start of a new solar activity cycle. The greater activity of the Sun meant the greater emission of solar radiation. And solar radiation can, and does, damage satellites. The increasing amount of radiation released from the Sun in space weather events finally disrupted the prime mission systems of the satellite. The last data regarding its primary mission was received on September 14, 2011.

 Even so, the programme brought important benefits to the country. Sansa pointed out that it re-established South Africa as a space-faring nation. It provided a significant boost to local human capital development. Nine new black South African engineers, four of them women, were trained on the Sumbandila project, while another 78 engineers widened their experience through it. At Stellenbosch University, the programme produced 18 Masters and two PhD graduates in engineering.

“Although we as a nation are saddened to witness the end of this aspirational satellite, this has led to the establishment of the nanosatellite [cubesat] missions of ZACUBE 1 and ZACUBE 2 by the Cape Peninsula University of Technology,” stated Sansa. “The satellite constellation will see the addition of a further seven nanosatellites that are in development for support to Operation Phakisa (monitoring of the marine environment and economy).”

A Space Infrastructure Hub is currently being developed in South Africa. One of the capabilities that the hub will host will be future development of various categories of satellite.

Edited by Creamer Media Reporter

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