Alouette 1

Alouette 1 was Canada's first satellite. He was shot in 1962 in the Orbit - five years after the USSR had sent in 1957, its first satellite, Sputnik 1, into orbit, and four years after the U.S. had Explorer 1 launched. Thus, Canada was the third nation with a satellite in orbit. The name is derived from the Alouette French word for skylark and a title of a popular French-Canadian folk song.

Satellite launch and mission progress

Alouette 1 was shot from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on September 29, 1962 at 06:05 UTC in orbit around the Earth. Alouettes task was to investigate the ionosphere, a region of the upper atmosphere, where many future satellites would be placed. Alouettes mission took 10 years before the unit was switched off on schedule. The mission director was the Canadian John Herbert Chapman.

In June 2010, Alouette 1 was circling still in orbit and some of the former leaders assumed that there is little chance for its reactivation would be in transmission of the activation signal.

Multiple construction

Two further satellites were built for redundancy in the event of a malfunction; if the first satellite were to fail, the second a few months could be launched later. It took 3 ½ years from the proposal for Alouette to its development and its construction. The mechanical frame was made ​​in Downsview from the Canadian manufacturer de Havilland Canada, this building is now the Toronto Aerospace Museum. The Satellite P27 -2 ( prototype), S27 -3 ( the satellite is used ) and S27 -4 ( backup) were fitted by the Defense Telecommunications Establishment Electronics Lab in Ottawa. The batteries used for Alouette were developed by a division of the Canadian Defence Research Board and were responsible for the long life of the satellite. The antennas used were two 45.7 m and 22.8 m long dipole antennas. After completion Alouette weighed 145.7 kg and was launched by a two-stage Thor - Agena B rocket. The backup satellite Alouette 1 was launched in 1965 as an Alouette 2 to replace the older Alouette 1.