Recent News

The ZY-3 satellite was successfully launched at 11:17 a.m. January 9, 2012 aboard a Long March 4B rocket from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center. The ILRS Governing Board has approved ILRS tracking of ZY-3.
First ranges to Galileo have been achieved by the ILRS and reported on the ESA website.
Galileo-101 and -102 were launched on October 21, 2011; first ranges obtained by Concepcion on November 29, 2011.
Radioastron was launched on July 18, 2011; first ranges obtained by Grasse on November 15, 2011.
LARES has been approved for ILRS tracking.
HY-2A was launched on August 16, 2011; tracking begins September 02, 2011.
The center of mass value for the Blits satellite has been updated: http://ilrs.gsfc.nasa.gov/satellite_missions/list_of_satellites/blit_com.html
The science mission of ERS-2 ended on July 04, 2011 and the satellite has begun de-orbit maneuvers. For more information on the ERS-2 retirement, mission, successes, can be found at the ESA website.
A website for presentations and proceedings from he 17th International Workshop on Laser Ranging in Bad Koetzing Germany is now available.
On May 23, 2011, the "Tsuboi Prize 2011" of the Geodetic Society of Japan was awarded to the AJISAI Development Group (JAXA, Japan Coast Guard, GSI, NICT and Hitotsubashi University). This prize was given for the satellite development of Ajisai and the 25-year-long operation and analysis. Mr Hidekazu Hashimoto, the father of Ajisai, is the leader of this group. Pictures from the award ceremony and the plaque are available. The Geodetic Society has a webpage on this prize: http://www.geod.jpn.org/english/tsuboi.html. Congratulations to the group and thank you to Toshi Otsubo for forwarding this information to the ILRS.
GLONASS-125 has replaced GLONASS-120 in the ILRS priority list on May 04, 2011.
The 1st quarter report card has been published.
The second PROBA-2 tracking campaign was completed on 06-Feb-2011.
Professor Yang Fumin, the former vice director of Shanghai Astronomical Observatory, passed away on Wednesday, February 9, 2011. Yang was a long-time contributor to the ILRS and SLR in general; he was one of the WPLTN representatives to the ILRS Governing Board. The entire SLR community will miss Yang and his many contributions to the field.
On November 11, 2010 our colleague Wolfgang Seemueller passed away after a long illness. Wolfgang was the head of the EUROLAS Data Center (EDC) at DGFI as well as the Data Center Representative on the ILRS Governing Board. He also was also the head of the Regional Network Associate Analysis Center for SIRGAS (RNAAC-SIR). We will greatly miss Wolfgang and his contributions to the scientific community.
The first 3-way simultaneous laser ranging to LRO occurred Monday November 1st. NGSLR, MLRS, and Monument Peak all successfully ranged to LRO during the same hour period. Simultaneous data allows more detailed comparison of the station biases, potentially permits a geometric solution of the spacecraft position, and provides a demonstration of what is possible for future planetary tracking using lasers.
The CHAMP satellite re-entered Earth's atmosphere on Sept. 20, 2010.
QZS-1 was successfully launched on September 11, 2010 at 08:17:00 p.m. (JST) from the Tanegashima Space Center.
ICESat re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on August 30 at 05:00 a.m. EDT.
JAXA has informed the ILRS that laser tracking of ETS-8 is no longer required.
The ANDE Castor spacecraft re-entered the Earth's atmosphere on August 18, 2010. The last radar contact was 18-Aug-2010 at 13:54 by the Cobra Dane site.
Past news items