MOSCOW (Sputnik) – The Russian track means have registered that two small spacecraft had detached from a large US military carrier satellite on the geostationary orbit, and Russia has been registering manoeuvres of one of these spacecraft since 2018, the Russian Astro Space Center said in a document obtained by Sputnik on Sunday.
According to the document, the Russian automated system for warning about hazardous situations in the near-Earth space environment registered the detachment of USA-285 and USA-286 subsatellites from the EAGLE carrier satellite on April 23, 2018.
The analysis of their movement revealed an unpredictable change in the trajectory of one of them, which may be a sign of manoeuvring capabilities, the document said.
Earlier, Astro Space Center said in a document that the Russian systems had registered intensive movement of four US GSSAP military satellites.
The Geosynchronous Space Situational Awareness Program (GSSAP), is a space surveillance satellite program operated by the United States Air Force. GSSAP spacecraft provide characterization of other satellites in Earth’s orbit. There are four spacecraft that operate in “near-geosynchronous orbit.”
Sourse: sputniknews.com
