The ILS launch team has settled in at Baikonur. Team members report that they celebrated Independence Day by reading Thomas Jefferson’s draft of the Declaration of Independence on the way to Yubileiny Airport at 0800 to offload the satellite test equipment, and then working until 1830. They had a picnic the following day to commemorate the holiday. Meanwhile, the spacecraft has landed! Early Sunday morning the Inmarsat-4 F3 satellite arrived at Yubileiny Airport aboard an AN-124-100 Ruslan aircraft owned by Russia’s Polyet cargo airlines. The satellite was taken to Building 92A-50 for assembly and testing. Everything else is going up to par, as well. Pictures soon, as well as some first-hand reports from the launch team…
