ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA)

ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA) is a tracked piece of space debris attributed to France, launched on 1991-12-16 from Guiana Space Centre, Kourou on the Telecom 2A launch. With over 35 years in orbit, it has far exceeded many satellites’ design lifetimes. It orbits in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) at altitudes between 286 km and 19,320 km with an inclination of 3.8°. It travels at approximately 17,872 km/h (4.96 km/s), completing one full orbit every 5 hours 41 minutes — that’s roughly 4.22 orbits per day. Its orbital eccentricity of 0.5884 gives it a noticeably elliptical path, with significant altitude variation between perigee and apogee. As orbital debris, ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA) poses a potential collision risk to operational satellites in nearby orbits and is continuously monitored by the U.S. Space Surveillance Network and other tracking systems.

ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA) orbits at an average altitude of 9,803 km in Medium Earth Orbit, the region between LEO and GEO (2,000–35,786 km). MEO’s higher altitude gives each satellite a much larger ground footprint than LEO, meaning fewer spacecraft are needed for global coverage — but signal latency is higher and radiation from the Van Allen belts is a significant design constraint. Within ±50 km of ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA)’s average altitude, there are currently 0 active payloads and 15 tracked debris or rocket body fragments. This is a relatively sparse altitude band, containing less than 1% of all active satellites. With an inclination of 3.8°, ARIANE 44L DEB (SPELDA) passes over latitudes between 3.8°N and 3.8°S, concentrating coverage over equatorial and near-equatorial regions. Low-inclination orbits maximise revisit rates over specific tropical zones. France operates approximately 115 active satellites in total.