Modern communications satellites receive and retransmit signals, but NASA’s first successful one carried no communications transponder. Echo 1A, launched in 1960, was a 30-metre-wide aluminized balloon that relayed radio signals simply by reflecting them between ground stations.

Echo 1A carried no transponder: ground stations relayed voice, radio and television by bouncing signals from a 30.5-metre aluminium-coated balloon in orbit. The post Modern communications satellites receive and retransmit signals, but NASA’s first successful one carried no communications transponder. Echo 1A, launched in 1960, was a 30-metre-wide aluminized balloon that relayed radio signals simply by reflecting them between ground stations. appeared first on Space Daily .