Israel's Amos-5 Satellite Failure Caused by Power Supply Malfunction

Israel's Amos-5 satellite failed as a result of a problem either with the power supply or an onboard cable network due to the external impact of high-energy cosmic particles, the manufacture of the satellite said in a statement Wednesday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Communication between the Israeli operator Spacecom and the satellite, manufactured by the Russian company JSC Academician M.F. Reshetnev Information Satellite Systems, was lost a month ago.

"At the moment, according to the research, the most likely cause of the satellite's failure is the total failure of either the power supply, or the onboard cable network… due to a complete internal component failure of the power supply or external exposure of a critical element of the power supply system to high [energy] cosmic ray particles or an onboard cable network," the manufacturer's statement reads.

AMOS-5 was launched into space on December 11, 2011 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

On Tuesday, Spacecom announced that the Amos-5 commercial satellite had completely lost power.