[Satellite TODAY 04-22-11] Orbital Sciences Corp. reported a 52 percent jump in revenue at its satellites and space segment during the company’s 2011 first fiscal quarter, backed by reported earnings of $12.3 million, compared with earnings of $9.3 million during the same period in 2009, the company announced in its latest financial results, issued April 21.
    Orbital’s satellites and space systems segment revenue grew to $152.7 million due to increased activity on communications satellite contracts, science and remote sensing satellite contracts, the company said.
    Overall, Orbital Sciences ended the quarter with a $1.6 billion backlog and a healthy gain in earnings, even as the failure of its Taurus XL rocket mission to launch a NASA satellite in March reduced operating income by 42 percent. Orbital spokesman Barron Beneski said that while the company collected insurance to offset the loss of a payment from NASA, the failure would still be costly in the long-term.
    "We will probably spend about $1.5 million investigating what went wrong and implementing a fix," Beneski said in a statement.