In a fascinating 18th June 2020 article at the Institute of Electrical and
Electronics Engineers (IEEE) spectrum magazine web site, Nola Taylor Redd
reports on zombie spacecraft, the Inter-Agency Space Debris Coordination
Committee (IADC) mandated graveyard orbits and the work of
the NASA/Grumman Mission Extension Vehicles (MEV) in resurrecting
decrepit satellites and moving others to the graveyard.
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Originally Posted by Nola Taylor Redd, IEEE Spectrum, 18th June 2020
In February, MEV-1 successfully brought a zombie satellite back from the graveyard back into geostationary orbit, where it now serves over 30 customers. Launched in 2001, the satellite eventually ran out of fuel and retired to the satellite graveyard. Without fuel, it could no longer adjust its orbit, though its other systems remained functional.
The MEV-1 was designed for interfacing with single-use satellites like the zombie satellite. By docking with the satellite's liquid apogee engine, a common feature that helps most geostationary satellites finalize their orbits at the start of their lifetime, MER-1 captured the satellite and began to lower its orbit, putting the dead satellite back into play at the start of April. MEV-1 will remain connected to the Intelsat for the next five years, then return it to the graveyard. MEV-1 will then proceed to its next customer.
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Article here :-
https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/...-the-graveyard