NASA’s top science mission planner, Associate Administrator John Grunsfeld, says NASA has the spare parts, plans and knowledge to create another Mars rover for launch in 2020. The mission, with a cost estimated by the Aerospace Corp. of $2.5 billion, needs congressional approval in what Grunsfeld acknowledges are “very tough fiscal times.” But he told members of the American Geophysical Union here Dec. 4 that the proposed mission “really reflects a strong commitment by NASA and the White House to Mars exploration.”
NEW DELHI — India has plans to launch a Geostationary Imaging Satellite (Gisat) for real-time observation over the Indian subcontinent and to shore up surveillance over its sensitive borders, a senior government official says. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is in the process of designing the Gisat, which will be placed in geostationary orbit at 36,000 km (22,369 mi.) altitude, the official tells Aviation Week. He did not specify a time frame for the launch.
BUYOUT APPROVED: Shareholders of commercial satellite imagery provider GeoEye approved a proposed buyout Dec. 3 that will leave the company’s chief U.S. competitor, DigitalGlobe of Longmont, Colo., operating the world’s largest fleet of high-resolution Earth imaging satellites. Under the terms of the merger, GeoEye shareholders can opt to take 1.137 shares of common stock and $4.10 per share in cash, a 100% cash payment totaling $20.27 per share, or 100% in stock, with each GeoEye share worth 1.425 shares of DigitalGlobe stock.
Government and industry officials from Europe and the U.S. opened discussions Nov. 30 on how to bring elements of the European Space Agency’s Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) into the service module for NASA’s Orion multipurpose crew vehicle.
Engineers do not expect three small cracks that appeared in the Orion multipurpose crew vehicle pressure vessel to delay the planned first flight of NASA's next human spacecraft in 2014. The cracks in three adjacent radial ribs machined into the aft bulkhead did not go all the way through, and the vessel continued to hold pressure after the cracks appeared when pressure reached 21.6 psi, according to a NASA spokeswoman. Orion's normal operating pressure is 14.7 psi.
Fiscal 2014—not 2013—will be the worst year for federal contractors, including defense companies, if the automatic budget cuts known as sequestration take effect in January 2013, says Alan Chvotkin, executive vice president and counsel at the Professional Services Council. That is because sequestration will not cause a sharp drop-off in contracting opportunities until then. Federal contract spending will return to growth thereafter, but under lower top-line budgets outlined by the 2011 law known as the Budget Control Act.
Limiting congressional terms brings in fresh blood, but that also means a change in direction. House Republicans are capping leadership terms at six years, which means that Rep. John Mica (Fla.), chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, will hand over his gavel next year. Mica may have rubbed colleagues the wrong way with his continued war against the Transportation Security Administration. But he was a strong advocate for the FAA's NextGen air traffic modernization system who came up through the aviation subcommittee.
MIRROR, MIRROR: NASA plans to hold a workshop in February on possible uses for two 2.4-meter telescope mirrors transferred to the civil space agency in June by the National Reconnaissance Office. Although the optics have been proposed for a wide field infrared survey of the sky, other possibilities include uses for focused space-technology research, human exploration and operations, heliophysics, astrophysics and planetary science. The agency will select concepts for using the mirrors that it believes advance its goals, and allow detailed presentations of them at the Feb.
A small engineering firm on Florida’s Space Coast hopes to recover some of the revenue and jobs the region lost with retirement of the space shuttle fleet by offering maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO) services to the commercial spaceflight industry that the Obama administration hopes will take the shuttle’s place.
SATELLITE EXPORTS: The U.S. Export-Import Bank has authorized two transactions totaling $461 million to underwrite the export of U.S.-made satellites to Hong Kong. Asia Broadcast Satellite (ABS) will deploy the satellites to upgrade and expand its fleet, which offers coverage to 80% of the world’s population. In the first transaction, the bank authorized a $171.3 million loan to ABS to finance the purchase of a FS1300, C/Ka/Ku-band geostationary satellite from Space Systems/Loral and associated insurance. The satellite is scheduled to launch in 2013.
Houston — The nonprofit ArduSat initiative has selected NanoRacks LLC to coordinate the launch of the first U.S. commercial satellites from the International Space Station using the small spacecraft deployment system successfully demonstrated by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and NASA from the orbiting lab’s Kibo science module in early October.
The 40-year stream of Landsat remote sending imagery of the Earth is poised to be extended by another decade with the upcoming launch of the Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM). The LDCM spacecraft is in thermal vacuum testing at prime contractor Orbital Sciences Corp.’s Gilbert, Ariz., factory, and on track for a Feb. 11 launch. The 3,085-kg spacecraft — built around Orbital’s LEOStar-3 bus — has a design life of five years, but will carry enough fuel to keep it functioning for 10.
The U.K. Defense Ministry plans to equip six Royal Navy mine-hunting ships with military X-band satellite communications gear over the next five years, with the first vessels to be outfitted by spring 2013. The ships will be the first to use SCOTPatrol 0.8-meter X-band satellite terminals developed by EADS-Astrium Services, a smaller version of the company’s legacy SCOT 5 terminals in service with 11 navies worldwide, including Britain.
HOUSTON — NASA and Roscosmos have selected two veteran International Space Station (ISS) crewmembers for a yearlong assignment to the 14-year-old orbiting science laboratory that is intended to shed new light on human adaptation to long-duration spaceflight and other challenges facing explorers on future deep-space missions. Scott Kelly, a 48-year-old U.S. Navy captain, and Mikhail Kornienko, a 52-year-old RSC Energia test engineer, will begin a two-year training program for the mission early next year.
Hypersonic technology is extremely difficult to master and high-speed travel generally involves long distances. These simple, but axiomatic principles of hypersonic studies not only dictate key areas of research but also, increasingly, influences who teams with whom.
