HOUSTON — International Space Station astronauts Chris Cassidy of NASA and Luca Parmitano of the European Space Agency plan to further prepare the six-person orbiting laboratory for the arrival of Russia’s Nauka Multipurpose Laboratory Module (MLM) during a pair of July spacewalks that will include external alterations to ready the outpost for possible power and cooling system failures.
STANDING DOWN: Jason-1, a Franco-U.S. ocean-topography spacecraft in operation since Dec. 7, 2001, has gone offline after its sole remaining transmitter failed on June 21. NASA and the French space agency CNES decommissioned the Earth-science bird after 11.5 years of service continuing the data set started in 1992 by Topex/Poseidon and continuing today with the Ocean Surface Topography Mission/Jason-2. Built by Thales Alenia Space, the 500-kg.
Virgin Galactic could be transporting fee-paying astronaut tourists into near space from its Abu Dhabi spaceport in around two-three years time. That was the message from Steve Landeene, Virgin Galactic's Chief Advisor, Abu Dhabi Spaceport, when talking to Arabian Aerospace at this year's Global Space and Satellite Forum.
The 2013 Global Space and Satellite Forum got under way today at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Abu Dhabi. Attracting global experts from across 30 countries, the event looked at the blossoming space industry in the Middle East and how satellites have an important role to play in terms of earth observation and communication.
OHB System AG of Germany has signed an €816 million ($1.06 billion) contract with Germany’s defense procurement agency to develop the SARah satellite-based radar reconnaissance system. SARah aims to provide an enhanced follow-on to Germany’s five-satellite SAR-Lupe constellation, which became fully operational in 2008. Built by OHB System AG, SAR-Lupe, which utilizes one ground station, is slated to retire after November 2017.
PARIS — A Proton M/Block DM-03 rocket carrying three Russian Glonass navigation satellites veered wildly off course shortly after liftoff July 2, exploding into a fiery ball before crashing 2.5 km from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.
NASA has cleared Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) through two more of its Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) milestones, paving the way for the company’s modified Dragon cargo carrier to begin pad-abort testing as early as this year. The U.S. space agency accepted the SpaceX human certification plan, which outlines everything the company plans to do to get ready for human spaceflight. That includes tests, demonstration, analyses, inspections, verifications and training events, NASA said.
NEW DELHI — India on July 1 lofted its first navigation and timing satellite meant to provide accurate position information services to both civilians and the military. IRNSS-1A, the first satellite of the seven-spacecraft Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS), was launched on a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C22) from the spaceport at Sriharikota off the coast of the south Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, says an official at the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO).
Successful tests of an all-composite cryogenic fuel tank for space launch vehicles hold promise for lower-cost access to space, perhaps before the decade is out. A small composite fuel tank fabricated by Boeing with funding from the “game-changing” program of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate contained 2,091 gal. of liquid hydrogen through a series of shifts in its internal pressure and three temperature cycles ranging from ambient down to minus 423F.
The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is seeking industry and public comment as it proposes new rules it says “would advance the commercial space industry and the important role it will play in our nation’s economy and technological innovation now and in the future.”
Space Florida, the aerospace development arm of Florida’s state government, has been named to negotiate a partnership with NASA to operate the 15,000-ft. Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) at Kennedy Space Center as a public spaceport. The U.S. space agency picked Space Florida after publishing a request for information last year seeking proposals for using the unique facility.
HOUSTON — NASA’s Johnson Space Center and Deloitte LLP will pursue a long-running collaboration to advance safety and risk management practices for the oil and gas industry under a June 27 strategic agreement. The effort, in part, will focus on low-probability, high-consequence events that can occur in remote and harsh environments, like those faced by U.S. astronauts currently on the International Space Station and prospective missions of deep-space exploration.
NEW DELHI — India has plans to loft two new satellites over the next two years to boost its communications capability and augment current services. A proposal for the development and launch of GSAT-15 and-16 was approved at a June 28 meeting of the federal cabinet, says India’s finance minister, P. Chidambaram. GSAT-15 is expected to be built within the next 18 months, and GSAT-16 in the next 24 months.
SAN FRANCISCO — NASA reports “a great insertion orbit” for its newest orbiting telescope for studying the Sun’s dynamic temperature bands, which was drop-launched from a former airliner off the central California coast at 7:28 p.m. PDT June 27.
It is a golden instrument, in more ways than one. NIRcam, the Near-Infrared Camera for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), is wrapped in a gold insulating foil, the better to maintain its operating temperature of 35K (-397F). But it also will play a golden role for the three other instruments on the $8 billion mission, which is to put astronomy's largest orbiting observatory into service in 2018.
PARIS — Thales Alenia Space of France and Italy will lead development of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) new Euclid cosmology satellite under a contract valued at €322.5 million ($420 million), the company announced June 27. Scheduled to launch in 2020 atop a European variant of Russia’s Soyuz, Euclid will explore dark energy and dark matter using a payload module to be built by EADS Astrium of Toulouse that includes a silicon-carbide telescope for infrared measurements and a 1.2-meter-dia. mirror to observe distant galaxies.
The medium Earth orbit constellation designed to bring broadband satellite service to the “other 3 billion” (O3b) customers in the developing world is taking shape above the equator with the June 25 launch of the first four spacecraft on an Arianespace Soyuz flying from the Guiana Space Center on the north coast of South America. Another set of four satellites is scheduled for launch later this year, and the third and final group of four is set to go up in the first half of next year.
Shenzhou 10, China’s longest human mission to date, ended safely early Wednesday with a landing on a Mongolian steppe. Touchdown of the mission’s return capsule with its crew of two men and a woman came at 8:07 a.m. local time (8:07 p.m. Tuesday EDT), 15 days after it was launched from the Jiuquan launch site on a Long March 2F rocket.
HOUSTON — Celestis, Inc., the post-cremation memorial spaceflight company, is offering to send a small sample of a loved one’s ashes into deep space in November 2014, accompanying a solar-sail mission flying as a secondary payload to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Deep Space Climate Observatory (Dscovr). Planned for launch from Cape Canaveral aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, Dscovr will head for the Earth-Sun L-1 Lagrangian point, where the NOAA spacecraft will serve as a solar weather sentry.
