May 13 News Items

No Winners in NASA's Regolith Competition (Source: SFgate.com)
Four teams and some strange machines competed for a quarter-of-a-million dollars from NASA, but all walked away empty-handed. NASA's Regolith Excavation Challenge invited teams to build machines for digging mock moon dirt, or regolith, in a competition held in a one-ton sandbox on Saturday. But all the teams fell well short of the winning requirement of 330 pounds of regolith deposited in a container in 30 minutes, and no one claimed the $250,000 purse. The prize rolls over to next year's competition, which will be worth $750,000.

Hughes Reports Strong Growth in Satellite Broadband (Source: Space News)
Hughes Network Systems (HNS) added 13,700 subscribers per month to its satellite consumer-broadband service in the United States during the first three months of this year. After accounting for subscribers who quit the service--2.2 percent per month on average--the company said its consumer-broadband customer base totaled 346,100 as of March 31, a 19 percent increase over a year ago.

Damaged Shuttle Booster Segments Returned to ATK (Source: Space News)
Four solid-rocket booster segments riding near the front of the freight train that derailed May 2 in Alabama are headed back to Utah where their manufacturer, Alliant Techsystems (ATK), will either use them for ground tests or thoroughly refurbish them.

Coast Guard Gives Warning to Orbcomm (Source: Space News)
The U.S. Coast Guard has given Orbcomm Inc. until July 2 to launch a Coast Guard-financed spacecraft or face penalties. The Coast Guard warning threatens "contractual or statutory" penalties unless the satellite, whose original launch date was in mid-2006, is operational by then, Orbcomm said in a submission to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Texas Congressman Requests NASA/NOAA Plan for QuickScat Replacement (Source: Space News)
U.S. Rep. Nick Lampson (D-Texas) has asked NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) to explain their contingency plans should a research satellite useful to hurricane forecasters suddenly shut down. NASA's QuickScat satellite, which tracks ocean surface wind data, is two years beyond its five-year design lifetime. Lampson is concerned that neither NASA nor NOAA have a near-term plan to replace the spacecraft's capability to forecast severe weather.

Martinez & Weldon Introduce Bills for Tax-Free Bonds for Spaceports (Source: Space News)
Legislation that would allow U.S. spaceports to use tax-free bonds to fund infrastructure improvements was introduced in both houses of Congress May 10. The Spaceport Equality Act of 2007 was introduced by Sen. Mel Martinez (R-Fla.) in the Senate and Rep. Dave Weldon (R-Fla.) in the House. "This will give the space transportation industry the same financial incentives currently granted to airports, seaports and rail, spurring private investment and modernizing our launch facilities," Martinez said in a prepared statement.

Sens. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas), Pete Domenici (R-N.M.), Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.), and Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) are co-sponsors. Weldon has introduced such legislation before, only to see it stall in the House Ways and Means Committee, which has jurisdiction over bills requiring changes to the U.S. tax code.

Raytheon-Led Team Bidding for Ares Avionics Work (Source: Space News)
Raytheon Missile Systems intends to submit a bid this summer for a contract worth roughly $400 million to help NASA develop the avionics suite for the Ares 1 rocket. The company will be supported in its bid for the avionics work by Intergraph Corp. and Dynetics. NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, also in Huntsville, is leading the Ares program. BAE Systems, Ball Aerospace, Boeing and Honeywell all previously have announced their intent to go after the avionics work.

NASA New Orleans Site Girds for Next Storm (Source: NOLA.com)
Before the 2007 hurricane season, work at the Michoud Assembly Facility has been completed to automate the four giant pumps that suck storm surge and rain off the grounds of the 832-acre campus and push the water back over the levees shielding the plant from adjacent canals and the Intracoastal Waterway. The pumps can now be managed from a new command center containing state-of-the-art communications equipment that provides a continuous flow of data about water levels, pump capacity and other items. Using closed-circuit cameras and wall-mounted widescreen monitors, the 39 members of the so-called ride-out crew can also monitor local and national weather reports, NASA's own communications channel and every one of the 48 buildings on the campus.