November 2, 2013

Skunk Works Reveals SR-71 Successor Plan (Source: Aviation Week)
After years of silence on the subject, Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works has revealed exclusively to AW&ST details of long-running plans for what it describes as an affordable hypersonic intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike platform that could enter development in demonstrator form as soon as 2018. Dubbed the SR-72, the twin-engine aircraft is designed for a Mach 6 cruise, around twice the speed of its forebear, and will have the optional capability to strike targets.

Ever since Lockheed’s unsurpassed SR-71 Blackbird was retired from U.S. Air Force service almost two decades ago, the perennial question has been: Will it ever be succeeded by a new-generation, higher-speed aircraft and, if so, when? Lockheed Martin’s Skunk Works has revealed details of long-running plans for what it describes as an affordable hypersonic intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and strike platform that could enter development in demonstrator form as soon as 2018.

Dubbed the SR-72, the twin-engine aircraft is designed for a Mach 6 cruise, around twice the speed of its forebear, and will have the optional capability to strike targets. Guided by the U.S. Air Force’s long-term hypersonic road map, the SR-72 is designed to fill what are perceived by defense planners as growing gaps in coverage of fast-reaction intelligence by the plethora of satellites, subsonic manned and unmanned platforms meant to replace the SR-71. (11/1)

Aldrin, Cernan Suggest Cooperation With China's Moon Plans (Sources: NASA Watch, Aerospace America)
Astronauts Buzz Aldrin of Apollo 11 and Eugene Cernan of Apollo 17 tell Aerospace America that engineering details emerging from China's first robotic Moon lander suggest it is a formal precursor to a manned lunar module that would carry Chinese astronauts to the surface of the Moon around 2030. In their view, the time may be right for NASA to begin direct cooperation with China on the return of humans--both Chinese and American--to the Moon as a prelude to international manned missions to Mars. (11/1)

Russia Plans to Spend $22M on Soyuz-2 Launch Pad (Source: RIA Novosti)
Russia's Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos, has announced a tender for construction of launch facilities for Soyuz-2 carrier rockets at the future Vostochny spaceport, being built in Russia's Far East. The tender, worth 695 million rubles (some $22 million), stipulates the completion of construction by November 25, 2015.

The newly appointed head of Roscosmos, Oleg Ostapenko, said Friday that the Vostochny project included construction of two launch pads: one for Soyuz-2 and another for Angara-family carrier rockets. The initial launches at Vostochny are slated for 2015, while the entire space center is scheduled for completion by 2020. (10/28)

Launch Pad 39B Flame Deflector will Support a Variety of Launch Vehicles (Source: NASA)
Significant changes are happening at Launch Pad 39B at NASA's Kennedy Space Center as the Ground Systems Development and Operations (GSDO) Program prepares it to support the launch of a variety of vehicles, including NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport.

A stark, gaping space can be seen between the walls of the pad’s flame trench. Construction workers have completely removed the massive flame deflector structure that served to protect the pad and space shuttles during 30 years of launches from the site. Jose Perez Morales, the GSDO Pad Element project manager, said there will be substantial changes in the design of the new flame deflector.

With the help of NASA’s Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, Calif., GSDO engineers ran computational fluid dynamic simulations of engine launches of five existing launch vehicles and discovered that the exhaust could be redirected to only the north side of the flame deflector. Perez Morales said the new flame deflector will be positioned about six feet south of the old flame deflector’s position to accommodate the design of the new mobile launcher. (11/1)

Here Comes The Interplanetary Internet (Source: NASA Watch)
TopCoder, the world's largest professional development and design community, with NASA and the Harvard-NASA Tournament Lab (at Harvard's Institute for Quantitative Social Science), announced the launch of a series of innovation challenges that will develop foundational technological concepts for disruption tolerant deep space networking. NASA has made significant progress in developing Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN) protocols that aide in deep space communication.

DTN protocols are an approach to network architecture that seeks to address the potential for lack of continuous connectivity in deep space. It is meant to aid NASA in the exploration of the solar system by overcoming communication time delays caused by interplanetary distances, and the disruptions caused by planetary rotation, orbits and limited transmission power. (11/1)

Can Gravity's Thrills Inspire Viewers To Reinvest In NASA? (Source: Forbes)
Despite the popularity of films like “Gravity,” public interest in NASA and space travel appears to be in hibernation. Although movie crews are inventing new technology to explore space on the big screen, Americans’ real-life space program continues to languish. With an estimated budget of $100 million, “Gravity” serves as something of a microcosm for what it takes to explore space in the real world: vision, commitment, and a lot of financial backing.

To some degree, the movie’s paradoxical relationship to space, one filled with equal parts longing and terror, echoes a recent shift in how Americans view space travel as well. While a majority believe that the U.S. should remain the leader in efforts to explore space, as of late this support hasn’t translated into greater support for NASA. Funding for the agency has been dropping as a percentage of the federal budget for decades. (11/1)

The Hidden History of the Soviet Satellite-Killer (Source: Popular Mechanics)
Half a century ago, on Nov. 1, 1963, the Soviet Union launched the first prototype of the "killer" satellite—what we would call today an antisatellite system, or ASAT. Officially announced as Polyot-1 (or Flight-1), this highly maneuverable spacecraft was intended to test whether the Soviets could approach an "enemy" satellite and blow it in smithereens.

This mission set off a decades-long race to develop and deploy offensive weapons in space that culminated in the 1980s with Ronald Reagan's famous Star Wars program. Although a nuclear standoff between East and West subsided soon thereafter and the Cold War thawed, the danger of weaponization of space flared up again recently with the emergence of new space powers, such as China and Iran. Click here. (11/1)