AsiaSat CEO Says Cape Canaveral Has
its Drawbacks (Source: SpaceFlight Now)
Expect some frustrations from bureaucratic red tape if you're a
commercial company looking to launch from Cape Canaveral, says the head
of AsiaSat as it prepared to send up a satellite Sunday. Based in Hong
Kong with an international staff, AsiaSat is in the midst of
back-to-back launches with SpaceX. The missions from Cape Canaveral
mark AsiaSat's first time launching from Florida since 2003, when an
Atlas 3B booster delivered one of the company's satellites to orbit.
"I think Cape Canaveral is a great place to launch, but it does have
its downside, which is it's quite bureaucratic here," said William
Wade, AsiaSat's president and CEO. "There are a lot of regulations and
clearances and restrictions, which I think hinders the processing of
commercial satellites here," Wade said in an interview at Cape
Canaveral. "I think that's too bad because it is a bit of a negative."
SpaceX's launch pad and processing facility is on U.S. Air Force
property. The military controls access to the launch base, meaning
employees and visitors must comply with Defense Department security and
safety restrictions. "Even though our processing has gone well, it's
not been without some frustrations from the various teams just having
to deal with some of the bureaucracy of the government in working at
the Cape," Wade said. Click here.
(9/6)
Vladimir Putin, Space Cadet
(Source: Behind the Black)
Two news stories today demonstrate without question that Russia’s newly
reorganized aerospace industry and its project to build a new spaceport
are not merely the efforts of mid-level bureaucrats in that aerospace
industry. No, these efforts have been instituted and are being pushed
at the very top of the Russian government, by Vladmir Putin himself.
It appears that he has decided, or has always believed, that Russia
deserves a strong and vibrant space program, run from Moscow, and is
doing everything he can to make it happen, as part of his personal
vision for Russia. The first story described a visit on Tuesday that
Putin made to Russia’s new spaceport, Vostochny, in the far eastern end
of Russia. While there he noted that construction is several months
behind schedule and that this slack must be made up.
He then endorsed the proposal put to him by space agency officials that
the number of people working on construction should be doubled. The
second story described Putin’s endorsement of the construction of a new
Russian heavy lift rocket, capable of putting 150 tons into orbit. Such
a rocket would be comparable in power to the largest version of the
U.S.’s SLS rocket, not due to be launched, if ever, until the 2020s.
(9/3)
One-Way Mars Colony Project Launches
Suborbital Spaceflight Raffle (Source: Space.com)
A private Mars colonization effort is asking for your help to make its
bold plans a reality, and it's dangling a pretty hefty prize as an
incentive — a trip to suborbital space. The Netherlands-based nonprofit
Mars One, which aims to land four astronauts on the Red Planet in 2025,
announced today Sep. 4 that it's raffling off a round-trip suborbital
flight aboard XCOR Aerospace's Lynx rocket plane. (9/5)
Will NASA Ames Workers Be 'Guinea
Pigs' for Google? (Source: Mountain View Voice)
Google is planning to take a leap forward in the development of its
self-driving car by removing drivers from test vehicles in a real-world
environment. The only problem is that some NASA Ames Research Center
employees aren't happy about the prospect of becoming test subjects as
they walk around the Moffett Field campus.
Leland Stone says Ames employees will be subjected to the "potentially
risky" experiment this fall, when Google is slated to begin running its
self-driving car prototypes -- without live drivers to take the wheel
if needed -- around the Ames campus, where more than 2,000 people work
for NASA. Google needs to begin proving the cars can work in a real
world environment, and Ames management obliged, signing an agreement to
allow the cars to operate driverless among pedestrians at Ames, located
on a Federal base that's not subject to state laws regulating
self-driving vehicles. (9/5)
Air Force Using Lasers to Preserve
Historic Space Launch Pads (Source: Collect Space)
The U.S. Air Force has a new tool in its effort to preserve space
history: lasers. The 45th Space Wing at Patrick Air Force Base in
Florida has partnered with the University of South Florida Alliance for
Integrated Spatial Technologies (AIST) to use a laser scanner to
survey, map and create virtual models of some of the historic space
launch complexes at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Spaceport.
"Some of these [launch] complexes are in poor shape," Tom Penders, the
cultural resources manager for the 45th Space Wing, said in an Air
Force interview. "A couple [of the structures] are on the verge of
collapsing, so I wanted highly detailed documentation before something
happens." (9/5)
The Telescope We Need to Find Earth 2.0
(Source: Popular Mechanics)
The past two decades of exoplanet hunting have turned up hundreds of
new worlds, and in recent years, that tally has grown to include many
that appear to be close to the Earth in size. Yet most of these new
planets are discovered indirectly, though the wobbling or dimming light
of their parent stars. The planets themselves are just too far away to
see.
For scientists seeking truly Earth-like worlds out there in the cosmos,
that's a problem. Those astronomers want to know not just the size and
probable temperature of an exoplanet, but also whether it has the
ingredients for life. As NASA plans for a new generation of powerful
satellite telescopes designed to seek out habitable worlds—the latest
design being the Advanced Technology Large Aperture Space Telescope
(ATLAST)—scientists are also wondering if our best tech would even be
good enough to catch biomarkers such as water, oxygen, or
photosynthetic greenery. (9/5)
Whale-Sized Asteroid Due for Earth
Flyby (Source: SpaceFlight Insider)
A tiny remnant of the solar system’s formation, an asteroid designated
2014 RC, will pass very close to Earth on Sept. 7. At 2:18 p.m. EDT,
the asteroid will conduct closest approach over New Zealand. Far from
the hunk of space rock that wiped out the dinosaurs, 2014 RS is
estimated to be about 60 feet (20 meters) in size. (9/5)
New Space Shop, The Space Store, Lands
in Cocoa Village (Source: Florida Today)
Readying for his grand opening on Sept. 12, Brett Anderson filled
display shelves with merchandise, placing a meteorite bracelet next to
an X-37B space plane model and a lunar rover toy. An inflatable space
shuttle and spacewalker hung from the ceiling of what was previously a
dress shop at 212 Brevard Ave. A solar system mat and moonwalker beach
towel lay on the floor.
This might seem like a tough time and place to open a store celebrating
the space program, which is mired in the middle of a projected six-year
gap between astronaut launches from the Space Coast, the area hit
hardest by shuttle program layoffs. But after sales at his online
business, TheSpaceStore.com, fell off over the past two years, an
indirect casualty of the shuttle's 2011 retirement, Anderson decided a
retail shop here presented the best opportunity to grow. (9/5)
CU-Boulder Student Teams Win Awards
for Space Mission Design (Source: CU-Boulder)
Two University of Colorado Boulder student aerospace engineering
science teams have won prestigious international and national awards
for the design of real-world space missions to Mars and the moon. One
CU-Boulder student team placed second in the world in a competition to
design the best concept for a two-person manned flyby of Mars mission
as inexpensively, safely and simply as possible.
The competition, the International Inspiration Mars Student Design
Contest sponsored by the Mars Society, required the teams to choose a
launch trajectory, a launch vehicle, flight systems and a concept of
operations. The flight system design selected by the CU-Boulder team
included environmental control and life support systems, solar flare
protection, navigation, communication and re-entry and landing
technology for a proposed 2018 mission to Mars. (9/4)
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