Orbiter Lands at KSC Runway
(Source: Florida Today)
Nearly five years after NASA's shuttle program declared "wheels stop"
on the final mission, a space shuttle orbiter appeared to grace Kennedy
Space Center's runway again last week. Named Inspiration, the orbiter
is a full-size mockup familiar to many on the Space Coast: It was
displayed for more than 20 years outside the U.S. Astronaut Hall of
Fame in Titusville.
LVX System, a developer of LED lighting technology that was given the
mockup by the KSC Visitor Complex, plans to spend at least a year and
roughly $5 million refurbishing the Inspiration at the former Shuttle
Landing Facility, near the runway's control tower. CEO John Pederson
said a lease subsequently worked out with Space Florida allowed the
refurbishment to be done at KSC. (4/30)
Debus to DiBello (Source:
Florida Today)
The National Space Club Florida Committee on Saturday bestowed its top
annual honor, the Debus Award, to Space Florida President and CEO Frank
DiBello. DiBello is being honored for his role in helping the Space
Coast rebound from the 2011 retirement of NASA's space shuttle program
and its transition to more commercial space operations. During his
tenure, companies such as Boeing, Blue Origin, OneWeb Satellites,
Embraer and Northrop Grumman have announced plans to establish or
expand operations in the area. (4/30)
Orion Under Pressure at Cape Canaveral
Spaceport (Source: Florida Today)
The pressure vessel forming the core of the Orion crew capsule slated
to blast off on from Kennedy Space Center in late 2018 on an unmanned
test flight is undergoing pressure tests to ensure its structural
integrity. KSC teams recently moved the pressure vessel to a stand and
then a proof pressure cell for the tests inside the Armstrong
Operations and Checkout building.
Also recently, the underlying structure for the mission's service
module, which is being provided by European Space Agency, was shipped
from Italy to a German facility for integration. The service module,
which will provide power and propulsion for the mission, is expected to
move to KSC early next year. (4/30)
Astronomers Discover Bizarre
Asteroid-Like Tailless Comet (Source: CSMonitor)
Is it an asteroid-like comet? A comet-like asteroid? A space rock with
a bit of a split personality, born near Earth, has found its way back
home, according to a new study published on Friday in the journal
Science Advances.
“If you’d shown me the spectrum, I would have just said this is another
stupid asteroid,” said paper co-author Olivier Hainaut to Gizmodo. “If
you showed me the orbit, I’d say yeah, it’s a standard long-period
comet. But you don’t at all expect to find a rocky asteroid on an Oort
cloud orbit. That’s wrong.” (4/30)
ULA Pushes Launches Back to 'Early
Summer' to Address RD-180 Anomaly (Source: Florida Politics)
Still dealing with concerns from an early engine cutoff that did not
affect the success of a March 22 rocket launch, United Launch Alliance
is now looking at launching its next Atlas V rocket no earlier than
early summer, the company announced today. But a critically timed NASA
asteroid mission should still blast off as planned in September, the
company stated.
The company is getting to the bottom of an unexpected glitch that
occurred in its latest Atlas V launch, when the rocket carried an
Orbital ATK Cygnus capsule into space. ULA was scheduled to launch a
military MUOS-5 satellite atop an Atlas V on March 29, and initially
delayed that to May 12. Now that’s being pushed back to “early summer,”
though no specific date has been set. (4/30)
Bezos Explains How Blue Origin Will
Prevent Rocket Engines From Melting (Source: Popular Science)
The BE-4, a rocket engine that Blue Origin is developing, uses a
preburner to set up a big combustion reaction that generates all those
flames and propulsive gases. Basically what the preburner does is it
burns a small amount of fuel, and uses the steam from that to drive
some pumps that move the fuel—methane and oxygen—into the combustion
chamber.
The problem is, that preburner reaction can get very hot. Like 3,000
degrees Fahrenheit, which is hot enough to melt a lot of rocket parts.
Blue Origin plans to cool down the steam coming from the pre-burner to
about 700 degrees Fahrenheit, otherwise it might melt the turbines that
power the pumps that dump fuel into the combustion chamber. To cool it,
they mix unburned oxygen gas into the steam. To make sure the oxygen
mixes thoroughly without hotspots, they use a fancy computer modeling
system.
"To date, we’ve completed several million core hours of CFD modeling of
BE-4 combustion processes. Modeling of the preburner shows good mixing
and temperature uniformity upstream of the turbine. The combustion and
temperature data we’ve gathered in our subscale testing correlate with
our CFD predictions." The company is hoping to fire up the rocket in
stationary tests later this year. (4/30)
Turkey and Ukraine to Cooperate on
Building Satellites (Source: SpaceWatch)
In a clear reaction to collapsed relations with the Russian Federation,
both Turkey and Ukraine have announced their intention to cooperate
with each other in the development and manufacture of satellites, as
well as collaboration on other strategic technologies.
The announcement has come as a surprise to analysts, many of whom claim
that apart from an obvious geopolitical agenda to counter Russian
strategic dominance and influence in the Black Sea and Caucasus, there
seems little industrial and technological foundations for the proposed
relationship to succeed. (4/30)
Iran’s Future Spy Satellites: What Can
Be Done? (Source: SpaceWatch)
Recent media reports have suggested that Iran and Russian Space
Monitoring Systems, Information & Control and Electromechanical
Complexes (VNIIEM) could sign a contract for a high-resolution remote
sensing satellite in the coming weeks. If this deal goes ahead, the
Iranian satellite would be launched in 2018, and will be based on
VNIIEM’s Kanopus-V remote sensing satellite, a version of which has
already been built and launched for Belarus.
With the Iranian sanctions regime steadily coming apart, it is only a
matter of time before Iran acquires – or even develops on its own – a
high-resolution imaging satellite that will revolutionize its military
and civil remote-sensing capabilities. Such a development is of
particular concern to a number of countries in the Arabian Gulf and
also for Israel. What are the implications of Iran gaining such a
capability, and what, if anything, can other countries in the Middle
East do to mitigate any military advantage Iran might gain from using a
high-resolution imaging satellite? Click here.
(4/30)
The Great Pluto Debate (Source:
Guardian)
As the consequence of the findings of an ambitious planetary
astronomer, the elite group of nine planets has overnight shrunk to
eight, and your mission is now heading towards a “dwarf planet”, just
another piece of ice and rock in the vast Kuiper belt, the band of
mostly small bodies that forms the perimeter, the unglamorous outer
suburbs, of the solar system. That’s exactly what happened to Alan
Stern a decade ago.
Shift forward nine years, and New Horizons has just stunned the world
with the clarity and drama of the images of Pluto sent back from its
flyby. Hundreds of millions of people go online to look at them. Stern
is the subject of international attention, feted, apparently
vindicated, a man who appears to have answered his critics about the
relevance of Pluto.
But then, out of the blue, the same astronomer whose original research
prompted the demotion of Pluto announces that he’s discovered evidence
of Planet Nine, a major planet somewhere between the size of Earth and
Neptune, that could take the place of Pluto – the original ninth planet
– in the known planetary system. That is exactly what Mike Brown did.
Click here.
(5/1)
2D Spacecraft, Reprogrammable Microbes
& More: NASA Eyes Wild Space Tech Ideas (Source: Space.com)
Get ready for two-dimensional spacecraft and microorganisms that can
recycle Mars dirt into working electronics. While both may sound like
science fiction, they could soon be a reality, thanks to the latest
round of space technology funding from NASA.
These are just two of the 13 exciting new concepts to win Phase 1
funding this year from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts(NIAC)
program, which aims to encourage and invest in groundbreaking research
that could transform how NASA does space exploration. Click here.
(5/1)
Little Astronaut Discovers Our World
in Touching Father/Son Photo Project (Source: PetaPixel)
There was a time when what you consider your “day-to-day,” with all its
errands and monotony, was new and fresh. A time when each trip outside
was a foray into the great unknown. That’s the feeling that
photographer dad Aaron Sheldon and his 4-year-old son capture in their
photo project Small Steps Are Giant Leaps. Click here.
(4/27)
Some Damage to Soyuz Launch Pad After
Inaugural Vostochny Launch (Source: Russian Space Web)
A preliminary post-launch inspection at Vostochny revealed that the
protective shield on the lower service platform below the launch pad
was torn off by the loads during the liftoff. In addition, NPO
Avtomatiki shipped back to its facility the cable, which was suspected
as a culprit in the failed launch attempt on April 27. The cable was
expected to arrive to the lab after May Day holidays for the analysis
of its soldering joints, which could be faulty.
Industry sources also said that, specialists were editing footage
obtained by external cameras on the Soyuz rocket before it could be
released to the general public. Even though the images were beamed to
the launch control room in real time during the ascent, officials were
apparently scrutinizing the video, so it would not be "misinterpreted"
by the press. Obviously, any evidence of damage to the launch pad or to
the rocket itself would be prime candidates to be edited out. (4/30)
Why Landing a Flying, Fire-Breathing
Red Dragon on Mars is Huge (Source: Ars Technica)
Is this really a big deal? Oh, heavens, yes. No private company has
ever launched a significant, independently financed expedition into
deep space, let alone all the way to Mars. In fact, only two world
powers have ever softly landed spacecraft on Mars. The U.S. has done so
half a dozen times, and the Soviet Union did it once with Mars 3 in
1971—although the vehicle failed after sending back just 15 seconds of
data.
And all previous soft landings have been relatively small and light;
SpaceX is talking about landing a Dragon weighing about 6,000kg on the
surface of Mars. The previous landing heavyweight was Curiosity, at
900kg. Soft-landing a 6,000kg object on Mars would be a stunning
achievement for NASA or any government-backed space agency. For a
private company, it's unheard of. Click here.
(4/29)
Russian Director Responsible for
Vostochny Gets Prison Sentence (Source: Moscow Times)
Igor Nesterenko, the former director of the construction company
involved in building the Vostochny Cosmodrome - was sentenced to three
years and three months in a labor camp on charges of fraud, the RBC
newspaper reported Friday.
While working as director of the Pacific Ocean bridge-building company
(TNK), Nesterenko embezzled over 100 million rubles ($1.6 million) via
a scheme run by an associate, Sergei Yudin. He was arrested in the far
eastern Primorye region in April following complaints from TNK workers
over unpaid wages, RBC reported, citing the regional Investigative
Committee statement. (4/29)
Why NASA Is Building An $18 Billion
Rocket To Nowhere (Source: BuzzFeed)
Space adventure fans might enjoy NASA’s latest saga, the story of a
rocket to nowhere that Congress wants, very badly, built in Alabama. Or
they might be really pissed off. In its 2017 budget request, NASA asked
Congress for $1.3 billion to build its next jumbo rocket. Last week,
despite years of fighting with the Obama Administration over its plans
to explore an asteroid with the rocket, the Senate Appropriations
Committee not only granted the request, but gave the space agency an
extra $995 million to build it. Click here.
(4/30)
LauncherOne to Start Test Missions in
2017 (Source: Via Satellite)
Virgin Galactic is planning a test campaign for its LauncherOne small
satellite launch vehicle next year consisting of multiple
trial-launches to pave the way for commercial missions. The
air-launched vehicle, first announced in 2012, has undergone some
significant evolutions since inception, including a doubling of its
payload performance, improved engines and switching carrier aircrafts
from WhiteKnightTwo to a Boeing 747-400 nicknamed Cosmic Girl.
Since then Virgin Galactic has also built and furnished a LauncherOne
manufacturing plant in Long Beach Calif., and signed a massive contract
with OneWeb for 39 launches. George Whitesides, CEO of Virgin Galactic,
said the company’s goal for 2016 is to finish the development program
for LauncherOne, and start building the test launch vehicles, which
will basically be identical to the operational version. He added that
Virgin Galactic is creating a test plan with partner L-3, which is
augmenting the Cosmic Girl aircraft to support the launch vehicle.
Whitesides said engine development is proceeding very well with the
Newton 3 main stage and Newton 4 upper stage engines. Virgin Galactic
replaced the Newton 1 and Newton 2 engines, which were pressure-fed,
with the newer pump-fed versions. Will Pomerantz, VP of special
projects at Virgin Galactic, told Via Satellite the Newton 1 and Newton
2 were pathfinder engines used as part of LauncherOne’s development
process. Whitesides said that the structural development program is
also very well advanced, paving the way for the test campaign next
year. (4/27)
The Best New Geography for Spaceflight
is in Georgia (Source: LinkedIn)
Did you know the State of Georgia now has THE BEST geography on Planet
Earth from which to launch rockets into orbit? See
http://spaceportcamden.us/why.php. People are always surprised, but
according to NASA's history, recently declassified reports show that
only because of a "can-do" General along with an adjoining Air Force
infrastructure, Cape Canaveral won the mid twenty century site to house
the nation's spaceflight infrastructure.
The geography of Georgia (and Cape Canaveral) is important because
there is almost a 400 meters per second speed bump from the Earth's
rotation. Also rockets get to orbit by traveling over the Atlantic
Ocean. In addition, there other very positive attributes for the
Georgia location. Not only does Georgia have one of the planets best
geographies for spaceflight, it is also home to one of the world's best
program for turning out space flight engineers. (4/30)
Haskell to Design-Build New Orbital
Rocket Manufacturing Facility (Source: Haskell)
Jacksonille-based Haskell, a leading integrated design, engineering and
construction firm, has been selected to design-build a new orbital
rocket manufacturing facility for Blue Origin. The facility will be
built within Exploration Park at the Cape Canaveral Spaceport – the hub
of U.S. space exploration. This is Haskell’s second engagement for the
private spaceflight company. Haskell previously performed design-build
services on a 20,000 SF launch site complex in Texas that was completed
in September of 2006. (4/29)
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