December 20, 2017

Why the NY Times Pentagon UFO Disclosures Deserve More Skepticism (Source: Player One)
There is no smoking gun that disproves the existence of scientist-stumping UFO materials or provides a mundane explanation for extraordinary UFO sighting footage, but there are more than enough unspoken assumptions, unannounced motives and dubious sources present in the NYT’s report to justify far more skepticism. And while it’s not ideal countering big revelations with little more than insinuations of untrustworthiness, it’s the only option made available by the outsized secrecy surrounding the privatization of UFO research.

In May, I called for Robert Bigelow to put up or shut up about UFOs after a 60 Minutes appearance during which he said “There has been and is an existing presence, an ET presence” on or around Earth: “Bigelow should make a choice between revealing what he knows — even if it means burning sources or leaking classified information — and relinquishing the rhetoric of certainty and insinuation. Otherwise we might be lead to the conclusion that Bigelow is deliberately withholding from the population of Earth the most important truth in the history of our species.”

Now that it’s been revealed that Bigelow’s secret-hoarding has the backing of powerful senators and government money, it’s more important than ever that UFO disclosure step out from the cover of anonymous sources and incomplete information to become the rightful knowledge of the democratic citizenry bankrolling Bigelow’s investigation. (12/19)

Lockheed Martin Teams with Aerion to Build Supersonic Business Jet (Source: Washington Post)
On Friday, leaders of Lockheed Martin and the Aerion Corp. announced a deal to build a speedy business jet that they vowed would “engineer a renaissance in supersonic travel.” Speaking at the National Press Club in Washington, the companies said they would build a civil jet, capable of flying as fast as Mach 1.4, or about 60 percent faster than a typical commercial airliner.

With operations projected to start in 2025, the AS2, as the jet would be called, would be able to fly as many as 12 passengers, and shave as much as three hours off the seven- to eight-hour trips between New York and London, so business executives could make a daily commute back and forth across the Atlantic. The memorandum of understanding between the two companies represents a departure for Bethesda-based Lockheed Martin. That legacy in building supersonic fighter jets, as well as the SR-71 surveillance jet — capable of traveling three times the speed of sound — is what made Lockheed such a good partner, the companies said. (12/16)

Trump's National Security Strategy is Dead on Arrival (Source: Newsweek)
To understand why it is pure fantasy to believe that the National Security Strategy will drive policy in the Trump administration, one need only look at the pattern of the past year. On one key international initiative after another we see the same story. The president tasks his team with developing an approach; they pursue a serious and rigorous process that takes into account a broad range of expertise from across the U.S. government; and then Trump interjects, undercutting the entire plan either because of politics, his obsession with tearing down what President Barack Obama built or what he most recently saw on Fox & Friends.

This makes it impossible to develop any meaningful, coherent, long-term approach to any difficult problem. Let’s examine some examples. The bottom line is that the president is the policymaker equivalent of the Tasmanian Devil. His advisers seriously deliberate on important options, only to have Trump enter and turn everything wildly upside down. The idea that in this environment an administration can put out a comprehensive national strategy that will have any impact whatsoever is pure fantasy. (12/19)

Ex-Im Woes Dampening Strong Export Growth (Source: AIN)
The U.S. aerospace industry's lack of a fully functioning Export-Import (Ex-Im) Bank remains “a source of great frustration,” AIA president David Melcher said. Melcher cautioned that the U.S. industry is facing growing and fierce competition. “It is hard to believe that the U.S. still doesn’t have a fully functioning Export-Import Bank.”

The bank is still lacking a full complement of directors and is unable to sign off on export deals valued at more than $10 million. This has had a tangible impact, Melcher said, pointing out that in the five years from 2011 to 2015 when Ex-Im was fully operating, the bank supported an average of $9.5 billion in export sales a year. That figure is now just 0.6 percent of that total—$57 million annually.

“Think about the deals we are leaving on the table for our competitors to take unopposed,” he said. “Why do some in Congress consider this state of affairs acceptable?” (12/18)

U.S. Senate Panel Likely to Reject Trump EXIM Bank Pick (Source: Reuters)
The U.S. Senate Banking Committee looks set to reject President Donald Trump’s nominee to run the Export-Import Bank on Tuesday, but the 2-1/2-year freeze on its ability to finance major export projects could begin to thaw soon anyway. Scott Garrett, a former Republican congressman who helped lead efforts by conservatives to shut down EXIM in 2015, has lost the support of Republican Senator Mike Rounds, giving Democrats enough votes to block his confirmation.

A Rounds spokeswoman said on Monday that the South Dakota Republican will vote against Garrett, but vote in favor of nominees for four other EXIM board positions and another nominee to be the agency’s inspector general. The panel has 12 Republicans and 11 Democrats. All of the panel’s Democrats have pledged to oppose Garrett but support the other nominees. (12/18)

Trump Faces Hurdles to Promised Military Build-up (Source: The Hill)
President Trump faces significant hurdles to fulfilling his promise to bulk up the military even after his signing of a defense policy bill on Tuesday. The first big challenge is to win funding for the policies he is enacting.

Unless he can secure an agreement from Congress to appropriate the policies, his new bill won’t become a reality. Further ahead, the administration has yet to finish its National Defense Strategy, which experts say is needed to help justify why the military needs more troops, aircraft, ships and other elements of a buildup. (12/17)

How Astronaut Nicole Marie Stott Bridges Science, Art And Healing (Source: Forbes)
For retired astronaut Nicole Marie Stott, a stay on the International Space Station gave her more than the thrill of a lifetime, it re-inspired her love of painting. Stott's art—inspired by the stunning views of earth glimpsed from space—eventually gave her the opportunity to launch the Spacesuit Art Project. Click here. (12/16)

Ispace Wants to Advertise on the Moon. Is That Legal? (Source: Slate)
A billboard on the moon! Well, something like that—a company spokesman told me that what Bloomberg is calling a billboard will technically be a projection of an advertisement onto a lunar lander, rover, or other vehicle, not a physical board. But it will serve the same purpose as a traditional billboard, which should make future colonists feel right at home.

Is it legal to advertise on the moon? The short answer is yeah. The 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which Japan has signed, declares space is free for all nations to explore; no celestial body can be claimed by any sovereign entity; no weapons of mass destruction are allowed in space; and individual nations (plus any businesses or citizens under their authority) must refrain from causing damage or contamination as a result of their space activities, or at the very least they have to clean up after themselves. (12/18)

Astrocast Adds $1.1 Million to Seed Round (Source: Space News)
Swiss satellite startup Astrocast, formerly named Else, gained an extra $1.1 million in seed financing to help carry the company through the launch of two demonstration satellites for a constellation of Internet of Things-focused cubesats.

Early stage investor Investiere added the capital, which brings the total amount of seed money raised to $4.1 million Swiss Francs ($4.16 million), Astrocast said in a Dec. 14 statement. Airbus Ventures, whose space investments include Japanese ground station services startup Infostellar and space debris monitoring company LeoLabs, led the seed round in August, with other Swiss and international private investors contributing. (12/19)

Scotland's Space Race Brings Billions to Economy (Source: Herald Scotland)
Scotland's rapidly growing space sector has helped bring a multi-billion pound boost to the economy. New figures for the Aerospace, Defense and Space sectors show they are worth £6.4bn to the Scottish purse, with the space sector making the largest single contribution.

ADS, the trade association for the industries in Scotland and the rest of the UK, released the findings in its first new industry guide for Scotland, setting out the strength of the three sectors, and detailing the organization’s priorities for the year ahead in 2018.

The ADS Scotland 2017 Industry Facts and Figures guide shows the space sector is now the largest of the three industries in Scotland with an annual turnover of £2.5bn, compared to £2bn for aerospace and £1.9bn for defense. (12/19)

Algeria Unveils Its National Space Program to 2040 (Source: SpaceWatch Middle East)
Algeria plans to send several state-of-the-art satellites as part of its space program 2020-2040, which is “under study now,” the director general of the Algerian Space Agency, Azzedine Oussedik, said on December 18, 2017, in Algiers.

A national space program, which includes plans for the launch of many cutting-edge satellites, is under consideration at the Algerian Space Agency, Oussedik told a news conference about the successful launch, on December 11, 2017, of the Algerian space communication satellite Alcomsat-1 from the Chinese launch site at Xichang.

He added that the new program will be put into operation after the completion of the current national space program 2006-2020, under which five satellites have been successfully launched, the latest of which is Alcomsat-1. (12/18)

New Satellite Tracking of In-flight Aircraft to Improve Safety (Source: Space Daily)
At any given time, there are approximately 59,000 aircraft in flight worldwide. The ability to effectively track, monitor and report these aircraft is paramount to ensuring the safety of passengers and crew, as well as that of communities on the ground.

The United Nations specialized agency for information and communication technologies - the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) - which establishes worldwide standards that foster seamless interconnection of a vast range of communications systems, has now adopted the main technical principals of enhanced aircraft automatic dependent surveillance via satellite, to track in-flight aircraft worldwide.

Aircraft automatic dependent surveillance is a technique in which aircraft automatically provide, via a data link, data from the on-board navigation and position-fixing systems, including aircraft identification, four-dimensional position (e.g. latitude, longitude, altitude and time) and additional data, as appropriate. The technique is termed "automatic" because there is no intervention from the pilot or interrogation from terrestrial stations, and "dependent" because the data is dependent upon on-board systems such as global positioning system and altimeter. (12/19)

Trying to Save Life on Earth by Tricking Us Into Thinking We’re Planning for Deep-Space Travel (Source: Quartz)
Mae Jemison likes to point out that when H.G. Wells wrote The First Men on the Moon in 1901, humans could barely fly planes. Less than 100 years later, people were indeed walking on the moon. To Jemison, that leaves humanity with no excuses. We can figure out how to travel to another star in the next 100 years. It’s just a matter of will. Click here. (12/19)

Nova Scotia Spaceport a Potential Threat to Migratory Birds (Source: Chronicle Herald)
A researcher says Canada's first proposed spaceport in Canso, N.S., is a potential threat to migratory birds. John Kearney, an adjunct professor at Dalhousie University, says he's concerned that lighting at the $200-million site could confuse birds and delay their migration. "When you put lights in such a place, birds are attracted to those lights and recent studies have shown that they can have quite a strong impact on birds' migratory behaviour," Kearney said in an interview. (12/19)

Stennis Seeks Developer for "Enterprise Park" (Source: NASA)
Stennis Space Center recently completed an assessment to determine the most readily developable land for a technology park with a first phase targeting approximately 1100 acres. NASA seeks interest in a Master Developer partner to take charge of the multi-phased development of the 1100-acre Enterprise Park. NASA seeks interest from qualified firms in leading the development and long-term operation of Enterprise Park, which NASA has established to enable and grow private sector participation in space exploration, support commercial space transportation, promote commercial development of technologies for application in space and on earth, and support the missions of tenants located at SSC.

The Master Developer opportunity that NASA envisions will be structured as a partnership between NASA SSC and an industry or non-federal public entity. NASA may grant a partner an interest in Enterprise Park for a specified term most likely through an Enhanced Use Lease (EUL). Click here. (12/4)