March 12, 2018

NASA’s Acting Administrator Says He’ll Retire in April, Adding to Power Vacuum (Source: Geekwire)
Robert Lightfoot, who has been serving as NASA’s acting administrator since the start of the Trump administration, says he’ll be retiring at the end of next month. His departure after more than a year of caretaker duty could open the power vacuum in space policy even wider — or force a resolution.

President Donald Trump nominated Rep. Jim Bridenstine, R-OK, to fill NASA’s top post last September, but his nomination has languished because Senate confirmation is in doubt. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-FL, is said to be a key opponent, claiming that Bridenstine would be too much of a political choice for a post that’s not traditionally held by a politician.

For what it’s worth, Rubio was a target of Bridenstine’s criticism during 2016’s presidential primary season. Other presidentially appointed posts at NASA — including deputy administrator and chief financial officer — are still unfilled as well. Editor's Note: Senators are allowed to secretly block any nominee. (3/12)

Environmental Assessment Readied for Nova Scotia Spaceport Effort (Source: SpaceQ)
Maritime Launch Services (MLS) is set to submit its environmental assessment report likely by the end of the month for review by the government of Nova Scotia for its spaceport. It’s been almost a year to the day since MLS selected the Canso Hazel Hill area of Nova Scotia to be the home of Canada’s only commercial spaceport. The review, which has taken longer to complete than was originally expected, is being conducted by Strum Consulting for MLS.

Once the environmental assessment report is submitted and accepted by Nova Scotia Environment, the government will conduct a 50 day review. In the first 30 days of the review the public has an opportunity to provide their comments. Once the 50 day review is over, the Minister of Environment will make public their decision.  Options for the Minister include green lighting the project to proceed, with or without conditions, or the Minister could delay approval pending submission of more information. (3/12)

When is a Satellite Too Small? (Source: IEEE Spectrum)
A small startup is in trouble with the FCC after launching four picosatellites without authorization. Swarm Technologies, a company still in stealth mode, flew the four SpaceBee satellites, each one a fourth the size of a single-unit cubesat, as secondary payloads on a PSLV launch in January. However, the FCC had denied an application from the company for an experimental license a month earlier, citing concerns that the satellites posed a collision threat to others because their small size made them difficult to track. The FCC last week revoked an authorization for four more of the company's satellites, which were to launch in the near future on a Rocket Lab Electron mission, citing the unauthorized launch.

Swarm Technologies had realized that the small size of its BEEs might be a problem. It installed a GPS device in each satellite that would broadcast its position when requested. It also covered each of the satellite’s four smallest faces with an experimental passive radar reflector to increase the BEE’s radar profile by a factor of 10. Meanwhile, Leo Labs said they are tracking the tiny satellites. "We were automatically tracking them even before we knew they were special," said Dan Ceperly. CEO. (3/12)

Global Eagle Gets $150M For Debt Payments, New Investment (Source: Space News)
Satellite connectivity company Global Eagle has received $150 million in capital from a private investment firm. Global Eagle said Searchlight Capital Partners provided the funding, which the company will use to pay off a $78 million balance on a credit line as well as for growth initiatives and other purposes. Jeff Leddy, the current CEO of Global Eagle, will shift to the position of executive chairman, to be replaced by Josh Marks, Global Eagle's executive vice president for connectivity. (3/12)

Planetary Resources Revising Plans After Funding Setback (Source: Space News)
Planetary Resources says it's successfully tested a satellite launched in January, even as the company recalibrates its plans after a funding setback. Speaking at a conference Saturday, Planetary Resources CEO and President Chris Lewicki said the Arkyd-6 satellite completed all its testing requirements, including demonstrating the operation of a midwave infrared instrument. Lewicki acknowledged that the company suffered a setback when a company that planned to lead a new round of investment last year delayed its plans. Planetary Resources has since laid off an unspecified number of its employees, and has delayed a planned 2020 mission to send probes to several near Earth asteroids to prospect for water. (3/12)

Urthecast Replaces CEO Amid Financial Strains (Source: Business in Vancouver)
UrtheCast co-founder Wade Larson has left his position as both CEO and boardroom director. Board director Greg Nordal replaced Larson on March 8 and will serve as interim CEO as the company seeks a permanent leader. The company’s third-quarter earnings revealed revenues in its Earth observation business had been impacted by delays in the award of a major contract. Third-quarter revenue — the most recent financials to be released — amounted to $10.2 million, while the company recorded a net loss of $6.4 million. (3/9)

Inside Robert Bigelow's Decades-Long Obsession with UFOs (Source: WIRED)
Bigelow has gotten his fingers into lots of private UFO pies. Even before Skinwalker, he helped initiate the UFO Research Coalition, which puts his UFO-hunting career at about 24 years old. Bigelow is not officially involved with To The Stars. But its aims, and its team, seem to line up with his past and his people. So I set off to try to understand that past. Click here. (2/24)

New Talent Hard to Come By for Space Companies (Source: Space News)
The space industry’s struggle to draw young professionals is causing its workforce to lose members faster than they are gained, according to research from Deloitte Consulting. “We’ve done a bunch of studies internally looking at the median age across the R&D portfolios for the U.S. government space programs as well as the commercial space market, and the average age of a worker is only getting older,” said Jeff Matthews. “With attrition and other causes that drag people out of the industry, we are not backfilling it fast enough to really fill the voids that we are creating.”

Workforce woes are becoming a “huge pain point,” made worse by increased competition from tech giants like Facebook, Apple and Google, Matthews said. Also, the space industry still hasn’t “cracked the women engineering issue,” and is losing female engineering talent at the collegiate level because of inclusivity challenges in a predominantly male field. “We are only graduating 18 percent female engineers even though they express a very keen interest in math and science earlier in their education, but we are losing them somewhere along the way.” (3/12)

Florida Legislature Approves $88.7 Billion Budget, With Millions for Space (Source: SPACErePORT)
Barring line-item vetoes by Governor Rick Scott, Space Florida will receive $19.5M for the coming fiscal year under an $88.7 billion budget passed last week by the Florida Legislature. Of that $19.5M, $7M is earmarked for financing, infrastructure, and related business-development aimed at recruiting and expanding aerospace businesses statewide. $1M is earmarked for an annual Florida/Israel aerospace grant program. That leaves $11.5M for Space Florida's annual operating budget.

On top of that, $1.6M is available for a separate "Space, Defense & Rural Infrastructure" economic development grant program; and $28M is appropriated for other economic development programs, including a "Qualified Defense Contractor and Space Flight" tax refund program and other incentive programs that can include space and aerospace. In the academic sector, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University will receive $3M for its "Aerospace Academies" program, and Seminole County's "Aviation and Aeronautics Workforce Initiative" will receive $500K. Here's a searchable copy of the entire budget bill. (3/12)

Red Giant Brings its Companion Star Back to Life (Source: Astronomy)
There’s some adage out there about helping out your neighbor, right? Well, a red giant star was recently spotted lending more than just a cup of flour to its companion neutron star — it blasted it with winds that nourished the dead star back to life in a burst of X-ray light.

The X-ray burst was first detected by the European Space Agency’s Integral space observatory in August 2017, but because of its location in the direction of the Milky Way’s center, researchers weren’t able easily identify its origin. It took weeks of observation to trace the X-ray flare back to its source: a slowly rotating neutron star orbiting a red giant star. The discovery is outlined in a paper accepted for future publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Stars with masses ranging from the size of the Sun to eight times that mass turn into red giants toward the end of their life. As they age, their outer layers are slowly pushed away from the star’s center by solar winds traveling at a few hundred kilometers per second. Over time, the outer layers can expand by millions of kilometers. Rather than floating off into no-man’s-land like they normally would, the winds from the red giant were captured by its neighboring neutron star, which flared up in X-rays as it began accreting them. (3/6)