May 26, 2018

Apollo Moonwalker Alan Bean Dies (Source: Astronaut Scholarship Foundation)
Apollo and Skylab astronaut Alan Bean, the fourth human to walk on the moon and an accomplished artist, has died. Bean, 86, died on Saturday, May 26, at Houston Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas. His death followed his suddenly falling ill while on travel in Fort Wayne, Indiana two weeks before.

A test pilot in the U.S. Navy, Bean was one of 14 trainees selected by NASA for its third group of astronauts in October 1963. He flew twice into space, first as the lunar module pilot on Apollo 12, the second moon landing mission, in November 1969, and then as commander of the second crewed flight to the United States’ first space station, Skylab, in July 1973. (5/26)

Branson Says He Will Go to Space in 'Months Not Years' (Source: City AM)
Sir Richard Branson says he is in training to be an astronaut and his first trip to space could be in “months not years”. Branson said that he was close to achieving his long-held ambition of space travel. “We're talking about months away, not years away - so it's close. There are exciting times ahead.” The 67-year old said he was in a serious training regime to prepare his body for the experience.

"I'm going for astronaut training; I'm going for fitness training, centrifuge and other training, so that my body will hopefully cope well when I go to space. If you're going to really enjoy the experience, the fitter you can be the better. Instead of doing one set of tennis every morning and every evening, I'm doing two sets. I'm going kiting and biking - doing whatever it takes to make me as fit as possible." (5/26)

Branson Says He's 'Neck and Neck' with Bezos in the Space Race (Source: CNBC)
Richard Branson, the 67-year-old British entrepreneur, says he's in a closely-fought race with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos to get the first fare-paying passengers into space. Speaking to the BBC's "You and Yours" radio show, he said that Tesla CEO Elon Musk is doing "fantastically well" with rocket development and space transport for cargo. But, he added that ultimately the commercial space race was between himself and Bezos.

"I think we're both neck and neck as to who will put people into space first," Branson said. "Ultimately, we have to do it safely. It's more a race with ourselves to make sure we have the craft that are safe to put people up there." (5/26)

Mars Rocks May Harbour Signs of Life (Source: U. of Edinborough)
Iron-rich rocks near ancient lake sites on Mars could hold vital clues that show life once existed there, research suggests. These rocks – which formed in lake beds – are the best place to seek fossil evidence of life from billions of years ago, researchers say. A new study that sheds light on where fossils might be preserved could aid the search for traces of tiny creatures – known as microbes – on Mars, which it is thought may have supported primitive life forms around four billion years ago. (5/26)

Bezos Says Amazon Will Save 'The Expanse' Sci-Fi TV Saga, and the Crowd Goes Wild (Source: GeekWire)
I wanted to start out talking with Jeff Bezos tonight about his vision for settling outer space, but the billionaire founder of Amazon and Blue Origin had other plans. When I asked my first question at a fireside chat, set up during an awards banquet here at the National Space Society’s International Space Development Conference, Bezos stopped me short. “Before I answer that question, I want to do one small thing,” he told me. “Does anybody here in this audience watch a TV show called ‘The Expanse’?”

Wild applause followed — in part because the science-fiction TV series is tailor-made for the space crowd, and in part because cast members and the show runner for “The Expanse” were sitting out in the audience. They came to the dinner after doing their own panel presentation about the science behind the show. “I was talking to the cast … right before dinner started,” Bezos said. “I was telling them we were working hard at Amazon to save ‘The Expanse,’ but it wasn’t a done deal yet. And during dinner, 10 minutes ago, I just got word that ‘The Expanse’ is saved.” (5/26)

China Appoints New Space Agency Administrator (Source: GB Times)
China's State Council has appointed a new head of the China National Space Administration (CNSA), with the position having been left unfilled since early in January. The announcement that Zhang Kejian would take on the role was made on May 24. Zhang also becomes the head of the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND), which oversees Chinese space-related activities, for which he was previously deputy. (5/25)

NASA Awards $43.5 Million to Small Businesses for Technology Projects, 20 in Florida (Source: NASA)
NASA has selected 304 proposals from U.S. small businesses to advance research and technology in Phase I of its 2018 Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) program and 44 proposals for the Small Business Technology Transfer (STTR) program, totaling $43.5 million in awards. These selections support NASA's future space exploration missions, while also benefiting the U.S. economy. Click here for the SBIR projects, and here for the STTR projects. (5/25)

New Head Of Roscosmos Is Under Formal U.S. Sanction (Source: NASA Watch)
Russian President Vladimir Putin has nominated former Deputy PM Dmitry Rogozin to head the State Space Corporation Roscosmos. "I will do everything possible and necessary to live up to your trust," Rogozin told the Russian leader. Unfotunately for Rogozin, he is among the Russian individuals who are sanctioned by the U.S. under a 2014 Executive Order blocking access to U.S. property of individuals involved in Russia's taking of Crimea from Ukraine. (5/26)

Wilbur Ross: That Moon Colony Will Be a Reality Sooner Than You Think (Source: New York Times)
The first man on the moon held an American flag. In the not-too-distant future, astronauts on the moon may be holding fuel pumps. The future for American commercial space activity is bright. Space entrepreneurs are already planning travel to Mars, and they are looking to the moon as the perfect location for a way station to refuel and restock Mars-bound rockets. As much as this sounds like the plot of “2001: A Space Odyssey,” it is coming closer to reality sooner than you may have ever thought possible.

A privately funded American space industry is the reason. This industry is making progress in leaps and bounds. The global space economy is approaching $350 billion and is expected to become a multitrillion-dollar industry. There are more than 800 operational American satellites in orbit, and by 2024 that number could exceed 15,000. Thanks to public-private partnerships, for the first time in seven years American rockets will soon carry NASA astronauts into space. Long dormant, Cape Canaveral is now bustling with activity. America is leading in space once again. Click here. (5/26)

Blue Origin Has Bought Landing Ship For New Glenn Rocket (Source: IB Times)
While Elon Musk and SpaceX hog most of the media spotlight when it comes to private companies involved with space exploration, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is very much in the race too. Development of the company’s New Glenn rocket and associated infrastructure seem to be moving along nicely. Bezos said Blue Origin had already purchased a landing ship for the first stage of the rocket (think drone ships that SpaceX uses to land the Falcon 9 first stages) and that work to refit the recovery ship would start soon.

The New Glenn rocket, which the company has been working on for 5 years, would have a reusable booster stage, while the second stage would be expendable. Reusability of the rocket is a key component to the success of private enterprise in space development, since the costs of setting up such a company runs into billions of dollars (Bezos has, and invested much of that money in Blue Origin). To demonstrate operable reusability, Bezos said he would want to fly the rocket’s booster stage 100 times. (5/26)

Curiosity Drilling Again on Mars (Source: Space.com)
The drill on the Curiosity Mars rover has collected its first sample in more than a year and a half. The drill bored into a rock early this week, collecting powered rock samples. The drill had been out of action since late 2016 when a motor that is part of a stabilization system stopped working. Engineers developed alternative techniques to use the drill and tested them on Earth. The drill was put to use earlier this year, but could not go deep enough to collect samples for analysis by the rover's instruments. (5/25)

SpaceX Propulsion Guru Looks Ahead to Raptor Rocket Engines for Mars (Source: GeekWire)
SpaceX’s success owes a lot to the tenacity of the company’s billionaire founder, Elon Musk, but some of the credit has to go to the guy who designed the engines that make the rockets go. That would be Tom Mueller, who was one of SpaceX’s first employees back in 2002 and now serves as its propulsion chief technology officer.

“[Merlin] is a world-class engine,” Mueller said. “This is very easy to make, very low-cost and extremely reliable. Very proud of it. And another thing that this engine had designed into it was fast and deep throttling. Fast and deep throttling allowed us to land the rocket, so this basically enabled recovery of the vehicles.”

Mueller dropped some hints about the more powerful Raptor engines to come. The methane-fueled Raptor is expected to be twice as powerful as the Merlin 1D, with liftoff thrust of 380,000 pounds. The BFR’s first-stage booster will use 31 of the engines to pack more punch than the Saturn V did during the Apollo era. Mueller said he’s been mulling over the Raptor for about a decade. The engine doesn’t make use of the Merlin design, but goes instead with a full-flow, staged-combustion system that requires a clean-sheet design. (5/24)

NASA: Commercial Partners Key to Sustainable Moon Presence (Source: Space Daily)
As NASA shifts human exploration back to the Moon, U.S. commercial partnerships will be a key to expediting missions and building a sustainable presence on the lunar surface. The agency is orchestrating a robotic lunar campaign with a focus on growing commercial base of partnerships and activity that can support U.S. science, technology, and exploration objectives.

NASA is planning a series of robotic commercial delivery missions as early as 2019 ahead of a human return to the Moon. These missions will deliver NASA instruments and technology to the surface of the Moon to conduct science and prepare for human exploration. Among the instruments to be flown are the instrumentation suite from the former Resource Prospector mission concept.

"We conducted a thorough science and engineering assessment of Resource Prospector and determined all four instruments are at a high technology readiness level, are appropriate for science on the Moon, and will make flights on future Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) missions," said Dennis Andrucyk, deputy associate administrator, Science Mission Directorate, at NASA Headquarters in Washington. (5/25)

Rocket Crafters Tests Hybrid Engine for Intrepid Rocket (Source: Ars Technica)
Another small booster company tests its engine. In a key step toward developing its Intrepid booster, Rocket Crafters has test fired a small-scale engine for 10 seconds. Florida Today reports the company's engine runs on a plastic-based hybrid fuel and that the Intrepid rocket could begin launching as soon as 2020. Under present designs, the Intrepid will carry up to half a ton into low Earth orbit. Rocket Crafters has already won a $650,000 contract from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to help develop a larger 5,000-pound thrust engine. (5/24)

Ripple Aerospace Developing Reusable Rocket for Ocean Launches (Source: Ars Technica)
A new sea-based launch system is under development. A Norwegian company called Ripple Aerospace is seeking to develop a reusable rocket called Sea Serpent One. The rocket will have a capacity of 2.6 tons to LEO and launch from an ocean-based platform. The company is certainly thinking BIG. The planned Sea Serpent Three would be capable of lifting 140 tons. Ripple Aerospace was founded in 2016 out of a Facebook group. (5/24)

Paul Allen's Space Plane Prepares for its Coming Out Party (Source: Politico)
Stratolaunch, the space startup established by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen in 2011, is banking on this year being a milestone in achieving its vision of the leading launch company for those who want to get to space at lower costs to help solve problems here on earth. “Paul is very interested in the small sat community, the entrepreneurs, the folks who are trying to invent new things and actually help us solve world problems," says CEO Jean Floyd. "So we start there and try to help that community first.”

Stratolaunch is eyeing a host of small satellite developers to hitch a ride into orbit on the world’s largest airplane, which it is designing to launch satellites into orbit via a rocket tucked under the wings. The company plans to flight test the all-composite aircraft, which will rely on six Boeing 747 engines for the first time later this year, according to Floyd.

But already the company is collecting letters of intent from companies interested in launching satellites at lower cost and with more flexibility than traditional space rockets. “The ride share is getting very difficult for small sats, so they’re looking for something a little faster, a little more flexible and cheaper than a ride share, where you have to get in line and wait,” he said. (5/25)

China Upgrades Spacecraft Reentry and Descent Technology (Source: Xinhua)
China has successfully tested its new space program's reentry and descent technology, which makes landing heavier spacecraft possible. Current spacecraft landing methods such as parachute and airbag landings can not satisfy the deceleration needs of heavier manned spacecraft reentry missions, according to China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC).

The CASC successfully conducted three experiments, involving upgraded parachute and airbag landing techniques as well as the inflatable reentry and descent technology (IRDT). It published the test results on its website earlier this week. The upgraded parachutes proved reliable with strong structure and performance and can be used to slow down a spacecraft at the initial stage of reentry. (5/25)

U.S. Military Seeks to Be More Lethal, Including in Space, Mattis Says (Source: AFSPC)
The U.S. military is seeking to be more lethal in all domains, including space, Defense Secretary James N. Mattis said yesterday. Mattis said U.S. Northern Command will have to change to meet the challenges of the future, to include space-related security challenges. “As the threats to North America evolve, we'll have to evolve the command, too,” he said. “It will continue to adapt from what it does, incorporating cyber defenses, outer space priorities and, of course, the air-breathing threats that we'll have to stay alert to.”

Mattis said changes start with business reforms inside the Pentagon. He noted the Defense Department is currently not adopting best practices from industry. “We want to make the military more lethal in outer space and cyberspace, at sea, on land, and in the air,” Mattis said. The department, he added, also wants to strengthen relations with U.S. partners and allies. The department needs to examine the changing character of war, to include issues like artificial intelligence, hypersonics and outer space activities, according to Mattis. (5/24)

Astronaut Sally Ride Gets Her Own Stamp (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
Sally Ride, the first American woman in space, is getting her own stamp. The United States Postal Service announced on Wednesday that the 50-cent “Forever” stamp would be available for sale immediately. Ride was just 32 years old on June 18, 1983 when she entered space on STS-7 aboard the shuttle Challenger. (5/24)

How to Get to Mars Without Going Mad (Source: Cosmos)
The technological challenges involved in sending a crewed mission to Mars are daunting, but new research highlights the need to focus on the psychology of spaceflight to prevent world’s first Mars explorers arriving at their destination stark raving crazy.

A paper in the journal American Psychologist reviews the already extensive research done by NASA into the psychological trials that come with being an astronaut, and concludes that there is still a hell of a lot of work still to be done.

The central problem for would-be Mars travelers is that early missions will comprise a team of people confined in a tin can about the size of a small Winnebago for two or three years. During this time, communication with family and friends will be extremely minimal. Even talking to Mission Control will be difficult, given that signals to and from the craft will take almost an hour to arrive. Click here. (5/24)