May 4, 2019

Dragon Was Destroyed Just Before the Firing of its SuperDraco Thrusters (Source: Ars Technica)
During a news conference Thursday in advance of a SpaceX supply mission to the International Space Station, the company's vice president of mission assurance, Hans Koenigsmann, provided some additional details about a failure with the company's Crew Dragon spacecraft 12 days ago. In the company's most expansive comments to date, Koenigsmann said the "anomaly" occurred during a series of tests with the spacecraft, approximately one-half second before the firing of the SuperDraco thrusters. At that point, he said, "There was an anomaly and the vehicle was destroyed."

During the activation phase, the SuperDraco thruster system is pressurized, and valves are opened and closed. Since the accident there has been speculation that there may have been some issue with the composite overwrap pressure vessels, or COPVs, which store rocket fuels at extremely high pressures. The COPVs on Crew Dragon are different from those on the Falcon 9, and they would not have been overly stressed at that moment, Koenigsmann said. "I'm fairly confident that the COPVs are going to be fine," he said.

Investigative teams from SpaceX and NASA are carefully reviewing telemetry data and high-speed imagery, Koenigsmann said, and soon they will begin analyzing pieces of the spacecraft recovered at the test site near Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Because this was a ground test, there is ample data for engineers to consider. He admitted the failure did come as "a shock" to some of the company's engineers. It is too early to determine a probable, or root, cause, but Koenigsmann expressed confidence in the SuperDraco thruster system. He noted that SpaceX has tested these powerful thrusters more than 600 times at its test facilities in McGregor, Texas. Editor's Note: My bet is on FOD somewhere in the system. (5/2)

SpaceX Offers Details on Dragon Anomaly (Source: Space News)
A SpaceX executive May 2 provided new details about, but no cause of, an incident that destroyed a Crew Dragon spacecraft during a ground test last month. Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of build and flight reliability at SpaceX, said at a NASA briefing about the upcoming launch of a cargo Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station that the anomaly took place just before the ignition of the SuperDraco thrusters on the spacecraft during an April 20 test at the company’s Landing Zone 1 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Koenigsmann said that the spacecraft had, earlier in the day, completed other tests on the stand, including of its smaller Draco thrusters. “Just before we wanted to fire the SuperDracos, there was an anomaly and the vehicle was destroyed,” he said. (5/3)

Space-Themed Tourism is Taking Off in China (Source: The Economist)
Mealworms wriggle on a shelf in the botanical module of Mars Base 1, a simulated Martian habitat on the edge of the Gobi desert in western China. Guo Jiayu, a guide, tells a group of wide-eyed schoolchildren that, mashed up, such larvae could be part of the diet of astronauts should they reach the red planet. Elsewhere in the complex (pictured), neon-lit corridors lead to sleeping compartments and a control centre. Through an airlock lined with spacesuits awaits a rover, ready for exploring the rocky expanse outside.

The small installation is near Jinchang, a nickel-mining city in the western province of Gansu. It was built last year at a cost of around 50m yuan ($7.5m) by Bai Fan, a garrulous British-educated entrepreneur with the backing of private investors. For now Mr Bai is mainly using the base to teach students about travel to Mars. Eventually he hopes the facility will become the centrepiece of a resort. His company has secured the right to develop 67 square kilometres of the surrounding desert—an area bigger than Manhattan. The base has already hosted a reality television show, in which six celebrities pretended to be astronauts facing life-threatening challenges. (5/2)

NASA Lunar Landing Concept Evolves, Minimizing Gateway Element (Source: Space News)
The approach would require three launches of the Space Launch System heavy-lift rocket and Orion spacecraft, starting with the uncrewed Exploration Mission (EM) 1 mission already in development. That mission has suffered delays because of problems assembling the core stage of the rocket, specifically its engine section, and Gerstenmaier said the agency was taking steps, such as horizontal integration of the core stage elements, to recover some schedule.

In a best-case scenario, EM-1 would launch in late 2020, “but probably more than likely some time in 2021.” A crewed test flight, EM-2, would follow in 2022, a date he said likely would not be affected by the EM-1 schedule. EM-3 would then carry out the initial lunar landing mission. NASA, meanwhile, would be working on other elements of the lunar landing architecture. “Now we’re asking for a service of ascent, descent and transfer [stages], essentially an all-in-one service for landing,” he said.

That is a shift from earlier plans, which called for procuring the stages separately and having NASA integrate them. “We thought that might be slower, and if we gave accountability for all that to one entity, they could make those trades,” he said, such as approaches that would require only two stages. NASA might support multiple companies through at least part of the development effort “so we have the ability that, if one gets in trouble, the other one will be there.” The plan also makes use of a minimal version of a lunar Gateway, though NASA is moving ahead with the Power and Propulsion Element, with the unit launched by the end of 2022. (5/1)

Facing 2024 Deadline, NASA Issues a Report Defending the Lunar Gateway (Source: Ars Technica)
As NASA continued to press lawmakers to support an accelerated plan to return humans to the Moon, the space agency began distributing a document titled Why Gateway? in defense of a return. The document summarizes why NASA thinks a space station near the Moon is critical to human exploration, and it was first shared internally by the Gateway program office at Johnson Space Center in Houston. The five-page paper is not signed by any NASA official, nor is a point of contact listed. Additionally, because there are several grammatical errors and typos, it appears the document was rushed into production.

Since it is not marked "for internal use only" and is written at a fairly general technical level, it seems meant for public consumption, including members of Congress amid criticism of the concept. "I do not know whether it is intended as a formal statement of policy, but the fact that it was released anonymously means someone expected blowback," said a Washington, D.C.-based NASA source who had read the document and is familiar with the agency's plans to bring a human landing forward from 2028 to 2024. Click here to read it. (5/2)

Canadian Lunar Gateway Proposals Go Ahead Despite Uncertainty in the US (Source: SpaceQ)
Following up on its earlier request for information issued in late January, the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) last Friday issued the expected follow-up request for proposals (RFP) for the Deep Space Exploration Robotics (DSXR) initiative. The RFP comes at time where there is some uncertainty in the US with respect to the path the Trump administration wants NASA to pursue versus the reality of the political situation.

The Trump administration has told NASA to accelerate its plan to send Americans to the moon. Instead of following a path which follows the global exploration roadmap developed by many national space agencies including Canada’s CSA, President Trump now wants NASA to send Americans to the moon by 2024. NASA is scrambling to provide the White House with an updated plan and cost it out. That plan would be very expensive and it’s unclear Congress will fund it. Many US lawmakers are skeptical about the plan but are waiting for NASA to provide the cost estimate. (4/30)

TRISAT Satellite Joins the First European Rideshare Mission on the SSMS (Source: Space Daily)
The University of Maribor and SAB Launch Services S.r.l. (SAB-LS) signed the Launch Services Agreement (LSA) for the launch of the TRISAT satellite. The TRISAT will fly on the Small Spacecraft Mission Service Maiden Flight planned on in August 2019 on Europe's VEGA small launcher. TRISAT is based on a highly miniaturized nanoscale platform from Slovenia's SkyLabs. "The scientific objective of the TRISAT mission is focused on remote sensing by incorporating a miniaturized multispectral optical payload as the primary instrument to provide affordable multispectral Earth observation in up to 20 non-overlapping bands in NIR-SWIR (Near to Short Wave Infrared) spectrum." (5/3)

NASA and Blue Origin Help Classrooms and [Florida] Researchers Reach Space (Source: Space Daily)
Nine NASA-supported payloads successfully lifted off from Blue Origin's West Texas launch site May 2. "It's such a huge milestone," said Kennick. "This opens the door to flying more experiments for more schools, and that means exposing more teachers and students to the promise of spaceflight." That promise is bolstered by Flight Opportunities, which lets researchers test technologies in a relevant environment-particularly innovations that will help NASA return to the Moon and send crewed missions to Mars.

The payloads will experience the rigors of a rocket launch and the challenges of a zero-gravity environment. These conditions will give researchers valuable insights into how their technologies would hold up on exploration missions. Among the six experiments flying on the rocket was the Strata-1 project by the University of Central Florida. This payload addresses the need for detailed understanding of the behavior of space dust, regolith and other particles on the surfaces of small bodies in space, to inform both robotic and human space exploration. (5/3)

Buzz Aldrin Calls For "Great Migration of Humankind to Mars" (Source: Futurism)
Aldrin notes his gratitude toward the Trump administration for committing to crewed missions to the Moon. But those missions should not be the ultimate goal, the astronaut wrote — instead, they should serve to help us define a path to Mars. “As matter of orbital mechanics, missions from Earth to Mars for migration are complex,” Aldrin wrote. “That said, human nature — and potentially the ultimate survival of our species — demands humanity’s continued outward reach into the universe.” (5/2)

Georgia's Spaceport Camden - Space Dreams and Nightmares (Source: All On Georgia)
At both nights of the Spaceport DEIS Hearings, supporters could not find anything needing correction with the seriously flawed document. But those who attended the Thursday morning meeting of the County-sponsored Environmental Subcommittee would have better understood what the opponents of the spaceport are talking about. The committee members, all of whom take their responsibility seriously, pretty much ripped the FFA apart about the errors, omissions, misrepresentations, contradictions, and violations of law they found throughout the document. “It’s a nightmare,” more than a few have said.

The FAA assured the members that they recognized the problems and would ‘fix’ them. My question is, “Wasn’t that what we’ve paid millions for over the past two years?” Supporter speakers at the DEIS hearings wanted to Comment about the benefits of the spaceport. Mind you, all of the promises of jobs are speculation, and there is not a single spaceport success they can model. For example: Once upon a time, there was the California Space Authority…. “Governed by a statewide board of directors, the space authority was a private nonprofit group whose headline members included Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Northrop, Grumman and Raytheon. However, it had managed more than $16 million in taxpayer funds since the 1990s" [before it was dissolved].

Spaceport Camden supporters will say something like “things are different now. There’re great companies like Vector Space and ABL who really want to come to Camden.” And, “They’re knocking on our door,” says the JDA. Well, Vector made promises to Wallops in October, brought their rocket and pony show to Vandenberg in November, and visited Kodiak spaceport in February promising an orbital launch from Alaska this Summer. Mind you, Vecotor’s “test” rocket launched here in August was an amateur-class rocket with a dummy second stage. They haven’t had a test since. Yet, they’re considered an egg in Camden’s basket. So is ABL Space, an 8-month-old, four-man startup with zero developed technology. Factories with 100’s of $85,000 jobs? In their dreams. (5/3)

Virgin Galactic Launched a Second Successful Space Flight. Now, the $250,000 Tickets Are Going Fast (Source: Robb Report)
In February, Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo (christened VSS Unity) successfully completed its fifth test flight and second trip into space. After many setbacks, the company in December successfully flew VSS Unity into space for the first time, reaching an altitude of 51.4 miles—past the border between Earth’s atmosphere and space, which NASA defines as 50 miles high. The flight marked a milestone in Virgin Galactic’s efforts to take paying passengers on space flights to altitudes where they will experience weightlessness, see the curvature of Earth, and stare at a pitch-black sky full of stars.

A crowd that included the firm’s founder Richard Branson, a number of its employees, and the press watched from the company’s base in Mojave, Calif., as the spaceship, attached to mother ship Eve, launched from the runway. The two ships flew together to 40,000 feet, whereupon SpaceShipTwo was released. The crew then activated the rocket engine for 60 seconds, propelling the ship to a speed of Mach 2.9 (about 2,200 mph) and powering its climb beyond the atmosphere.

Shortly after passing the 50-mile mark, the crew turned the spacecraft back to Mojave and glided it down to the runway. Two more crafts are being built to help meet the anticipated passenger demand. And while all of the $250,000 seats are currently filled, those interested in booking a flight can sign up for updates on new offerings by registering with the company’s website. (5/2)

NASA Aids Testing of Boeing Deep Space Habitat Ground Prototype in Alabama (Source: Space Daily)
Engineers and technicians explore a deep space habitat ground prototype May 1 at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The prototype, built by Boeing, will undergo testing this summer at Marshall. As part of a two-phased approach to lunar exploration, NASA is leading development of a lunar outpost called the Gateway. In the initial Gateway phase, NASA will work with American companies to design, develop and launch a power and propulsion element and a deep space habitat for the outpost.

The Boeing Exploration Habitat Demonstrator at Marshall is one of five uniquely designed, deep space habitat prototypes in development through NASA's Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships, or NextSTEP. Throughout the test period, NASA will assess the overall habitation design, with astronauts conducting simulations inside to evaluate the internal layout and ergonomics, to support efficient work-life balance aboard a deep space ship. (5/2)

Hera's CubeSat to Perform First Radar Probe of an Asteroid (Source: Space Daily)
Small enough to be an aircraft carry-on, the Juventas spacecraft nevertheless has big mission goals. Once in orbit around its target body, Juventas will unfurl an antenna larger than itself, to perform the very first subsurface radar survey of an asteroid. ESA's proposed Hera mission for planetary defence will explore the twin Didymos asteroids, but it will not go there alone: it will also serve as mothership for Europe's first two 'CubeSats' to travel into deep space. Juventas will be a '6-unit' CubeSat, selected to fly aboard Hera along with the similarly-sized APEX Asteroid Prospection Explorer, built by a Swedish-Finnish-German-Czech consortium. (5/2)