July 18, 2019

Hundreds of Protesters Refuse to Budge on Eve of Hawaii Telescope Project Launch (Source: NPR)
About 300 demonstrators are trying to halt construction on the controversial Thirty Meter Telescope, developers of which are supposed to break ground on Hawaii's Big Island this week. Before the sun came up on the summit of Mauna Kea, the island's tallest mountain, a group of about half a dozen protesters chained themselves to a grate in the road at the base of the dormant volcano in an attempt to block workers from accessing the only paved road onto the what they say is a sacred site. (7/17)

House Nixes Funding for Pentagon Space Development Agency (Source: Space News)
The House declined to allocate funding for the Pentagon's Space Development Agency, citing ongoing turmoil at the agency. The chairman and ranking member of the House Armed Services Committee denied earlier this month a Pentagon request to reprogram $15 million in fiscal year 2019 to the SDA. Committee leadership said it was concerned about "the abrupt resignation of the director and the apparent change in direction for this proposed program." According to DoD sources, troubles at the SDA had been brewing and were accelerated by the sudden resignation of the agency's champion, Patrick Shanahan, as acting secretary of defense. (7/16)

Impasse on Space Force Approach (Source: Space News)
Congress and the White House remain at an impasse about reconciling different visions of establishing a Space Force. Defense Department and Air Force officials leading Space Force negotiations have been engaged in talks with congressional staff, but at the most recent meeting Friday neither side was ready to compromise. Meanwhile, a group at Air Force Space Command, dubbed "Task Force Tang-O," has been working to contribute ideas on how the Space Force could be organized. Briefing charts developed by the task force call the Space Force the "Guardians of the Ultimate High Ground" and propose multiple options to build the headquarters and field organizations. (7/16)

Galileo Outage Highlights Need for New European Approach (Source: Inside GNSS)
The ongoing Galileo outage is raising questions about the management of Europe's satellite navigation system. The Galileo system remains offline, apparently because of a problem at two separate ground stations that provide precise timing signals for the satellites. Some industry observers say the outage is a sign that Europe needs a "change of mindset" about Galileo, treating it instead as critical infrastructure that cannot fail at any costs, as is the case with the GPS system. (7/16)

More Funding Sought for Aussie Space Agency (Source: Sydney Morning Herald)
The Australian space community is asking the government to increase funding for the country's fledgling space agency. The year-old Australian Space Agency received less than $30 million over four years in the federal budget last year, plus $14 million for a Space Infrastructure Fund. By comparison, the National Gallery of Australia received $46 million this year. Experts in industry and academia said that while the agency is doing a good job, it needs a funding increase to grow the country's space industry. (7/16)

Virgin Test Pilot Joins Fallen NASA Astronauts on Space Mirror (Source: Florida Today)
A test pilot killed in a Virgin Galactic SpaceShipTwo accident in 2014 will be added to a memorial at the Kennedy Space Center. The board of the Astronaut Memorial Foundation voted unanimously Monday to add Mike Alsbury to the Space Mirror memorial after changing its rules to allow private, as well as government, astronauts, to be considered for the memorial. The Space Mirror is a black slab with the names of fallen astronauts etched on it. Alsbury was the co-pilot on a SpaceShipTwo test flight in October 2014 and was killed when the vehicle broke apart. (7/16)

US Heat Waves to Skyrocket as Globe Warms (Source: USA Today)
If you think it's hot now, just wait awhile. As the globe warms in the years ahead, days with extreme heat are forecast to skyrocket across hundreds of U.S. cities, a new study suggests, perhaps even breaking the "heat index." “Our analysis shows a hotter future that’s hard to imagine today,” study co-author Kristina Dahl, a climate scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said in a statement. “Nearly everywhere, people will experience more days of dangerous heat in the next few decades."

By 2050, hundreds of U.S. cities could see an entire month each year with heat index temperatures above 100 degrees if nothing is done to rein in global warming. The number of days per year when the heat index exceeds 100 degrees will more than double nationally, according to the study. (7/16)

SecDef Nominee Supports Space Force (Source: Space News)
The nominee to be the next secretary of defense said he'll work with Congress to create a Space Force. Mark Esper said at his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday he wants to work with the House and Senate "to come up with a right solution" for the Space Force, reconciling the different language in the House and Senate defense authorization bills with the administration's own proposal. He suggested in written testimony he had issues with the Senate bill that sets up a transition period for establishing a Space Force. He also said he supports the mission of the Space Development Agency, a newly created organization that has come under political fire because of leadership turmoil. (7/16)

UbiquitiLink Raises $12 Million for Cellular Constellation (Source: Space News)
Satellite communications startup UbiquitiLink has raised more than $12 million for its plan to launch a constellation of satellites to extend the reach of terrestrial mobile networks. The company is developing technology that allows conventional cellphones to communicate directly with satellites, and tested its technology on a hosted payload flown on a Cygnus cargo spacecraft earlier this year. By the end of the year, UbiquitiLink plans to launch its first free-flying satellite, with the next two slated to launch in the spring of 2020. (7/16)

3DGS Raises $12 Million for Radio Device Things (Source: Space News)
3D Glass Solutions (3DGS), a company developing radiofrequency devices using glass-ceramics that have space applications, has raised $12 million. Japanese conglomerate Nagase & Company led the round, with participation from Lockheed Martin Ventures, Sun Mountain Capital and Murata Manufacturing Co. The company builds radiofrequency devices for markets ranging from 5G cellular networks to automotive radar for self-driving vehicles. Demand from the space industry is leading the company to expand, and the first satellite to carry 3DGS technology is scheduled to launch in the coming months. (7/16)

The FAA plans to extend the deadline again for comments on its proposed revisions to commercial launch and re-entry regulations. An FAA official said Tuesday the comment period will be extended from July 30 to Aug. 19, the second extension the agency has provided to a comment period that opened with the release of the proposed rules in mid-April. However, the FAA doesn't plan to hold a public meeting about the rules, arguing that the comment period is the best way to solicit input on the regulations. Many in the commercial launch industry have criticized the draft regulations, arguing they don't meet the goal of streamlining the process laid out in Space Policy Directive 2 last year. (7/16)

SpaceX Glitch With Raptor Test on Starhopper (Source: NasaSpaceFlight.com)
A static fire test of SpaceX's Starhopper vehicle last night didn't appear to go as planned. Observers of the test at SpaceX's South Texas site noted that, after the Raptor engine on the vehicle fired, the vehicle was then engulfed in flames briefly. There was no obvious damage to the vehicle, but an investigation into that incident will delay the vehicle's first free flight, which was scheduled for as soon as Wednesday. (7/16)

Bridenstine Hopes Moon Mission Can Accelerate Mars Missions (Source: Space News)
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine says he won't rule out a first human mission to Mars in 2033. Bridenstine said in a call with reporters Monday that the agency is studying how its accelerated return to the moon can pull forward plans for human missions to Mars. An independent report earlier this year concluded that a 2033 Mars mission, a goal set by some in the space community and in Congress, was not feasible, but Bridenstine said the report's assumptions, which used NASA's exploration architecture, may not be accurate. NASA has placed a new emphasis on its long-term Mars plans since a tweet by President Trump in June that appeared to criticize NASA for talking too much about going back to the moon. (7/16)

Michael Collins Disagrees with NASA's Planned Moon Return (Source: Fox News)
Apollo 11 astronaut Michael Collins wants NASA to aim its sights squarely on Mars for future space exploration. Collins, however, said he thought NASA should be focusing its efforts on the Red Planet. “The current plan has been well thought out, but I disagree with it, we should shoot directly for Mars,” he said. “Twenty-some years ago, I even wrote a book, a whole boring book, on a mission to Mars and I have always been a believer in Mars.” (7/18)

How Much Will It Cost to Travel to Mars? (Source: CNN)
It’s being billed as the largest event ever dedicated to human exploration to Mars: From May 9 to 11, leading scientists and engineers will gather in Washington for the Humans to Mars Summit. Among the headline speakers will be Buzz Aldrin,William H. Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for the Human Exploration and Operations Directorate at NASA; and Pascal Lee, the director of the Mars Institute, an international non-profit research organization partially funded by NASA.

The Apollo lunar landing program cost $24 billion in 1960s dollars over 10 years. That means NASA set aside 4 percent of U.S. GDP to do Apollo. To put things in perspective, we also spent $24 billion per year at the Defense Department during the Vietnam War. So basically, going to the moon with funding spread over 10 years cost the same to run the Department of Defense for one year in wartime. Now, 50 years, later, today’s NASA budget is $19 billion a year; that’s only 0.3 percent of GDP, so that’s less than 10 times less than what it was in the 1960s.

Meanwhile, the Department of Defense gets $400 billion a year. So the number I find believable, and this is somewhat a matter of opinion, a ballpark figure, doing a human mission to Mars “the government way” could not cost less than $400 billion. And that was going to the moon. This is going to Mars, so you multiply that by a factor of 2 or 3 in terms of complexity, you’re talking about $1 trillion, spread over the course of the next 25 years. (5/2017)

Bezos: I Spend My Billions on Space Because We're Destroying Earth (Source: CNBC)
Amazon boss Jeff Bezos is the richest person in the world with a current net worth of $125 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaire Index. And he’s investing much of his Amazon fortune in the development of space technologies through his aerospace company Blue Origin. Why? “Because I think it’s important,” Bezos tells Norah O’Donnell of “CBS Evening News” in an interview which aired Tuesday. “I think it is important for this planet. I think it’s important for the dynamism of future generations. It is something I care deeply about. And it is something I have been thinking about all my life.” (7/18)

An issue with the same component has delayed launched of United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5 and Delta 4 rockets. ULA said Wednesday the Delta 4 launch of a GPS satellite, which was scheduled for July 25, had been postponed to at least Aug. 22. The company earlier delayed an Atlas 5 launch of the AEHF-5 military communications satellite from mid-July to Aug. 8. ULA said that the delays were due to an anomaly with an unspecified component during testing at a supplier, and the company later confirmed it was the same component in the upper stages of each rocket. Both rockets use the RL10 engine in their upper stages, but engine manufacturer Aerojet Rocketdyne said the problem with not with the engine itself. (7/18)

Bridenstine: Detailed Artemis Costs Estimate Ready Next Year (Source: Space News)
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine told senators Wednesday that a detailed cost estimate for the Artemis program likely won't be ready until early next year. Bridenstine said at a Senate Commerce Committee hearing that the agency is working with the administration on its fiscal year 2021 budget request, which will include a detailed estimate of the cost of returning humans to the moon by 2024. That budget request, though, won't be released until February 2020. Bridenstine said the total cost could depend on the size of commercial contributions to elements like the lunar lander, but warned development of the lander could be jeopardized if NASA starts the 2020 fiscal year this fall on a continuing resolution.  (7/18)

America is Losing the Second Space Race (Source: CNN)
Today, the space industry is largely an extension of the government itself and massively inefficient in how it allocates capital to promote commercial growth. Instead of encouraging free-market innovation and private investment, current government policy discourages commercial-type competition, reinforces incumbency and opposes reforms to improve. While expedient in the near term to win the technology race of the Cold War, this narrowminded approach has ultimately inhibited innovation, and we are now falling behind.

At best, the government-funded space industry loiters, with NASA and national security space programs spending billions of unnecessary dollars on obsolete technologies while keeping outdated satellite architectures on life support. Over 20 years of this downward trend has left this part of our space industry unprepared to lead or even be competitive for the next 50 years. If we lose the second space race that is already underway, the consequences will be actually far worse than if we had lost the first. This race is not about bragging rights or national prestige — it's about commercial economic growth and national security. (7/18)

Galileo Back Online (Source: AFP)
Europe's Galileo satellite navigation system is back in service after an extended outage. The European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Agency said Thursday that it had restored service after a six-day outage caused by a problem with ground stations that provide precise timing information. Although Galileo had yet to start full operations, the outage had caused frustrations among those using, or were planning to use, the service, in part because of the lack of information about the problem and when service would be restored. (7/18)

Crew Ends Four-Month Russian Lunar Simulation (Source: TASS)
A crew has wrapped up a simulated four-month mission to the moon. The six-person SIRIUS crew spent four months in an isolated habitat at the Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute of Biomedical Problems, intended to simulate a trip to and long-term stay on the moon. The Russian space agency Roscosmos cooperated with NASA on the experiment, with plans for later simulated missions lasting 8 to 12 months. (7/18)

India Reschedules Lunar Launch to Monday (Source: PTI)
The Indian space agency ISRO has rescheduled the launch of the Chandrayaan-2 lunar mission for Monday. ISRO said in a statement Thursday that the launch of the GSLV Mark 3 rocket was now set for 5:13 a.m. Eastern Monday. ISRO scrubbed the launch Sunday less than an hour before liftoff because of a problem with the rocket. The agency didn't disclose details about the problem, but other reports said the scrub was caused by a helium leak in the rocket's cryogenic upper stage. (7/18)

UK Space Agency Joins NASA in Lunar Exploration (Source: Press Association)
The U.K. Space Agency said Tuesday it's signed an agreement with NASA to cooperate on lunar exploration. The two agencies will establish a working group to coordinate joint scientific research and identify future opportunities to work together later this year. That agreement could enable the use of British communications and navigation systems on future NASA lunar missions, and "essentially" opens the door to potentially flying a British astronaut to the moon, Science Minister Chris Skidmore said. (7/17)

New Research on Tunguska Finds Such Events Happen Less Often Than We Thought (Source: Ars Technica)
Last month marked the 111th anniversary of the Tunguska event, a blast that flattened trees across half a million acres of Siberian forest on June 20, 1908. Scientists have been puzzling over the details ever since. We now have fresh evidence about what transpired back then, in the form of new data gleaned from a well-documented rare meteor burst near Chelyabinsk, Russia, in February 2013. That data shores up the hypothesis that the Tunguska event was most likely due to an asteroid impact. The findings are described in a series of scholarly papers commemorating the event.

Those models, plus current data on the asteroid population, also enabled researchers to calculate how frequently such impact events are likely to occur. The good news is that this research suggests mid-size rocky bodies like the one that likely caused the damage at Tunguska occur less frequently than previously thought—on the order of millennia, rather than centuries. NASA remains committed to improving its systems for detecting possible asteroid impacts. "Because there are so few observed cases, a lot of uncertainty remains about how large asteroids break up in the atmosphere and how much damage they could cause on the ground," said Lorien Wheeler. (7/17)

Momentus Raises $25.5 Million for In-Space Transport (Source: Space News)
Momentus announced Wednesday it has raised a $25.5 million round to develop in-space transportation services. Prime Movers Lab led the Series A investment round, which brings the total raised by the company to date to $34 million. Momentus is building two transportation vehicles: Vigoride to move satellites within low Earth orbit and Vigoride Extended to move satellites from low Earth orbit to geostationary transfer or geostationary orbits. Momentus launched its first demonstration mission earlier this month as a secondary payload on a Soyuz rocket, but has not disclosed details about the status of that spacecraft. (7/18)

Viasat Wins $48.3 Million Verdict (Source: Space News)
Viasat has won a $49.3 million verdict in a case against a company about to be acquired by Cisco. A jury concluded that Acacia Communications violated the satellite operator's intellectual property rights when it created products based on Viasat-developed integrated circuits, but refused to pay Viasat royalties stipulated as part of product development in 2009. Cisco announced plans a week ago to purchase Acacia for $2.6 billion. (7/18)

Investors Don't See Virgin Galactic Deal as Model for Space Industry (Source: Space News)
Virgin Galactic’s merger with a publicly-traded investment company is likely a one-off event based on the company and people involved, and not a sign of more fundamental changes in the industry, investors argue. Virgin Galactic announced July 9 it would merge with Social Capital Hedosophia (SCH), a special purpose acquisition company, with SCH taking a 49 percent stake in the combined entity. The deal would provide $800 million in capital for Virgin Galactic and allow the company to be publicly traded once the deal closes.

A panel of investors at the Space Frontier Foundation’s NewSpace 2019 conference were doubtful the deal was a harbinger of either other large deals involving space startups, or the use of special purpose acquisition companies — which raise money on the public markets for the sole intent of acquiring another company — as an alternative to a more conventional initial public offering (IPO) of stock. (7/18)

NASA Chief Bridenstine on Harvesting Rare-Earth Metals From the Moon (Source: CNBC)
NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said harvesting rare-earth metals from the surface of the moon will be possible in “this century.” Rare-earth minerals have been a key sticking point in the trade war between the U.S. and China. More than 80% of U.S. rare-earth imports come from China, and the resource has become increasingly valuable. The element is used in cellphones, batteries for electric cars, military equipment, fluorescent lights and more.

Getting these metals from the moon in the decades ahead is becoming realistic because of “the investments that the space community is making,” Bridenstine said. He called out Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Sir Richard Branson by name in this regard, praising the progress their funds have made. Bezos, Musk and Branson are the founders of space companies Blue Origin, SpaceX, and Virgin Galactic and Virgin Orbit, respectively. (7/18)

How Virtual Reality Might Help NASA Sell America on Space Again (Source: Bloomberg)
Felix Lajeunesse, a Canadian and co-founder of a Montreal-based cinematic virtual reality (VR) studio, hopes to be part of the solution to NASA’s problem. The 38-year-old is the creative force behind a VR documentary effort aboard the ISS, working with the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space (CASIS), which manages the U.S. National Laboratory aboard the station, and Time.

While NASA has participated in many documentaries over the years and maintains a significant footprint on social media, this latest collaboration aims to leverage cutting-edge media technology at a time when the space program needs it most. The hope is to accomplish through cinematic VR what in 1969 was left to grainy television broadcasts. (7/17)

Fifty Years of Apollo Technologies in Your Life (Source: NASA)
In 1969 when NASA astronauts took one small step on the lunar surface, the feat resulted in a giant leap forward in innovations for humanity. The many challenges NASA overcame on the way to the Moon led the agency and its partners to devise new inventions and techniques that spread into public life, and we are still reaping the benefits of those technology developments today. As with the many spinoffs from the Apollo era, the technologies we’re building for today’s missions to the Moon and on to Mars will transform our lives for generations to come. Click here. (7/18)

'Spooky' Quantum Entanglement Finally Captured in Stunning Photo (Source: Live Science)
Scientists just captured the first-ever photo of the phenomenon dubbed "spooky action at a distance" by Albert Einstein. That phenomenon, called quantum entanglement, describes a situation where particles can remain connected such that the physical properties of one will affect the other, no matter the distance (even miles) between them. Click here. (7/17)

There Aren’t Enough Space Explosions to Explain Strange Radio Bursts (Source: New Scientist)
Many of the brightest, weirdest phenomena in space come from cataclysmic events like explosions or collisions. But many fast radio bursts (FRBs), one of the most mysterious space signals we’ve seen, must not. That might mean that they are all part of a class of FRB that we previously thought might be rare. FRBs are milliseconds-long bursts of powerful radio waves that come from the depths of space. They have been attributed to many different sources, from neutron star mergers to alien spaceships, but no explanations have definitively fit yet.

Physicists Wonder: Why Has No One Been Killed by Dark Matter? (Source: Gizmodo)
The fact that no one has died from being struck by dark matter is enough proof to rule out certain ideas about the mysterious stuff, according to one new theory paper. There’s a conundrum facing physicists: Most of the universe’s mass appears to be missing, based on observations of the universe’s structure, how galaxies move, and how they seem to warp distant light.

Thousands of physicists are now hunting for what might be producing these effects. But the mere fact that we’re alive here on Earth can offer some insight as to what dark matter isn’t, and the researchers behind the new paper say the human body itself can serve as a dark matter detector. Click here. (7/17)

Most of the FRBs we’ve spotted appear only once, but three appear to repeat, sending multiple blasts of radio waves through space. Those three cannot come from cataclysmic events like neutron star collisions or supernovae that destroy their progenitors. Now, Vikram Ravi at the California Institute of Technology has calculated that the rest probably don’t either. He used a few of the closest non-repeating FRBs we’ve seen to calculate a lower limit on how often they occur, and compared that rate to the rates of cataclysmic events in the nearby universe. (7/18)

OneWeb’s Satellites Hit 400Mbps and 32ms Latency in New Test (Source: Ars Technica)
OneWeb says a test of its low-Earth orbit satellites has delivered broadband speeds of more than 400Mbps with average latency of 32ms. "The tests, which took place in Seoul, South Korea, represent the most significant demonstration of the OneWeb constellation to date, proving its ability to provide superior broadband connectivity anywhere on the planet," OneWeb said.

The company said it's on track toward creating "a fully functioning global constellation in 2021 and delivering partial service beginning as early as 2020." The test described yesterday involved six OneWeb satellites that were launched in February. OneWeb says its commercial network "will start with an initial 650 satellites and grow up to 1,980 satellites." While the 32ms latency figure is an average, the 400Mbps result seems to be the peak speed delivered during the test. OneWeb said its test also demonstrated "seamless beam and satellite handovers; accurate antenna pointing and tracking; [and] live-streamed video at resolutions up to 1080p." (7/17)

Corvettes, Astronauts and the Future of the Former Shuttle Runway (Source: ClickOrlando)
Since 2015, the Florida space port authority has operated the runway, now called the Launch and Landing Facility, as private use airport, but begin obtaining launch and re-entry site operator licenses through the Federal Aviation Administration to host new spacecraft landings and launches. In the meantime, while Space Florida prepares to host commercial more launch companies, technology and automotive companies are utilizing the unique space. Click here. (7/3)

The Improbable Story of the Bra-Maker Who Won the Right to Make Astronaut Spacesuits (Source: Fast Company)
It’s easy enough to make a tank-like suit that will protect a person from the rigors of space. But making a suit that does that, and also moves with something like grace and ease—that turned out to be brutally difficult. The company that managed to figure out how to solve the problem was Playtex, the famous maker of bras and girdles of the 1950s and 1960s whose Cross Your Heart bra, introduced in 1965, was an icon of the era. Playtex—part of a company with the corporate name International Latex Company (ILC)—was an unlikely choice. Click here. (7/15)