September 8, 2020

Chinese Reusable Spacecraft Deployed Payload (Source: Space News)
A Chinese reusable spacecraft returned to Earth Sunday, but not before deploying an object in orbit. The spacecraft likely landed at or near the Lop Nor test site, based on orbital tracking data, two days after its launch from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. Chinese state media provided few details about the spacecraft's return, such as a specific landing time and location, or images of the vehicle. Two orbits before landing, the spacecraft released an object that remained in orbit after the spacecraft landed, but what that object is remains unclear. The reusable spacecraft itself is thought to be similar to the U.S. Air Force's X-37B uncrewed spaceplane. (9/8)

None Of Us Is Perfect—Not Even The Venerable Hubble Space Telescope (Source: NPR)
Tom Brown, head of the Hubble mission office at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore says that Hubble can sometimes aim in the wrong direction. "It used to happen on the order of about one percent of the time," he says. "These days, it happens more like five percent of the time."

This is an aging telescope, after all. Back in 2018, when a gyroscope on Hubble failed, researchers activated one of its on-board spares—the so-called gyroscope 3. It's been glitchy from the get-go. "It tells you the telescope is moving around even when it's not," explains Brown. Telescope operators compensate for this error, but sometimes it gets out of whack before they're able to adjust things. (9/7)

Gerstenmaier Warns of Premature ISS Retirement (Source: Space News)
A former head of NASA's human spaceflight programs warned against prematurely retiring the International Space Station. In an appearance at an AIAA online town hall meeting Saturday, Bill Gerstenmaier said he is concerned there may be a push to retire the ISS early to free up funding for exploration programs, a move he called a "false choice." Maintaining the ISS is essential, he argued, to build up commercial markets that can enable a transition to private space stations at some point in the future, and stimulate demand for commercial transportation services.

Gerstenmaier retired from NASA late last year, several months after being reassigned from his longtime position as associate administrator for human exploration and operations, and now works as a consultant for SpaceX. He did not discuss his new work in detail, but noted that, from a technical standpoint, the "demands of human spaceflight are the same" in both the government and the private sector. (9/8)

China Launches Imaging Satellite, Booster Crashes Near Village (Source: Space.com)
China launched an imaging satellite Monday. A Long March 4B rocket lifted off from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center at 1:57 a.m. Eastern and placed the Gaofen-11 (02) satellite into orbit. The satellite is part of a system designed to provide high-resolution images for civil applications. The rocket's first stage crashed near a village, according to video taken by residents, releasing a plume of toxic chemicals. (9/8)

India Plans Second Lunar Lander Mission in 2021 (Source: DNA India / Express News Service)
India is planning to launch a second lunar lander mission early next year. The Indian space agency ISRO had hoped to launch the Chandrayaan-3 mission before the end of this year, but Jitendra Singh, the government minister responsible for space, said delays caused by the pandemic have pushed that launch back to the first quarter of 2021.

The report didn't discuss the progress on the spacecraft itself, a follow-up to the lander on the Chandrayaan-2 that crashed attempting a landing a year ago. Indian launches have been suspended because of the pandemic, and while half the staff of the Satish Dhawan Space Centre launch site have returned to work, cases of COVID-19 have surged there in recent days. Despite that increase in cases, ISRO has declined to suspend work there. (9/8)

Genetically Engineered Mice Retain Muscle Mass During Spaceflight (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
Bulked-up, mutant “mighty mice” held onto their muscle during a monthlong stay at the International Space Station, returning to Earth with ripped bodybuilder physiques, scientists reported Monday. The findings hold promise for preventing muscle and bone loss in astronauts on prolonged space trips like Mars missions, as well as people on Earth who are confined to bed or need wheelchairs.

A research team sent 40 young female black mice to the space station in December, launching aboard a SpaceX rocket. The 24 regular untreated mice lost considerable muscle and bone mass in weightlessness as expected — up to 18%. But the eight genetically engineered “mighty mice” launched with double the muscle maintained their bulk. Their muscles appeared to be comparable to similar “mighty mice” that stayed behind at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

In addition, eight normal mice that received “mighty mouse” treatment in space returned to Earth with dramatically bigger muscles. The treatment involves blocking a pair of proteins that typically limit muscle mass. (9/8)

Pandemic Delays Next Landsat Launch (Source: SpaceFlight Now)
The pandemic has also delayed next year's launch of the next Landsat mission. The launch of Landsat 9, previously scheduled for April 2021, has been pushed back to September. NASA said that production of the spacecraft at a Northrop Grumman facility in Arizona has been slowed because of procedures enacted in response to the pandemic. The delay is not expected to increase the cost of the mission, currently estimated to be $885 million. (9/8)

NASA Resumes Suborbital Launch Campaigns (Source: NASA)
NASA plans to resume sounding rocket launches today after a hiatus caused by the pandemic. A Black Brant 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off this afternoon from White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico on a mission called DUST-2 to study how dust grains interact in microgravity. That research can help astronomers understand the formation of dust grains by dying stars, as well as how such grains clump together during the early stages of solar system formation. NASA halted sound rocket launches during the pandemic to put into place new safety precautions to ensure the health of personnel working on those missions. (9/8)

Another Chinese Rocket Falls Near a School, Creating Toxic Orange Cloud (Source: Ars Technica)
As often happens with the first stages of Chinese rockets launching from the inland Taiyuan facility, the spent Long March 4B booster fell downstream of the spaceport. In this case, it landed near a school, creating a predictably large cloud of toxic gas. Unlike most of the world's spaceports, several of China's launch sites are located at inland locations rather than near water to avoid such hazards. For security purposes, China built three of its major launch centers away from water during the Cold War, amid tensions with both America and the Soviet Union.

In recent years China has begun to experiment with grid fins to steer its rockets back to Earth—and eventually to potentially land boosters like SpaceX does with its Falcon 9 rocket. However this project seems driven more by a desire to master reuse technology than to protect its population, as China has been launching from Taiyuan since 1968 with seemingly little regard for nearby residents.

Compounding the problem of dropping rocket first stages on the surrounding countryside is that China continues to use toxic hydrazine fuel for its first stages. Hydrazine, which is two nitrogens bound together by hydrogen atoms, is an efficient, storable fuel. But it is also highly corrosive and toxic. Click here to see some video. (9/8)

Colonizing Mars Would Be Dangerous and Ridiculously Expensive. Elon Musk Wants To Do It Anyway (Source: CNN)
"If there's something terrible that happens on Earth, either made by humans or natural, we want to have, like, life insurance for life as a whole," Musk said on Aug. 31. "Then, there's the kind of excitement and adventure." SpaceX's plans for a Red-Planet settlement bring up numerous technological, political and ethical questions. One of the most challenging hurdles may also be financial: Not even Musk has ventured to guess an all-in cost estimate.

SpaceX is likely still many, many years from developing all the technology a Mars settlement would require. The company is in the early stages of developing its Starship, a massive rocket and spaceship system that Musk hopes will ferry cargo and convoys of people across the at-minimum 30 million-mile void between Earth and Mars. Musk has estimated Starship development will cost up to $10 billion, and Musk said Aug. 31 that SpaceX will look to launch "hundreds" of satellites aboard Starship before entrusting it with human lives.
If it proves capable of the trek to Mars, settlers will need air-tight habitats to shield them from toxic air and the deadly radiation that rains down on its surface. Click here. (9/8)

Astrobotic Peregrine Lunar Lander Completes Structural Model Testing (Source: Parabolic Arc)
Our Peregrine lunar lander successfully completed structural model testing, marking a major development milestone toward its maiden voyage and lunar landing in 2021! These tests qualify the integrity of the Peregrine lander’s structure and its ability to survive launch while carrying payloads from 16 customers.

The test campaign was completed using the Peregrine Structural Test Model (STM), a one-to-one scale representation of Peregrine that was assembled at Astrobotic’s new lunar logistics headquarters in Pittsburgh. Testing was conducted over 2 months at the Dayton T. Brown, Inc. commercial test facility in Bohemia, NY. The campaign proved that Peregrine can withstand the flight environment of United Launch Alliance (ULA)’s Vulcan Centaur, the launch vehicle for the mission. (9/8)

Space Force Aims to Set Standard for Diversity, Inclusion (Source: AP)
When 1st Lt. Kelley McCaa found out she would be part of the American military’s first all-female space operations crew, alongside a team of women she considers close friends, she knew it would make a bold statement for the newly-formed U.S. Space Force. McCaa’s squadron, based at Schriever Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, operates one of the approximately 30 GPS satellites used by more than 5 billion people around the world.

“Growing up, you don’t see too many women in STEM or women in recruiter videos for the military or science or physics,” McCaa said. “So, for me, I’m hoping that women will see that they have more opportunities than they might’ve realized growing up.” That all-female team isn’t the only sign that the Space Force is trying to build diversity into its mission from the start. Nina Armagno was recently promoted as its first female three-star general. (9/6)