October 23, 2023

SpaceX Sets November 1st For Starship Flight Test Date As FWS Visits Boca Chica Site (Source: WCCF)
After a brief lull, SpaceX has picked up the pace with its rocket testing in Boca Chica, Texas, amidst a flurry of developments that indicate that the ball has started to roll again for the second Starship test flight. SpaceX's first test flight forced the firm to redesign its launch pad with a new fire suppression system, and this system is the primary cause of delay for the second test as it and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) wait for the Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) to finish its evaluation of the redesigned launch pad.

However, as SpaceX waits, it seems to have penciled in a date for the second Starship test flight, as FWS officials visit the Boca Chica test site and it tests a Starship upper stage, all the while stacking, de-stacking and then restacking the massive rockets on top of each other. (10/20)

Mars Mission Aims to Solve Mystery of Its Leaky Atmosphere (Source: Gizmodo)
A pair of spacecraft is undergoing final testing before a roughly 230 million mile journey to explore the Red Planet. This week, Rocket Lab announced that the two spacecraft it is building for NASA’s EscaPADE mission have gone into the system integration phase in preparation for launch in 2024, the company wrote. The dual-spacecraft mission will make its way to Mars to study the planet’s magnetosphere as part of NASA’s Small Innovative Missions for Planetary Exploration (SIMPLEx) program. (10/20)

Scientists Just Came Up With a Wild Idea For Making Oxygen on Mars (Source: Science Alert)
Desert-dwelling bacteria that feed on sunlight, slurp up carbon dioxide, and emit oxygen could be incorporated into paint that supplements the air in a habitat on Mars. It's called Chroococcidiopsis cubana, and scientists have developed a biocoating that emits measurable amounts of oxygen on a daily basis while reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the air around it. This has implications, not just for space travel but here at home on Earth, too, according to a team at the University of Surrey in the UK. (10/21)

Construction of NASA's Artemis Moon Rockets on Track Despite Welding Issue (Source: Gizmodo)
In recent updates on NASA’s Artemis program, all four core stage engines have been installed onto the booster of the second SLS rocket, but a production issue has temporarily slowed work on the third. The installation of all four RS-25 core stage engines onto Core Stage-2 (for use in Artemis 2) marks a major milestone, though production on Core Stage-3 (Artemis 3) has faced a minor setback due to a welding issue. Meanwhile, looking ahead to Artemis 5 and beyond, the revamped RS-25 rocket engines have undergone their inaugural certification test. (10/19)

Increase in Launches Creates Impacts for Aviation, Emergency Management, Public Safety (Source: Florida Today)
Airplane flight rules. Boat restrictions. Emergency preparedness. Traffic assistance. The big boost in launches on the Space Coast isn't just bringing more tourists to Brevard, it also has a ripple effect on other industries as they work to accommodate — or, in some cases, capitalize — on the unprecedented pace. Airlines, cruise ships, emergency operations officials and police have had to adjust as the skies above the Space Coast get busier.

The Space Force, which runs the Eastern Range, has collaborated with partner organizations like the FAA and commercial spaceflight companies to shrink potential hazard zones, making it easier on planes and boats. Here are some of the ways the uptick in launches is impacting other areas of the Space Coast. Click here. (10/22)

Years After Space Shuttle Retirement, Florida Chases Nearly 70 Launches a Year (Source: Florida Today)
The world's busiest spaceport rewrote another record this year: the number of orbital missions launched. It was the 58th launch of the year, breaking last year's total and it's still October. For more than five decades, set in 1966, that number stood at 29. It finally fell in 2020 with the addition of just one more launch. It's only increased every year since. Last year's record of 57 nearly doubled 2021's previous record of 31 orbital launches. At the breathless pace of about twice a week, by year's end, Brevard could witness nearly 70 launches from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport. (10/22)

Framatome Space: A New Player in Space Exploration and Nuclear Power (Source: Space Daily)
With more than six decades of experience in the nuclear and industrial sectors, Framatome announced the establishment of a new subsidiary focused on the burgeoning space industry: Framatome Space. This new venture aims to leverage Framatome's expertise in nuclear energy to drive advancements in space exploration and habitation. (10/20)

Maine Space Conference, Nov. 5-7, Sponsored by Maine Space Grant Consortium (Source: Maine Space)
The conference is part of Maine Space 2030, a new public campaign designed to raise awareness of Maine’s research, education, and commercial assets in the NewSpace economy and realize its considerable economic potential for the people and the future of Maine. Click here. (10/23)

The Moon is 40 Million Years Older Than Thought, Lunar Crystals Study Suggests (Source: Phys.org)
More than 4 billion years ago, when the solar system was still young and the Earth was still growing, a giant object the size of Mars crashed into the Earth. The biggest piece that broke off of the early Earth formed our moon. But precisely when this happened has remained a mystery. In a new study in the journal Geochemical Perspectives Letters, researchers used crystals brought back from the moon by Apollo astronauts in 1972 to help pinpoint the time of the moon's formation. Their discovery pushes back the age of the moon by 40 million years, to at least 4.46 billion years old. (10/23)

Is SpaceX the Rocket Company to Rule Them All? (Source: The Hill)
What is it about Elon Musk that allowed him to succeed at commercial spaceflight when so many others had failed before? The 1990s was a decade replete with rocket companies like Beal Aerospace and Rotary Rocket that flourished briefly, only to fade away. Musk has a number of qualities few people that have created his success, He has the ability to relentlessly drive his employees to perform feats that they never imagined themselves capable of. He has an obsession to look at processes and examine whether they can be done at a lower cost.

Most important, Musk has a vision that goes beyond wealth acquisition. Because of his childhood love of science fiction, he really wants to expand human consciousness into space. He wants to save the human race by making sure that a planetwide catastrophe such as a nuclear war or climate change will not wipe it out.

Another factor is that, after the Columbia disaster, NASA became interested in outsourcing space launches to the private sector with the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services and Commercial Crew programs. The space agency became a huge market for commercial space companies. In Elon Musk, the man met the moment. (10/22)

SpaceX Signs Deal to Launch Key European Satellites (Source: Wall Street Journal)
SpaceX has signed a deal to launch up to four of Europe’s flagship navigation satellites into orbit, reinforcing the Elon Musk-led company’s growing foothold in the region as local rivals struggle to get rockets off the ground. SpaceX and ESA recently signed an agreement for two launches next year, each carrying two Galileo satellites, said Javier Benedicto, the agency’s director of navigation. The European Commission, the European Union’s executive arm, along with EU member states, must still give final approval for the deal. That is likely to happen before the end of the year. (10/23)

The Fermi Paradox – Where Is Everybody? (Source: Vice)
Scientists have theorised an intelligent civilisation could take about 10 million years to evolve and develop – surely at least one alien society would have developed the technology for space exploration and used it to conquer the galaxy by now. Ten million years would be more than enough time – hardly a blip on the timeline of the universe, which is ten times that. This was Fermi’s unanswerable paradox. If all of the known possibilities for the advancement of intelligent life are out there, why are we all alone?

The Drake equation attempts to estimate the number of advanced alien civilizations in our galaxy. It looks at the mean rate of star formation in the galaxy, the fraction of stars with planetary systems, the number of planets in such systems that are ecologically suitable for the origin of life, the fraction of such planets on which life actually develops, the fraction of such planets where life evolves to an intelligent form, the fraction of worlds in which the intelligent life form invents high technology capable at least of interstellar radio communication, and the average lifetime of such advanced civilisations.

When Drake presented his equation, it was estimated there were somewhere between 1,000 and 100,000,000 civilisations in the observable universe. These vary widely because the only variables scientists know with any certainty are the rates of star formation and the number of exoplanets in the galaxy. In 2016, scientists found that human civilization was likely to be unique in the cosmos only if the odds of a civilisation developing on a habitable planet were less than around one in 10 billion trillion. With odds that slim, the researchers told NASA there was a good chance an alien civilisation had developed. Click here. (10/22)

Women Can Join Future Indian Human Space Missions (Source: Outlook India)
While the Gaganyaan mission slated for 2025 will not have any woman astronauts, Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) chief S Somanath said that women can definitely join Indian human space missions in the future as astronauts or scientists. Somanath said that astronauts for the Gaganyaan mission, India's first human spaceflight mission, have been selected from among the Indian Air Force's (IAF) test fighter pilots and no women have been selected because there are no women test fighter pilots currently. (10/22)

Surprising Link Discovered Between Fast Radio Bursts and Earthquakes (Source: Physics World)
Researchers in Japan have found striking similarities between the statistical behaviour of repeating fast radio bursts (FRBs) and earthquakes. FRBs are brief, intense bursts of radio waves from outside our galaxy. Whilst these bursts typically last a few milliseconds, astronomers have also found bursts a thousand times shorter.

They used a dataset of 7000 bursts from three repeating sources. The data was taken by radio astronomers using the Arecibo observatory in Puerto Rico and Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope in south-west China. They found that the arrival times of bursts from FRB20121102A showed a high degree of correlation, with many more bursts arriving within a second of each other than would be expected if the generation of bursts were completely random. This correlation faded away at longer timescales, with bursts separated by over a second arriving completely at random. (10/21)

Space Force Considering Small GEO Satellites for Military Comms (Source: Space News)
The U.S. Space Force is exploring the use of small geosynchronous satellites to enhance military communications networks. Clare Hopper, chief of the Space Force's Commercial Satellite Communications Office, said the service was looking at either purchasing services from commercial small GEO communications satellites or owning such spacecraft. Her office issued a request for information last week on the capabilities of the "microGEO" satellite sector. She added that the Space Force also plans to issue a request for information on so-called direct-to-device satellite services, providing connectivity directly to cellphones. (10/23)

Spain's PLD Declares Suborbital Test Launch a Success (Source: Space News)
Spanish launch startup PLD Space said a suborbital test flight earlier this month was a success. At a briefing Friday, the company said the Miura 1 rocket it launched earlier this month from a Spanish base performed as expected, achieving the goals the company set for the mission. Executives said that they adjusted the trajectory before launch for safety reasons, lowering its apogee and extending its downrange distance, which explained why the rocket reached a peak altitude of 46 kilometers after previously projecting an apogee of 80 kilometers. The rocket followed the revised trajectory without issues, they said. The rocket is a precursor for its Miura 5 orbital launch vehicle, scheduled to make its first launch in early 2026. (10/23)

Voyager Spacecraft Get Updates (Source: NASA JPL)
The two Voyager spacecraft are getting software and other updates. JPL said Friday that engineers are working to update the software on Voyagers 1 and 2 to prevent a recurrence of a glitch last year that temporarily garbled data from Voyager 1. Controllers are also changing how they operate attitude control thrusters on the spacecraft to address residue that is building up inside propellant lines. The changes, which involve fewer but longer thruster firings, are expected to extend the life of the thrusters by at least five more years. Voyagers 1 and 2 have been in service since 1977. (10/23)