September 2, 2017

NGA Seeks to Enable Speedy Innovation (Source: Trajectory)
The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), like many other government agencies, has found itself consistently outpaced by commercial industry when it comes to the development of progressive GEOINT tools and solutions. Rather than trying to compete with industry, the agency has focused on contracting with private sector innovators to leverage their creativity and technical expertise. Click here. (8/16)

Dynetics' Big Week Boosts Alabama's Aerospace Surge in 2017 (Source: Huntsville Times)
It's been a big week for Huntsville science and technology company Dynetics and its partners. The team finished one big project for NASA and broke ground on a new building complex for more rocket work. On Thursday, Dynetics and its team marked completion of NASA's Space Launch System Core Stage Pathfinder vehicle at the factory of steel fabricators G&G Steel in Cordova, Alabama. Radiance Technologies of Huntsville was also part of the Pathfinder team.

These developments - including RUAG's expansion - are parts of this year's surge in aerospace-related development in North Alabama that the state expects to create more than 1,200 jobs and bring $350 million in capital investment. Included in the year's announcements already are expansions by ULA, Blue Origin, Aerojet Rocketdyne, and Boeing. (9/1)

Spike's S-512 Supersonic Passenger Jet Featured in FastForward Brief (Source: IFG)
This quarter’s FastForward Group teleconference will feature Vik Kachoria, President & CEO of Spike Aerospace. The Spike S-512 uses advanced engine technology and an aerodynamic design fly at Mach 1.6 while minimizing the aircraft’s sonic boom. This supersonic jet will be able fly overland unrestricted. That means, for the first time, supersonic passenger flights across Europe, Middle East and Asia will be possible. Click here. (9/2)

How Cats (and Other Good Animals) Helped Pave the Way For Human Spaceflight (Source: Gizmodo)
All cats are amateur physicists. We know this because they insist on constantly knocking things over to make sure gravity still exists. But just because cats are interested in science doesn’t make them great candidates for space travel. Of course, that didn’t stop the Air Force from putting that to the test.

Archival video footage from 1947 shows researchers at the Air Force’s Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio, flying kitties and pigeons on a C-131 aircraft, nicknamed the “Vomit Comet,” that simulated weightlessness through a parabolic flight trajectory. The experiment was part of the Aerospace Medical Division’s bioastronautics research, so the Air Force probably wanted to see how kitties would fare in space before humans went. The researchers wrote very detailed instructions on how humans could potentially move around in space, based on kitty maneuvers.

Though Americans (regrettably) never sent a cat into actual space, France did, because, of course. On October 24th, 1963, the Centre national d’études sent a tuxedo cat named Fèlicette on a 15-minute-long jaunt in suborbital space. She survived, and was later studied by French scientists at the Education Center of Aviation and Medical Research (CERMA), to see whether or not her brain had been impacted by spaceflight. (9/1)

Cautious Optimism About Spaceport America (Source: Las Cruces Sun-News)
I wasn’t expecting to find positive news when I began my journalistic investigation of Spaceport America in March. The delays in getting Virgin Galactic’s customers into space and other problems had built a public perception that the project may be a boondoggle.

The situation that sparked my investigation heightened my skepticism. Two spaceport staffers called me, said they wanted to answer my questions, and then wouldn’t answer questions about finances. Red flag raised. Public records requests filed.

But as I dissected the spaceport’s claim that it was having a positive impact on New Mexico’s economy, I discovered reason for optimism. Economists were impressed. The spaceport has signed leases with four companies besides Virgin Galactic and held events like the Spaceport America Cup, a rocket-launching competition that brought 1,100 college students to southern New Mexico in June. (9/1)

India Suspects Snag in Explosive Bolts (Source: Deccan Chronicle)
Isro scientists suspect that a problem in the pyro mechanism — explosive bolts used to separate the heat shield — was responsible for the failure of the IRNSS-1H satellite to separate from the PSLV rocket after its launch. “This kind of failure is rare,” an ISRO scientist said, stressing the need for in-depth analysis to detect the root cause of the anomaly. Scientists usually don’t even consider this type of failure as a possible risk.

He said everything related to heat shield separation has a back-up system except for the explosive material used in the bolts. Usually, a number of tests are performed on the heat shield to guarantee successful separation. The heat shield is an encasement that protects the satellite in the rocket. Once the rocket is in orbit, the heat shield separates and releases the satellite in space. (9/2)

Swamp Watch: Trump has Picked a Politician to Lead NASA. Is That a Good Thing? (Source: Science)
President Donald Trump’s pick to lead NASA, Representative James Bridenstine (R-OK), is a political ally who has long lobbied for the job. If confirmed by the Senate, he is expected to serve as a champion for advocates who seek to open up commercial access to space. But his views on climate change are likely to draw opposition from some Senators who will consider his nomination.

"Mr. Speaker, global temperatures stopped rising 10 years ago," he said in 2013. "Global temperature changes, when they exist, correlate with Sun output and ocean cycles." And some critics are wary of naming a politician to lead an agency known for science and technology.

Bridenstine, who prior to joining the House of Representatives in 2012 served as the executive director of the Tulsa Air and Space Museum and Planetarium, will be expected to immediately help the $18-billion agency define how it will reach its long-term mission of sending humans to Mars. But many expect that Bridenstine, who has written about the commercial potential of exploiting lunar resources, could shift the agency's emphasis toward the Moon. (9/1)

NASA Invites CubeSat Launch Initiative (Source: ARRL)
NASA has invited accredited education institutions, nonprofit organizations, and NASA centers to submit applications for the agency’s CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI). Applicants must submit proposals by November 21. Educational CubeSats often carry Amateur Radio payloads.

“The CSLI provides CubeSat developers with a low-cost pathway to conduct research in space that advances NASA’s strategic goals in the areas of science, exploration, technology development, education and operations.” The announcement said. “The initiative allows students, teachers and faculty to gain hands-on experience designing, building, and operating these small research satellites.”

To date, NASA has selected 151 CubeSat missions for its CSLI program, and 49 of these have been launched into space. NASA has offered a launch opportunities to 95% of those selected, with 44 scheduled for launch within the next 12 months. The selected CubeSats represent participants from 38 states and 85 unique organizations across the country. (9/1)

Aerojet Rocketdyne: Do SpaceX and Blue Origin Have Pension Plans? (Source: Space Intel Report)
erojet Rocketdyne looks at SpaceX to its left and Blue Origin to its right and concludes: Freed of our Old Space/defense contractor fetters, many required by legislation, we could be like them. But it’s a long process, as company Chief Financial Officer Paul R. Lundstrom has been telling investors. The company is in the middle of a six-year Competitive Improvement Program whose goal is to shed up to $235 million in annual costs — no mean feat for a business with total revenue of $1.8 billion. Click here. (9/2)

White House Soon to Nominate Bridenstine as NASA Administrator (Source: Space News)
After leaving the space community waiting and wondering for months, the White House is expected to nominate Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK) as NASA administrator. Several space industry sources, speaking on background, said they anticipated a formal nomination of Bridenstine to run the space agency on Sept. 5, the day after the Labor Day holiday. That schedule could slip.

NASA has been led since the beginning of the Trump administration by an acting administrator, Robert Lightfoot, and an acting deputy administrator, Lesa Roe. Lightfoot has been in that position for nearly seven and a half months, the longest NASA has been led by an acting administrator in the agency’s history.

Lightfoot is expected to remain acting administrator for at least several more weeks, even if a nomination is announced soon, because of the length of the Senate confirmation process. In 2009, it took nearly two months for the Senate to confirm the nomination of Charles Bolden as NASA administrator. (9/1)

Florida Senators Rubio, Nelson Blast Trump’s NASA Pick (Source: Politico)
Florida’s senators are voicing opposition to President Trump’s pick for NASA administrator, Oklahoma Congressman Jim Bridenstine, saying a “politician” shouldn’t lead the nation’s space program. Republican Marco Rubio and Democrat Bill Nelson wouldn’t say if they’d buck the president and vote against Bridenstine, who was nominated Friday. But they suggested the GOP congressman’s political past would needlessly spark a partisan fight in the Senate that could ultimately damage NASA.

Bridenstine also trashed Rubio during last year’s GOP presidential primary, although Rubio said he doesn’t hold that against the congressman. The bipartisan pushback against Trump’s nominee for NASA administrator underscores the importance of the agency to Florida, home of the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral. Nelson, as a member of Congress in 1986 flew on a Space Shuttle Columbia mission; he also has a home on what’s known as the state’s Space Coast.

“The head of NASA ought to be a space professional, not a politician,” Nelson said. Nelson serves as the ranking member on the Senate’s Committee on Commerce, Science & Transportation, which oversees NASA and would hear Bridenstine’s nomination. Bridenstine’s office did not return calls seeking comment. (9/1)

US Air Force Announces Date for X-37B Launch at Cape Canaveral Spaceport (Source: Defense News)
The U.S. Air Force’s secretive X-37B space plane will make its debut launch on the SpaceX Falcon 9 on Sep. 7, the Air Force’s top civilian said Thursday. “If the weather is good,” the Boeing-built X-37B will launch from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, announced U.S. Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson, who declined to comment on the nature of the mission the space plane will perform. “It’s one of our experimental platforms,” she said.

The September launch will mark the start of the X-37B’s fifth mission, during which it will be outfitted with the Advanced Structurally Embedded Thermal Spreader, or ASETS-11, created by the Air Force Research Lab to “test experimental electronics and oscillating heat pipes in the long duration space environment,” the service said earlier this summer. (9/1)

Lockheed's Bid to Dismiss Retaliation Suit By NASA Contract Whistleblowers Falls Short (Sources: Law 360, Louisiana Voice)
A Louisiana federal judge Wednesday shot down Lockheed Martin Corp.'s effort to quash retaliation claims brought by two whistleblowers who have accused the company of fraudulent billing under a NASA contract, saying the former employees' allegations include sufficient factual support to constitute a claim.

The two Louisiana residents, one former Lockheed employee and the other a former contract employee for Lockheed, brought suit in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Louisiana in New Orleans under the federal False Claims Act. The two, Mark Javery of St. Tammany Parish and Brian DeJan of New Orleans, claim that they were first given no duties and then fired from their jobs after reporting cost overruns and safety and performance issues. (9/1)

Small Satellite Congestion Worries Air Force (Source: Space Intel Report)
First the good news: The agency with the world’s most extensive network of ground- and space-based tracking assets is mandated to offer — free of charge — a satellite identification, tracking and collision-avoidance service to anyone — North Korea included — who owns, operates or launches a spacecraft. It’s a role that is becoming more important with the planned launch of thousands of small satellites into low Earth orbit.

The bad news: The agency is the U.S. Air Force. That means some of the launch-service providers who could most profit from it — including India’s PSLV, Russia’s Soyuz and China’s Long March vehicles, all of which are seeking foreign smallsat launch customers — are disinclined to use it.

Space traffic regulations are unlikely until an in-orbit collision with widely felt repercussions occurs and provokes a regulatory response. For now, there’s not even an informal code of conduct among launch agencies. How big a risk to orbital safety — collision avoidance and space-debris mitigation — is posed by the growth of the smallsat sector is a subject of debate. Click here. (8/25) 

Artificial Intelligence Analyzes Gravitational Lenses 10 Million Times Faster (Source: Space Daily)
Researchers from the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory and Stanford University have for the first time shown that neural networks - a form of artificial intelligence - can accurately analyze the complex distortions in spacetime known as gravitational lenses 10 million times faster than traditional methods. (8/31)

In 1.3 Million Years, the Solar System Will Briefly Contain Two Stars (Source: Motherboard)
The Sun is used to having plenty of personal space, given that its nearest stellar neighbor, the Alpha Centauri system, is located about four light years away. While that's not very distant in cosmic terms, it's wide enough for our solar system to not be influenced by these alien stars.

But in about 1.3 million years, a star named Gliese 710, which is about 60 percent as massive as the Sun, is projected to interrupt the Sun's hermitude by crashing right on through the far-flung reaches of the solar system. While astronomers have been aware of this stellar meetup for years, new observations from the European Space Agency's Gaia satellite, released on Thursday, have constrained the trajectory of Gliese 710's impending visit, and charted out nearly 100 other upcoming close encounters with wandering stars. (8/31)