October 31, 2018

Russian Official Says Soyuz Failure Caused by an Errant Sensor (Source: Ars Technica)
Although the official report on the cause of a Soyuz rocket failure won't be released until Thursday, a Russian official disclosed its central conclusion a day early. Sergei Krikalev, the executive director of "manned programs" for Russia's space corporation Roscosmos, said a sensor on board the rocket failed to properly signal the separation of the first and second stages. As a result, one of the side-mounted rocket boosters did not separate properly from the vehicle and collided with the rocket. (10/31)

ConsenSys Acquires Planetary Resources (Source: Planetary Resources)
Blockchain venture production studio ConsenSys has acquired the pioneering space company Planetary Resources through an asset-purchase transaction. Planetary Resources’ President & CEO Chris Lewicki and General Counsel Brian Israel have joined ConsenSys in connection with the acquisition. (10/31)

Kepler Mission Ends as Fuel Runs Dry (Source: Space News)
NASA's Kepler planet-hunting spacecraft has ended operations after running out of fuel. NASA announced Tuesday that the spacecraft would no longer be able to perform science observations after exhausting the last of the hydrazine fuel used for attitude control. Final commands to decommission the spacecraft will be executed in the next week or two. The spacecraft, launched in 2009, changed astronomers' views on the abundance of planets after discovering several thousand exoplanets. Astronomers now believe planets, including small rocky worlds the size of the Earth, are commonplace around stars. (10/30)

Astroscale Raises $50M (Source: Space News)
Orbital debris removal company Astroscale said Wednesday that it has raised a $50 million Series D round. The company, headquartered in Singapore but with main R&D operations in Tokyo, raised the funding from several Japanese investors, led by the Innovation Network Corporation of Japan. Astroscale, which has raised a total of $102 million, will use the funds to support development of a technology demonstration satellite scheduled for launch in 2020 and other expansion plans. The company seeks to demonstrate its ability to remove satellites, providing such services to operators of megaconstellations. (10/31)

Arianespace: Russia's Soyuz Problems Won't Affect Kourou Missions (Source: Space News)
Arianespace says its Soyuz launches are not affected by the Soyuz MS-10 launch accident early this month. The company said Tuesday it is moving ahead with its next Soyuz launch from French Guiana, of the MetOp-C weather satellite, scheduled for Nov. 7. The launch is the second of at least three planned before the Soyuz rocket is used again for a crewed mission. (10/31)

Rocket Lab Returns to Flight in November in New Zealand (Source: Space News)
Rocket Lab plans to carry out its next launch in mid-November. The company said Tuesday its next launch of the Electron rocket is scheduled for a nine-day period beginning Nov. 11 from New Zealand. The launch, dubbed "It's Business Time," was scheduled for April but delayed because of technical issues that reappeared during a June launch attempt. The company has since fixed the component that caused the problem, and hopes that this launch will mark the beginning of a transition into "high frequency" launch operations. (10/31)

Musk Shakes Up SpaceX in Race to Make Satellite Launch Window (Source: Reuters)
SpaceX shook up the leadership of its Starlink broadband satellite constellation program earlier this year in an effort to accelerate progress. During a June meeting at a SpaceX office in Seattle leading Starlink, company CEO Elon Musk reportedly fired at least seven members of the Starlink senior management team, including executives who previously worked for Microsoft and Google. SpaceX launched two prototype Starlink satellites, called Tintin A and B, in February, and Musk is seeking to start launching operational satellites in mid-2019, a faster schedule than what the former managers had proposed. (10/31)

Navy Vet Wants to Create Space Medicine Hub in Northeast Florida (Source: Action News Jax)
A retired Navy pilot from Orange Park is spearheading an effort to create a space medicine hub in Northeast Florida. Larry Harvey, co-founder of the Center for Applied Space Technology, or CAST, recently helped a Jacksonville Mayo Clinic project get on board an EXOS Aerospace Systems & Technologies rocket launch.

Husband-and-wife team Dr. Michelle Freeman and Dr. David Freeman helped create technology that can monitor astronauts’ vital signs without them having to wear cumbersome medical equipment. “People ask: How does this help us on Earth?” said Dr. David Freeman, who is the medical director of the neurology intensive care unit at the Mayo Clinic. “If you can do that in space, you can monitor people in their own home -- their health monitoring in home, like Alexa or Siri.”

Harvey said one of the reasons he thinks Northeast Florida has potential is the development of Cecil Spaceport on Jacksonville’s Westside. It’s the only licensed horizontal launch commercial spaceport on the East Coast. The first launch is expected to happen there in the spring. (10/31)

Hawaii Supreme Court Rules in Favor of Building Thirty Meter Telescope (Source: Honolulu Star-Advertiser)
A Hawaiian court has approved a building permit for a controversial telescope. The Hawaiian Supreme Court, in a 4-1 ruling released Tuesday, approved an earlier decision by the state's Board of Land and Natural Resources to grant a construction permit for the Thirty Meter Telescope atop Mauna Kea. The court rescinded an earlier permit two and a half years ago on procedural grounds. The telescope is opposed by some Native Hawaiians who see it as desecrating a holy ground. Earlier protests blocked an effort to start construction of the telescope before the original permit was revoked. (10/31)

Chinese Company Demonstrates Vertical Landing (Source: GB Times)
A Chinese company has developed a vertical takeoff and landing technology demonstrator. Linkspace said its RLV-T5 vehicle will be used to test the ability to take off and land vertically under rocket power, setting the stage for a more advanced vehicle, the RLV-T6, which will make suborbital test flights in 2019. Linkspace plans to use that technology on its NewLine-1 small launch vehicle, whose first stage is intended to be recovered and reused. That vehicle is scheduled to begin launches in 2020. (10/31)

Kazakhstan Seeking No Compensation for Soyuz Damage (Source: Interfax)
Kazakhstan will not seek compensation from the Soyuz launch failure this month. Kazakh Defense and Aerospace Industry Minister Beibut Atamkulov said Wednesday the government will not seek any compensation from Roscosmos for the failed launch. It's unclear if the launch in fact caused any damage at all, with the Soyuz MS-10 spacecraft aborting to a landing in an empty field. (10/31)

Soviet Lunar Samples Up for Auction (Source: CollectSpace)
Lunar samples returned to Earth by Soviet spacecraft decades ago will go up for auction for the second time. Sotheby's will offer for sale three pebbles returned to Earth by the Luna 16 spacecraft, the first Soviet lunar sample return mission, in 1970. The samples were presented to Nina Ivanovna Koroleva, widow of Soviet rocket designer Sergei Korolev, and sold at a 1993 auction for more than $440,000. The samples are expected to fetch between $700,000 and $1 million in the new auction, scheduled for Nov. 29. (10/30)