August 30, 2019

US Space Command Officially Re-Established, Temporarily Based in Colorado (Source: Space News)
President Trump formally reestablished U.S. Space Command during a White House ceremony Thursday. In brief remarks, Trump said the revived command "will boldly deter aggression and outpace America's rivals" in space. The United States had a U.S. Space Command from 1985 until 2002, when it was dissolved and its functions absorbed into Strategic Command in order to establish U.S. Northern Command to oversee homeland defense.

Space Command will have a temporary headquarters of about 287 people at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado, with six sites in Alabama, California and Colorado being considered as the permanent headquarters. Gen. Jay Raymond, the head of Space Command, said the goal is to reach "initial operational capability" of the command in the coming year and "full operational capability" in the years beyond. (8/30)

Cutting-Edge Chinese Satellite Malfunctions After Launch (Source: Sputnik)
The ChinaSat-18 (Zhongxing-18) telecom satellite suffered a technical malfunction immediately after launch, SpaceNews reported on Thursday. The satellite was launched on 19 August from the Xichang Space Centre aboard a Long March 3B rocket. It is the first satellite based on an enhanced version of the Chinese DFH-4 satellite platform. The ChinaSat-18 allegedly experienced a solar array deployment failure, but this information has not been confirmed by satellite owner China Satcom. According to the publication, the satellite is insured for $250 million. China Satcom has not yet filed a claim. (8/30)

Space Insurers Take Another Hit with Chinasat-18 Failure (Source: Space News)
Space insurers may be on the hook for a $250 million claim for Chinasat-18. The communications satellite, launched Aug. 19, remains in its transfer orbit and may have suffered a mission-ending problem. Though underwritten by the People's Insurance Company of China, ChinaSat-18 was reinsured on the international market, meaning foreign insurers are likely on the hook for much of any claim that operator China Satcom files. Combined with a claim of more than $400 million for Vega launch failure that destroyed the Falcon Eye-1 remote sensing satellite in July, this likely means that the space insurance field will suffer a loss for the second straight year. (8/30)

ISS Partners Back Gateway Plan (Source: Space News)
International Space Station partners have endorsed revised plans for the lunar Gateway. The station's Multilateral Coordination Board, meeting earlier this month, said the Gateway was a "critical next step" in human spaceflight and reaffirmed their commitment to participating in its development. The board offered a similar endorsement in March, weeks before the White House instructed NASA to accelerate a human lunar landing to 2024, deferring much of the Gateway's development until after that. Canada, Europe, Japan and Russia all said they were interested in contributing modules or other elements to the Gateway after completion of the initial, minimal Gateway needed to support the 2024 landing. (8/30)

Tiny Helicopter Integrated Onto Mars 2020 Rover (Source: Space.com)
A small helicopter has now been installed on the Mars 2020 rover. The Mars Helicopter is a technology demonstration that will be deployed from the rover after landing on Mars in February 2021. The solar-powered helicopter will perform brief flights to demonstrate how such a vehicle could be used to support future missions as a scout for other spacecraft or as a science platform. (8/30)

Aerion, Boom Supersonic Urge Changes To Planned Standards (Source: Aviation Week)
The leading U.S. developers of supersonic aircraft have  called on the Transportation Department (DOT) to modify its proposed rule on supersonic flight authorizations, arguing the proposal’s wording amounts to an effective prohibition on all supersonic flight. The rulemaking—which is expected to be published in the Federal Register by year-end—will not constitute a repeal of the current prohibition on overland flights in excess of Mach 1, although FAA will reserve the authority to approve supersonic operations on an individual basis.

In comments submitted to the DOT on Aug. 27, Nevada-based Aerion wrote that the rulemaking’s requirement that test flights cause “no measurable sonic boom overpressure to reach the surface . . . would effectively create a ban on all supersonic flight.” ... "This requirement does not recognize the possibility for a sonic boom or evanescent wave to be produced that is barely noticeable on the ground—if noticeable at all—but can still be detected by some scientific measurement method,” the company wrote.

Aerion suggested DOT eliminate the “no-measurable-overpressure” standard, instead allowing companies to perform environmental analyses that can accurately model the noise impacts of supersonic booms. The FAA, in turn, should evaluate those effects according to the same regulatory standards as subsonic aviation and commercial space operations. Boom suggested that in lieu of expensive over-ocean testing, "the public may be spared a few dozen half-second disturbances (on par with cracks of thunder, motorcycles backfires and other noises already tolerated in the environment) per year.” (8/28)

Trump Says U.S. Not Behind Iran's Failed Missile Launch, Sends Country 'Best Wishes' (Source: Haaretz)
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Friday that the United States was not involved with a failed Iranian rocket launch, and he wished Tehran luck at finding out what went wrong. "The United States of America was not involved in the catastrophic accident during final launch preparations for the Safir SLV Launch at Semnan Launch Site One in Iran," Trump said on Twitter.

The rocket exploded on its launch pad at a space center in northern Iran on Thursday, an Iranian official said. A U.S. official also said Iran suffered a satellite launch failure. On Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron said during a joint press conference with the American president at the G7 summit that Trump may meet Iranian President Hassan Rohani in the coming weeks. Trump said it was realistic to think that a meeting could happen in the coming weeks. (8/30)

Introducing the First Line of Adaptive Commercial Spacesuits (Source: Space Daily)
Space. Vast and unknown. Commercial spaceflight might barely make a dent in the enigma with more visitors but ILC Dover, maker of the spacesuits that took the giant leap on the Moon in 1969, is ready. The company recently rolled out its first line of commercial spacesuits this month with the launch of Astro, the EVA (Extravehicular Activity) spacesuit, and Sol, the LEA (Launch, Entry and Abort) spacesuit. (8/30)

New Russian Space Suit Clashes With Pee Ritual (Source: Space Daily)
Russia on Thursday unveiled a new space suit for a future spaceship, but the design may have to be changed to continue a decades-old tradition: making a stop to pee on the way to the launch. The Sokol-M prototype suit was demonstrated at an airshow outside Moscow, as a future replacement for suits currently worn during launches to the International Space Station on Soyuz spacecraft.

The Soyuz, in use since the 1960s, is set to be phased out and replaced in the next few years with a new Russian ship called the Federation. The maker of the suits, aerospace firm Zvezda, says they will be made of "new materials" and adaptable to different body sizes. The current suits must be custom-made for each individual. (8/29)

Kilopower: NASA's Offworld Nuclear Reactor (Source: Hackaday)
Since 2015, NASA and the United States Department of Energy have been working on the Kilopower project, which aims to develop a small, lightweight, and extremely reliable nuclear reactor that they believe will fulfill this critical role in future off-world exploration. Following a series of highly successful test runs on the prototype hardware in 2017 and 2018, the team believes the miniaturized power plant could be ready for a test flight as early as 2022. Once fully operational, this nearly complete re-imagining of the classic thermal reactor could usher in a whole new era of space exploration.

Kilopower bears little resemblance to traditional nuclear reactors. In fact, it’s more like an evolved version of the radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTGs). There’s no dangerous high pressure steam, finicky turbines to spin, or coolant pumps to fail. Thermal energy is passively carried away from the reactor core using sodium-filled heat pipes, which lead to the “hot” side of a Stirling engine array. With a large deployable radiator on the other side, the Stirling engines would use the temperature differential to produce reciprocal motion that can drive a small generator.

The Kilopower has been designed as a self-regulating system where everything happens automatically and without the need for external control. The use of passive heat pipes and Stirling engines rather than steam-driven turbines results in an incredible reduction of overall system complexity and size. An equally important aspect of the Kilopower design is the vastly simplified reactor core: a cylinder of uranium-235 that’s about the size of a paper towel roll and weighs just 28 kilograms (62 pounds). Despite its diminutive proportions, the core is designed to run at 850 °C (1,560 °F) for as long as fifteen years. (8/28)

Worldwide, There Are 131 Small Launch Vehicles in the Works. Most of These Will Fizzle Out (Source: Space News)
The numbers continue to boggle the minds of most people in the space industry. In a brief presentation at the Conference on Small Satellites Aug. 6, Carlos Niederstrasser of Northrop Grumman gave an update of a long-running effort to track small launch vehicle efforts. “And now the number everyone’s been waiting for: 128 small launch vehicles currently under development,” he announced.

But, he added that number was already out of date. “In the past four days I picked up three more launch vehicles,” he said. “So, the number is actually 131.” There’s almost universal agreement in the industry that there are far many more small launchers under development than can be supported by even the most optimistic forecasts of smallsat development. That inevitable shakeout of the market will give an advantage to companies that are already launching, like Rocket Lab, or those that soon plan to enter service, like Virgin Orbit.

Then there are companies like Rocket Crafters. The company, based on Florida’s Space Coast, is developing a rocket called the Intrepid-1 that is like many of the small launch vehicles proposed or under development. It will be capable of placing up to 500 kilograms into low Earth orbit for $9 million. Company executives shrugged off the aborted test and instead focused on their future plans. Sean Mirsky, a Rocket Crafters board member, said the company was seeing interest in its rocket from companies that want to launch satellites for communications systems and even “crypto” — as in cryptocurrency — applications. Click here. (8/29)

SpaceX Revamps Smallsat Rideshare Program (Source: Space News)
Less than a month after announcing a new effort to provide low-cost launch services for small satellites, SpaceX says it will increase the number of flight opportunities and reduce the prices it offers. The revamped smallsat rideshare program, the company announced late Aug. 28, will provide launch opportunities at least once per month starting in March 2020, at a cost of $1 million for a 200-kilogram smallsat. "We have updated the terms of the program and have made the service even more compelling with reduced pricing and increased flight opportunities.”

When SpaceX announced the program Aug. 5, the company was charging $2.25 million for a 150-kilogram smallsat, provided the launch was under contract at least a year in advance. From six to 12 months in advance the price increased to $3 million. A 300-kilogram satellite could launch for $4.5 million if ordered a year in advance or $6 million between six and 12 months in advance.

The original program also offered a limited number of dedicated Falcon 9 launches to sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, with the first scheduled for between November 2020 and March 2021. Subsequent launches were tentatively scheduled for early 2022 and early 2023. SpaceX now plans to provide three dedicated SSO launches a year, starting in 2020. In addition, SpaceX will offer additional rideshare services, taking advantage of excess capacity on Falcon 9 launches of Starlink satellites and other, unspecified missions to SSO or other polar orbits. (8/29)

SpaceX, OneWeb, or Kepler Communications: Who Really Launched the First Ku-band Satellite? (Source: IEEE Spectrum)
No one denies that the Soviet Union put the first man-made object into orbit nor, a few wackos aside, that American astronauts were first to reach the moon. But deciding which of three companies’ new broadband internet satellites was first to launch is proving somewhat more contentious. Elon Musk’s SpaceX, SoftBank’s OneWeb and Canadian start-up Kepler Communications are all claiming that they launched the first satellites capable of delivering high-speed internet using Ku-band (12-18 GHz) frequencies.

At stake is far more than just bragging rights or national pride. According to US law, the first operator to launch gets first choice of back-up spectrum should there be any interference between the rival systems—a near certainty given the more than 10,000 satellites they intend to deploy. The FCC now finds itself in the bizarre position of having to rule on something that might seem utterly obvious but that will affect the future of all three companies. SpaceX, OneWeb and Kepler would all very much like to be first in line to choose their home spectrum.

After launching its initial six satellites in February, OneWeb claimed victory. It wrote: “OneWeb hereby claims first priority in home spectrum selection in the Ku-band.” In May, Kepler put in its own claim, noting that its KIPP spacecraft reached orbit more than a year earlier and had since been carrying out commercial operations. A few weeks later SpaceX made its own case. Despite launching its first experimental satellite in 2018 (after Kepler), and its first 60 commercial satellites in May 2019 (after OneWeb), SpaceX says it still officially launched first. "An operator must not only launch satellites but must also communicate with a U.S.-licensed earth station in the specific frequency band,” it wrote to the Commission. (8/29)