October 19, 2019

Boeing Astronaut Will Bring Gift From Merritt Island High School When He Returns to Space (Source: Florida Today)
When Chris Ferguson returns to space for the fourth time on Boeing's Starliner capsule, he will bring a souvenir from Merritt Island High School. The former NASA astronaut and current Boeing astronaut was given a dog tag on Thursday by students from the da Vinci Academy of Aerospace Engineering at Merritt Island High School in hopes that Ferguson would take it with him on his ride to space. Ferguson, who was there to talk to students about the space program, replied, "you bet." (10/17)

The Quest to Get Photos of the USSR's First Space Shuttle (Source: WIRED)
Today, three versions of the Buran survive. One, a full-scale test model, is on display at the Baikonur Cosmodrome Museum. The other two—including the shuttle that was scheduled to fly the second mission—are rotting away in an abandoned hangar in another part of the sprawling Baikonur complex. Over the years, local scavengers have snuck into the hangar to harvest valuable metals and electronics. The site has also been targeted by international adventurers seeking a glimpse at Soviet space history. Among them is French photographer Jonk, who managed to sneak into the hangar in April 2018. Click here. (10/17)

China's Private Reusable Rocket To Be Launched in 2021 (Source: Xinhua)
A Chinese reusable carrier rocket that uses liquid oxygen-methane propellants made its first public appearance Friday at the ongoing 2019 Zhongguancun Forum in Beijing. The rocket named the Hyperbola-2, will be launched for the first time in 2021. It may make up for China's lack of reusable liquid-propellant rockets. The Hyperbola-2 was developed by a Beijing-based private rocket developer i-Space. Its primary stage can be reused, reducing more than 70 percent of the rocket production cost, according to Dong Yanmin, the company's vice president of technology. (10/18)

NASA Shirts Are Big Sellers for Retailers. Who's Profiting? (Source: Fox Business)
Fashion designers can be very protective of their trademarks and it’s not unusual for authorities to seize knockoff fashion goods. But one of the hottest brands going right now is letting just about anyone produce merchandise with its logo on it, for free. It’s NASA. Shirts sporting the abbreviated name of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration have been popular with youths for a few years now, and they’re sold everywhere from JCPenney for $9.74 to Saks Fifth Avenue for $355.

Bert Ulrich, a multimedia liaison at NASA, said the administration is experiencing a “golden age of interest,” thanks in part to social media posts that show off great photos from the Hubble Space Telescope, the Mars Curiosity Rover and astronauts on the International Space Station. Because NASA is a public agency, it doesn’t have any exclusive licensing agreements; anyone interested in producing NASA-related merchandise gets equal access. It also means that NASA doesn't get a share of sales.

That means just about anyone from mom-and-pop shops to major national retailers are welcome to put NASA’s logo on a shirt, as long as they’re willing to follow the administration’s rules. NASA has certain requirements like which colors are used, and its logos can’t be used in conjunction with another logo to suggest “co-branding.” (10/18)

All Female Spacewalk - Trump Just Got Fact-Checked From Space, Again (Source: The Verge)
President Trump took a few moments out of his day to speak with NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir, who were conducting the first all-female spacewalk in history on the outside of the International Space Station. While speaking with the pair, Trump mistakenly suggested this was the first female spacewalk ever — a point that the astronauts corrected him on.

“This is the first time for a woman outside of the space station,” Trump said. He later added: “You are amazing people; they’re conducting the first ever female spacewalk to replace an exterior part of the space station. They’re doing some work, and they’re doing it in a very high altitude — an altitude that very few people will ever see.”

In her response, Meir made it clear that they were building on the work of many previous women who had spacewalked before them. “We don’t want to take too much credit because there have been many other female spacewalkers before,” Meir said. “This is the first time that there’s been two women outside at the same time.” In the history of spaceflight, only 15 women have ever spacewalked, including Meir and Koch. (10/18)

China Launches New Communication Technology Experiment Satellite (Source: Xinhua)
China sent a new communication technology experiment satellite into planned orbit from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province late Thursday. The satellite, launched by a Long March-3B carrier rocket at 23:21 (Beijing Time), will be mainly used for multi-band and high-speed communication technology experiments. The satellite and the carrier rocket were respectively developed by the China Academy of Space Technology and the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology under the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation. (10/17)

Aerial Video Shows SpaceX Beginning Construction of Another Starship Rocket in Florida (Source: CNBC)
SpaceX now has three of its next-generation Starship rockets under construction, as aerial video shows the latest developments at the company’s facility in Florida. The first bands of stainless steel for another Starship rocket were put on a stand Thursday, and were captured in a video taken from a flying drone. Former commercial pilot John Winkopp took the video and gave CNBC permission to use his footage.

Starship is a massive rocket that SpaceX is developing to eventually launch cargo and people to the moon and Mars. The rocket is designed to be reusable so SpaceX can launch and land it multiple times, like a commercial airplane. SpaceX is building three Starship rockets simultaneously: One in at its facility in Boca Chica, Texas and two at its facility in Cocoa, Florida. Click here. (10/18)

Every $1 NASA Spends Drives Up to $10 in Growth, and That’s Great for the Space Industry, Says Man Behind the UFO ETF (Source: CNBC)
Space spending is speeding up. World Space Week, a massive confab that takes place across over 80 countries, just ended, and it has breathed new life into organizations around the world participating in the space race, says one top industry player. “People from all over the world are really realizing how important space is not just for any one individual, any one company or any one government.

This is a truly global collaborative industry,” Andrew Chanin, CEO of ProcureAM and the man behind the Procure Space ETF, ticker UFO, said Monday on CNBC’s “ETF Edge.” This year, Chanin spotted a notable change in how institutions are approaching investing in space. “What we’re seeing is ... this transformation away from it being completely reliant upon government agencies like NASA, like Roscosmos, like the [European Space Agency], and it being driven by commercial interests now,” the CEO said.

“So, the governments out there are saying, ‘Hey, we want to play ball. We want to work with you. Come up with your solutions and we’re happy to finance that.’ But so much of the spending now is coming from outside the government, so it’s a really exciting time for the industry,” Chanin said. “It’s come out in various reports showing that $1 that NASA spends actually shows $8-10 in growth,” he said. “This money being spent by NASA isn’t just for, ‘OK, we want to be able to say we’re great.’ We’re actually being able to take those technologies where that money’s getting spent and turn that into a positive for the overall economy.” (10/19)

Australia Joins US in Battle With China for Space Supremacy (Source: Nikkei)
When Australia announced a deal for $150 million Australian dollars ($102 million) to ensure its space industry's participation in NASA's Artemis mission, it was leveraging its 50-year collaboration with the U.S. space agency. It was also a show of shrewd but potentially risky space diplomacy as China readies to become America's most powerful space adversary. (10/18)

How SpaceX Just Turbocharged The Space Race (Again) (Source: Forbes)
After a decade hiatus and with almost impeccable timing, SpaceX has reentered the smallsat market. The company has officially announced it will dedicate a sizable fraction of its routine Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches as rideshare for this growing segment of the market.

With regular departure dates and minimal rebooking fees, the competition for launch service is now reaching a fever pitch in the smallsat market. At $1 million per launch, SpaceX is today offering an 80% cost reduction in dollars per kilo compared to its nearest competitor. And it's not an offer to ride on some notional future rocket, but instead on a rocket with plenty of flight heritage and at much lower insurance rates. (10/18)

Midland Councilman: Continued Spending “Wasted” on City Spaceport (Source: Texas Scorecard)
A years-long project by the Midland City Council and Midland Development Corporation to turn the city’s airport into a “commercial spaceport” has yet to bring any wealthy adventurers closer to the stars. Despite its failure, taxpayer money given to the project has continued to pile sky high. It’s important to remember that millions in taxpayer dollars have been spent without the spaceport in actual operation; but several large highway signs leading into town boldly advertise a “spaceport.”

Councilman J. Ross Lacy, who recently announced his candidacy for U.S. Congress, quickly responded to Robnett’s remarks, stating funds used for the spaceport are “not tax dollars.” Lacy has long been a strong proponent of the spaceport. “These are City of Midland airport dollars,” Spencer responded. “They are Midland Development tax dollars—those are tax dollars.” Continuing the unusual debate on whether the funds the governmental entity was about to appropriate were tax dollars, Lacy went further, saying, “No, these are not tax dollars; these are funds that are coming out of the airport funds that are only paid for by people that use the airport.”

Scrutiny of spending surrounding the spaceport has expanded, with Midland City Council candidate Kimberly Crisp publishing city documents showing other alarming expenses. According to the records, the city has paid $21,000 annually to have a representative on the board of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF), an organization whose mission statement is to promote the development of commercial human spaceflight and commercial space industry. Click here. (10/18)

Texas' Cameron County Addresses Boca Chica Eminent Domain Concerns (Source: KRGV)
The possibility of eminent domain is still on the minds of Boca Chica homeowners near the SpaceX facility. Some homeowners who live right next to SpaceX and Stargate have not accepted the appraised offer for their home. We spoke with Cameron County Judge Eddie Trevino Jr. who tells us there are no plans to take properties away by SpaceX or the Cameron County Space Port Development Corporation.

We reported earlier, the Cameron County Space Port Authority does have eminent domain authority. Trevino adds SpaceX has not reached out to them either. The new deadline whether or not to accept the buyout offer is next Friday, Oct. 25. (10/19)

Mark Kelly Raises Astronomical Sum in Bid to Snag Senate Seat From GOP (Source: Politico)
Mark Kelly has more money in his Senate election war chest than Joe Biden does running for president. The former astronaut, gun control activist and husband of Gabrielle Giffords has established a veritable cash gusher in Arizona, raising nearly $14 million this year, including $5.6 million in the last three months alone. Combined with his compelling biography, Kelly, a Democrat running for elected office for the first time, has laid the groundwork for a serious bid to unseat GOP Sen. Martha McSally in a critical battleground for Senate control.

McSally, who was appointed to the Senate after losing the race for the state’s other seat in 2018, has posted impressive fundraising in the off year, too, outraising all but two Republican senators in the most recent fundraising period. But Kelly has nonetheless stretched his advantage, with $9.5 million in the bank as of Sept. 30, compared with $5.6 million for McSally. (10/18)

The Most Precious Commodity of the Next Space Age (Source: Wall Street Journal)
I propose that the next phase of a space-based economy will revolve around gravity. Humans evolved in the gravity environment of Earth’s surface. The proper functioning of our bones and blood rely on it. Out in space, however, we meet with different gravity levels. The moon has one-sixth of Earth’s gravity, and Mars is a bit over a third. Crew on the International Space Station live in microgravity: They are effectively weightless.

To maintain their bone density and muscle mass, crew members must exercise for over two hours each day. Without this discipline, the astronauts could end up with osteoporosis. Living in gravity so different from Earth’s has consequences, including vision impairment and diminished organ function. (10/17)