February 22, 2020

Geostationary Satellite Orders Bouncing Back (Source: Space News)
Manufacturers are hopeful that 2019 marked the beginning of a turnaround for geostationary satellite orders, even though their market remains fraught with uncertainty. After booking just 14 orders in 2017 and 2018 combined, satellite manufacturers reported 2019 orders for 15 commercially competed geostationary communications spacecraft and two military comsats awarded without open bidding. While total commercial GEO satellite orders in 2019 more than doubled what satellite operators ordered in each of the prior two years, the range of spacecraft ordered grew as well. (2/21)

Betelgeuse Mystery Solved? New Deep-Space Image Stirs Up Fresh Theories Behind Dimming Star (Source: AccuWeather)
"Betelgeuse will eventually explode as a supernova blasting its store of heavy elements out into our galaxy," NASA reported. "This explosion might happen tonight ... or within the few hundred thousand years," NASA added. It is hard to predict with precision when exactly a star like Betelgeuse will explode.
If Betelgeuse does explode, it would be a spectacle that would not soon be forgotten. It is estimated that the supernova would be nearly as bright as a full moon and would easily be visible in the sky in the middle of the day for weeks. Although 700 light years may sound close on a cosmic scale, the massive star is far away enough from Earth that when it does explode, it would not cause any harm to life on our planet, according to EarthSky.

A team of scientists in Belgium, has been observing Betelgeuse since December using the Very Large Telescope in Cerro Paranal, Chile, one of the few facilities on Earth capable of taking detailed images of the surface of Betelgeuse. Through these detailed observations, they have formulated two new possibilities to describe Betelgeuse's dimming: Either a large cloud of dust was ejected toward the Earth, obscuring our view of the star; or there is a large area of cooling on the star's surface due to ‘exceptional stellar activity.' (2/20)

China Ready to Begin Space Station Assembly (Source; Space Daily)
The maiden flight of the Long March-5B rocket carrying a trial version of China's new-generation manned spaceship is expected to take place in April, indicating the imminent start of construction of China's space station. The rocket, the prototype core capsule of the space station and the experimental manned spaceship are undergoing tests at the Wenchang Space Launch Center on the coast of south China's island province of Hainan.

During the flight in mid to late April, the experimental manned spaceship will be sent into space with no crew. The prototype of the core capsule of the space station will not be launched. The Long March-5B is a modified version of the Long March-5, currently China's largest carrier rocket, and will be mainly used for sending capsules of China's space station and large spacecraft to the low-Earth orbit, according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). (2/21)

Sex in Space: Could Technology Meet Astronauts’ Intimate Needs? (Source: The Conversation)
Space exploration and colonization is one of humanity’s greatest endeavours, but it comes with challenges. One of them is to make the space journey human compatible, that is, physically and psychologically viable. Given that intimacy and sexuality are basic needs, they become central issues for human-space compatibility.

How will humans have sex in space? Can we propagate the species beyond Earth? What will intimate relationships look like aboard spaceships and settlements? As of now, NASA and other space agencies have denied that any sexual activity has ever occurred during a space mission. Either sex in space hasn’t happened, or no one is talking about it. Nonetheless, imminent prolonged human missions to the moon and Mars raise concerns regarding the future of intimacy and sexuality in space. Click here. (2/21)

China-France Oceanography Satellite Put Into Service (Source: Xinhua)
The China-France Oceanography Satellite (CFOSat) has been put into service after completing in-orbit tests, according to the Ministry of Natural Resources. During the 8-month in-orbit test, the satellite acquired high-accuracy remote sensing data with its scatterometer and wave spectrometer, and the ground stations have met the requirement of data processing, said Liu Jianqiang, chief scientist of the satellite.

The CFOSat can conduct high-resolution observations of ocean surface wind fields, which have been applied in monitoring typhoons, hurricanes, and the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice. The observation data will play an important role in global marine environment monitoring, disaster prevention and tackling climate change. During the in-orbit test, the satellite has generated more than 20TB of data, which has been used by more than 40 users in China. Jointly developed by China and France, the satellite was launched in October 2018. (2/21)

How Better Propulsion Systems Can Help Improve Space Exploration (Source: Stanford)
“Plasma thrusters represent the future of space exploration,” said Ken Hara, an assistant professor of aeronautics and astronautics, who is helping develop computer models to make ion engines more powerful, efficient and useful.

Hara says the plasma thrusters have a number of advantages over their predecessors. For starters, the ionized gases used as the propellants in plasma thrusters weigh less than the fuels burned by the thrusters of the Apollo era. Every pound the spacecraft saves by lessening its fuel load means more weight to carry a larger scientific payload. Moreover, once a plasma-powered craft is in space, it can accelerate over time in a way that fuel-burning craft can’t, ultimately giving these lightweight engines a speed advantage as well.

Understanding just why this is so involves a concept called exhaust velocity — the speed at which a propellant exits an engine. A traditional fuel-burning engine burns a huge volume of fuel but at a low exhaust velocity, a combination that produces tremendous thrust. Think about a rocket on the launch pad, moving slowly at first as it is lifted by a great billowing of flames, then accelerating as the tremendous thrust that is generated breaks the grip of gravity and hurls the rocket skyward. (2/21)

Musk Went From Sleeping in the Factory to Being on the Cusp of Launching a CrewInto Space (Source: Washington Post)
Just over a year ago, the Securities and Exchange Commission had launched an investigation into Elon Musk after he tweeted that he planned to take Tesla private. He was facing criticism, and a defamation lawsuit, for calling a Thai-cave rescuer a “pedo guy” and “child rapist.” And when Musk took a hit off a joint during an Internet broadcast, it triggered a safety review from NASA that was concerned the billionaire maverick was going off the rails.

But now Musk is on a roll, literally dancing his way forward past a thicket of controversies. Tesla’s stock price has quadrupled, and the company’s market value now is greater than GM’s and Ford’s combined. A jury acquitted him in the defamation suit. And SpaceX is on the cusp of its first human spaceflight, having just completed what Musk called “a picture-perfect” test flight. President Trump even compared him recently to Thomas Edison, calling him “one of our great geniuses.”

Most notable for some is that Musk, known for taking to Twitter to tout his successes and lash out at his critics, has demonstrated restraint. He hasn’t tweeted any sensitive numbers about the publicly traded Tesla, and he kept silent after NASA pronounced the software in Boeing’s Starliner capsule — SpaceX’s competitor for sending people into space — so flawed that more than a million lines of code must be meticulously reviewed, a process that could take months. People who follow Musk closely say they’ve noticed the change. (2/21)

SpaceX Looks to Raise About $250 Million, Valuing Elon Musk's Space Company at $36 Billion (Source: CNBC)
SpaceX is looking to raise about a quarter billion dollars in new funds, as Elon Musk's company heads into a critical year for its three major projects. The company is seeking to bring in about $250 million at a price of $220 a share, according to people familiar with the financing. The new raise would value SpaceX at around $36 billion, up from $33.3 billion previously. The round is not expected to close until the second week of March, those people told CNBC, and includes an equivalent purchase offer to existing SpaceX shareholders.

Last year SpaceX raised $1.33 billion across three funding rounds. It's one of the most valuable private companies in the world and, with consistently oversubscribed capital raises, SpaceX shares rank as some of the most in demand of any pre-IPO companies as well. The steady fundraising comes as SpaceX continues development on three important programs: Crew Dragon, Starlink and Starship. (2/21)

Here’s What it Takes to Forecast Space Coast Launch, Landing Weather (Source: Click Orlando)
On any launch day, a team with the U.S. Air Force’s 45th Weather Squadron helps ensure a safe and successful launch – and sometimes landing—using all the technology and tools at their disposal, including weather balloons. Weather operations at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station deploy the balloons at least twice a day, launch or no launch, to gauge the wind shear and other conditions.

Suzanne Siverling is the supervisor of weather operations at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Years ago, she got her start as a New 6 WKMG weather team intern and now she oversees a team that plays an important role in every launch from the Space Coast and weather prediction across the world. Outside of launch forecasting, the Cape weather station is one of 1,300 sites across the globe that releases a weather balloon 365 days a year, twice a day at the same time. Click here. (2/21)