July 7, 2021

NASA Chief Bill Nelson Brings a Politician's Eye to Space Agency (Source: Space.com)
NASA's new administrator, Bill Nelson, is a familiar face in the space community, but the agency he has led for nearly two months now has changed a great deal in recent years. Nelson comes to the position after representing the Space Coast and Florida in Congress for decades, and he takes the reins at a busy time for NASA, which is pushing double quick toward crewed missions to the moon while also feeling out its place in an arena ever more crowded by commercial players. Space.com sat down with Nelson to understand where his priorities for the agency lie and what he's thinking about as he settles into the job. Click here. (7/6)

Chinese Researchers Propose Deflecting 'Armageddon' Asteroids with Rockets (Source: Reuters)
Chinese researchers want to send more than 20 of China's largest rockets to practice turning away a sizable asteroid - a technique that may eventually be crucial if a killer rock is on a collision course with Earth. The idea is more than science fiction. Sometime between late 2021 to early 2022, the United States will launch a robotic spacecraft to intercept two asteroids relatively close to Earth. When it arrives a year later, the NASA spacecraft will crash-land on the smaller of the two rocky bodies to see how much the asteroid's trajectory changes. It will be humanity's first try at changing the course of a celestial body.

At China's National Space Science Center, researchers found in simulations that 23 Long March 5 rockets hitting simultaneously could deflect a large asteroid from its original path by a distance 1.4 times the Earth's radius. Their calculations are based on an asteroid dubbed Bennu, orbiting the sun, which is as wide as the Empire State Building is tall. It belongs to a class of rocks with the potential to cause regional or continental damage. Asteroids spanning more than 1 km would have global consequences. (7/7)

Europe Will Launch a New Two-Handed Robotic Arm to the International Space Station (Source: Space.com)
An autonomous robotic arm is readying to fly to the ISS to service its Russian segment. The European Robotic Arm (ERA), built by European aerospace company Airbus for ESA, will fly to the orbital outpost on July 15 together with the new Russian Multipurpose Laboratory Module, also known as Nauka (the Russian word for science). Airbus engineers have already installed the lightweight arm onto the module, ahead of its launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. (7/6)

Uplift Aerospace Goes Public, Plans Marketing on the Moon (Source: KSL.com)
Uplift Aerospace, a Utah company focused on lunar manufacturing and establishing a multiplanetary marketplace, has moved to the public market through its acquisition of NRP Stone on Tuesday. NRP Stone is a jewelry and precious metals company that uses a proprietary silver-based, tarnish-resistant, atomically formulated and engineered metal called Luxium. "We have chosen to enter the public markets through an acquisition to accelerate our plans to reach the moon," said Josh Hanes.

More investors on every level means more capital with which Uplift hopes to fulfill three ambitious projects for the next year. the goal is to construct buildings made of moon particles on the surface of the moon, including marketplaces and commercializing in-space mining. The second is to launch the first in-space marketplace, filled with unique artisanal products using Constellation Vault, a platform built to sell and auction off rare items in space. Uplift would commission and sell fine art and products from luxury brands and designers. (7/6)

Las Cruces Hotel Rooms Fill Up Ahead of Branson’s Space Launch (Source: KVIA)
Five days before British billionaire Sir Richard Branson launches into space, his team has booked half the hotel rooms at the Ramada hotel in Las Cruces, staff confirmed. "It's exciting!" said Maryann Costa, an administrative assistant at the hotel. "Everybody’s like, ‘Yeah! This is going to be great!'" She hopes to learn on Wednesday whether her hotel will host Branson himself. "I think Las Cruces deserves the kind of focus we're going to get from this." (7/6)

SpaceX Sets New Goals for Falcon Booster Reuse Goals After Ten-Flight Milestone (Source: Teslarati)
Elon Musk says that SpaceX has set its sights on even more ambitious reusability for Falcon rocket boosters. SpaceX competitors – most notably the ULA – have often held the ten-flight mark over its head to discredit, demean, and look down upon reusable rockets and SpaceX’s efforts to realize them. Not long before it was clear that SpaceX would hit that 10-flight target with at least one Falcon booster, competitors working overtime to rationalize a lack of substantial investment into reusable rockets shifted their goalposts again, expanding rationales to require a fleetwide average of ten flights.

Now, five and half years after Falcon 9’s first successful booster landing, four years after SpaceX’s first successful booster reuse, and seven weeks after a Falcon 9 first stage’s first ten-flight milestone, Musk says that some of the company’s fleet of boosters are already “slated to fly 20 or possibly 30 times.” Technically, if SpaceX had developed a reusable upper stage, Falcon 9 launches could feasibly cost just ~10% of the list price (~$6 million). Factoring in the cost of a new expendable upper stage for each mission, the actual cost of a modern Falcon 9 launch with a flight-proven booster and payload fairing is closer to ~$18M.

However, Musk confirmed that the cost of Falcon 9 operations – as in refurbishment, recovery, consumables, and any other recurring work – is just 10% of the cost of launch, effectively confirming that Falcon 9’s Block 5 upgrade really did create a rocket booster that requires virtually no refurbishment. Musk noted that beyond plans for up to ten flights without refurbishment, Falcon boosters could feasibly be made to fly dozens or even 100+ times with occasional in-depth maintenance – not unlike modern aircraft. (7/6)

Most Americans Believe in Intelligent Life Beyond Earth; Few See UFOs as a Major National Security Threat (Source: Pew Research)
As an unprecedented U.S. intelligence report brings new attention to the phenomenon of unidentified flying objects, about two-thirds of Americans (65%) say their best guess is that intelligent life exists on other planets, according to a Pew Research Center survey conducted just before the release of the government assessment.

A smaller but still sizable share of the public (51%) says that UFOs reported by people in the military are likely evidence of intelligent life outside Earth. Most of this sentiment comes from people who say that military-reported UFOs are “probably” evidence of extraterrestrial life (40%), rather than “definitely” such evidence (11%), according to the survey of 10,417 U.S. adults, conducted June 14 to 24. On the other hand, 47% of Americans say the military reports are probably (36%) or definitely (11%) not evidence of life outside Earth. (6/30)

Could We Really Terraform Mars? (Source: Space.com)
Almost every sci-fi story begins (and sometimes ends) with the terraforming of Mars to turn it into a more hospitable world. But with its frigid temperatures, remoteness from the sun and general dustiness, changing Mars to be more Earth-like is more challenging than it seems (and it already seems pretty tough). If we could somehow warm the planets ice caps, that might release enough carbon into the atmosphere to kick-start a greenhouse warming trend. All we would need to do is watch and wait for a few centuries for physics to do its thing and turn Mars into a much less nasty place.

Unfortunately, that simple idea probably isn't going to work. Also, Mars is smaller than Earth, which means it cooled off much faster. The core of our planet is still molten, and that spinning blob of iron-rich goo in the center of Earth powers our strong magnetic field. The magnetic field is a literal force field, capable of stopping and deflecting the solar wind, which is a never-ending stream of [deadly] high-energy particles blasting out of the sun. (7/6)

Ingenuity, InSight, and Ice Mapper (Source: Space Review)
Rovers seem to get all the attention on Mars, but there are other current and planned missions to the Red Planet. Jeff Foust updates progress on a helicopter that continues to push the limits of flight, a lander with fading power, and a future orbiter mission working on a tight budget. Click here. (7/6)
 
Flights to Mars, Real and LEGO (Source: Space Review)
In the late 1960s, Boeing developed a concept for a nuclear-powered crewed Mars spacecraft. More than a half-century later, Dwayne Day describes, that concept continues to stimulate imaginations, including of one designer who created models of it using LEGOs. Click here. (7/6)
 
The Nanosatellite Gold Rush Demands New Routes to Space (Source: Space Review)
Smallsats offer new, cost-effective approaches to flying advanced technologies—if you can launch them. Steve Heller argues that continued innovation in smallsats requires innovation in getting the satellites to space. Click here. (7/6)
 
Did Ancient Astronomers set a Message in Stone for Us? (Source: Space Review)
An ancient stone pillar in a temple in Turkey may tell the story of a long-ago impact, some researchers suggest. Sam Dinkin notes the pillar may have been a message of a very different kind as well. Click here. (7/6)

Methane in the Plumes of Saturn's Moon Enceladus: Possible Signs of Life? (Source: University of Arizona)
An unknown methane-producing process is likely at work in the hidden ocean beneath the icy shell of Saturn's moon Enceladus, suggests a new study. Giant water plumes erupting from Enceladus have long fascinated scientists. Flying through the plumes and sampling their chemical makeup, the Cassini spacecraft detected a relatively high concentration of certain molecules associated with hydrothermal vents on the bottom of Earth's oceans, specifically dihydrogen, methane and carbon dioxide. The amount of methane found in the plumes was particularly unexpected. (7/6)

Bezos-Branson-Musk Space Race is a Huge Waste of Money and Scientifically Useless (Source: LA Times)
The big news on the spaceflight front last week was the announcement by billionaire Richard Branson that he would ride his Virgin Galactic spacecraft aloft on July 11, beating fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos to the edge of space by nine days. Big news, that is, for anyone mourning the demise of the TV show “Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,” which ran out its string more than 15 years ago. For anyone else anchored here on planet Earth, the competition to be the first billionaire in space should mark a milestone in the towering vanity of the wealthy. (7/6)

Bezos, Branson and Musk: Who is Winning the Space Tourism Race? (Source: Reuters)
Bezos, Branson and Musk have been investing billions of dollars in their space startups, each promising to ferry paying customers on rides to space - and it will cost a pretty penny to be part of it. Virgin Galactic is reported to have more than 600 ticket reservations already, priced around $250,000. It expects to begin a full commercial service in 2022 and eventually hopes to slash the ticket price to around $40,000.

Bezos' Blue Origin was planning to charge passengers at least $200,000 for the ride, based on an appraisal of Branson's rival plans and other considerations, though its thinking may have changed. Blue has not divulged its long-term pricing plans. SpaceX has already taken a crew to the International Space Station, and the company has plans to send an all-civilian crew into orbit in September. Musk has also said SpaceX will fly Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa around the moon with its forthcoming Starship rocket in 2023.

Virgin Galactic boasts a flight time of around 90 minutes from take-off to landing, including several minutes of weightlessness. Blue Origin's capsule suborbital flight is around 10 minutes after separation. Again, those on board experience a few minutes of weightlessness and see the curvature of the planet before returning to Earth. The SpaceX missions are expected to last three to four days from launch to splashdown. (7/6)

Astronauts Reunite at KSC Visitor Complex for Anniversary of Atlantis Final Flight (Source: Florida Today)
Thursday marks the 10th anniversary of the final flight of space shuttle Atlantis and the end of the NASA vehicle’s era. The iconic spacecraft last launched from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center on July 8, 2011, carrying a crew of four astronauts: Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley, and Mission Specialists Sandy Magnus and Rex Walheim. Atlantis flew 33 missions over its 25-year career and has been on display at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex since 2013. (7/6)

Redesigning Space Travel for Women (Source: Guardian)
In February, the ESA launched its first recruitment drive for new astronauts in 11 years, emphasizing women applicants and those with disabilities (it recently extended the deadline). NASA is reportedly planning to change rules on astronaut radiation limits, which are currently preventing female astronauts doing as many missions as their male counterparts. And as the US space agency gears up for its historic Artemis moon mission, which aims to see the first woman and person of color land on the moon, it is a good time to understand just how much diversity affects innovation.

Tara Ruttley, associate chief scientist for microgravity research and adviser to the chief scientist’s office at NASA, has witnessed a culture change at the biggest space agency in the world. When she started 20 years ago, she was one of only three women in her engineering group. Today, women make up around a third of employees, and represent 24% of those in science and engineering roles.

Over the years, initiatives and campaigns have attempted to encourage more women into the space sector. For example, the organization Rocket Women aims to inspire women to pursue a career in space and other STEM sectors, while the Space4Women project, run by the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs, promotes gender equality and women’s empowerment in STEM fields. Last year, Olay ran a Super Bowl ad campaign Make Space for Women, featuring retired astronaut Nicole Stott. (7/6)

NASA Software Benefits Earth, Available for Business, Public Use (Source: Space.com)
Many of NASA's computational innovations were developed to help explore space, but the public can download them for applications that benefit us right here on Earth. The agency's latest software catalog has hundreds of popular programs, as well as more than 180 new ones, all available for free download. "The good news is this technology is available to the public for free," said Bill Nelson. "The software suited for satellites, astronauts, engineers, and scientists as it is applied and adapted across industries and businesses is a testament to the extensive value NASA brings to the United States - and the world." (6/30)

Planet, Satellogic Enter SPAC Deals (Sources: Planet, Space News)
Earth imaging company Planet will go public through a SPAC merger. Planet announced early Wednesday that it will merge with dMY Technology Group, Inc. IV, a special purpose acquisition company, valuing the company at nearly $2.8 billion. The deal will provide more than $430 million in cash that Planet says will go towards "new and existing growth initiatives." The companies expect the deal to close later this year.

One day earlier, Satellogic announced its own SPAC merger. Satellogic will merge with CF Acquisition Corp. V, raising $271 million and giving the company an equity valuation of $1.1 billion. Satellogic says the proceeds will allow it to build out a constellation of 300 imaging satellites by 2025, which will provide daily high-resolution imaging of the globe. Satellogic has 13 operational satellites plus four launched last week. Satellogic argues it can dominate the market for high-resolution imagery since its costs will be two orders of magnitude lower than its competitors based on the design of its satellites. (7/7)

China Continues Launch Pace with Data Relay Satellite (Source: Space News)
China launched a data relay satellite Tuesday, its third launch in four days. A Long March 3C lifted off from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center at 11:53 a.m. Eastern and successfully placed the Tianlian-1 (05) satellite into geosynchronous transfer orbit. Tianlian satellites handle communications for Chinese satellites in low and medium Earth orbits, as well as the new Chinese space station. The launch was China’s 22nd of 2021, including one failure of a commercial rocket. (7/7)

NOAA Smallsat Weather Constellation Advances with Demonstration Plans (Source: Space News)
NOAA is taking the first steps towards developing a constellation of smallsats to collect weather data. Instead of flying large, expensive satellites, NOAA is exploring the benefits of feeding data supplied by a constellation of small satellites in low Earth orbit into weather forecast models. NOAA plans to conduct a series of demonstrations while continuing to draw weather data from the current Joint Polar Satellite System satellites. One example is SounderSat, a concept proposed in the NOAA Satellite Observing System Architecture study to collect atmospheric temperature and moisture soundings that could fly by the mid-2020s. (7/7)

OneWeb Picks Winners for Connectivity Competition (Source: Space News)
Five companies are winners of a competition by OneWeb to "rethink satellite connectivity." OneWeb announced the winners — IRT Saint Exupéry, Mbryonics, Morpheus Space, Oledcomm and R3-IoT — of its 2021 Innovation Challenge last week during the launch of the latest set of its satellites. It's not yet clear what role the new companies will play in its efforts to develop its broadband constellation, although OneWeb previously said the winners would support "co-engineering a new generation of satellite." OneWeb also selected three research institutions as winners. (7/7)

OSTP Gets Planetary Protectio Brief (Source: Space Policy Online)
The White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) got input last week from the private sector on planetary protection policies. The closed-door meeting last week involved "dozens" of companies and organizations, OSTP said in a statement, providing views from the private sector on policies to prevent contamination of other worlds by spacecraft, or contaminating Earth with any material returned from those worlds. The OSTP effort, done in cooperation with NASA, is separate from studies of planetary protection policies by a committee of the National Academies. (7/7)

SpaceX Droneship Relocates to California for Launch Support (Long Beach Press-Telegram)
A SpaceX droneship has traveled to California to support launches from Vandenberg Space Force Base. The ship "Of Course I Still Love You" arrived at the Port Of Long Beach Tuesday, transported from Florida via the Panama Canal by a larger ship. The droneship will be based at Long Beach, using Sea Launch's former berth at the port, for launches from Vandenberg. SpaceX is expected to increase the cadence of launches from Vandenberg later this year, in large part to support deployment of Starlink satellites. (7/7)

Lockheed Invests in Australian Composite Tanks for Satellites (Source: GasWorld)
Omni Tanker, Lockheed Martin and the University of New South Wales (UNSW) have joined forces to develop and commercialize world-first composite tank technologies, with support of a grant from the Federal Government’s Advanced Manufacturing Growth Center (AMGC). The project builds on a recent invention at UNSW which enables carbon fibre composites to withstand liquid hydrogen temperatures without matrix cracks – a challenge that has, up until now, prevented mass-market adoption of these materials for such applications. (7/5)

Chinese Astronauts Perform First Spacewalk at New Station (Source: Space News)
Chinese astronauts performed the first spacewalk outside their new space station Saturday night. Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo spent about six and a half hours outside the Tianhe core module of the station, installing foot restraints and a platform on the module's robotic arm. The spacewalk was only the second in the history of the Chinese space program, after a brief spacewalk during the Shenzhou-7 mission in 2008. The astronauts are expected to conduct a second spacewalk later in their three-month mission. (7/6)

China Launches Weather Satellite (Sources: SpaceFlight Now, NasaSpaceFlight.com)
China launched a weather satellite Sunday. A Long March 4C rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 7:28 p.m. Eastern and placed the Fengyun 3E satellite into a sun-synchronous orbit. The satellite will operate in a "early morning" orbit that Chinese officials said will fill a gap in weather forecasting. That mission followed a Long March 2D launch from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center at 10:51 p.m. Eastern Friday. That rocket placed five small imaging satellites into orbit, four of which are part of the Jilin-1 constellation. (7/6)

NASA Moves Forward with Artemis Lunar Lander Effort (Source: Space News)
NASA is moving ahead with the next phase of procuring lunar lander services for the Artemis program despite an ongoing protest. NASA issued a request for proposals last week for Appendix N of its NextSTEP program, funding lander studies and risk reduction activities. NASA will provide up to $45 million for each award to support work for lander missions beyond Artemis 3.

Proposals are due to NASA Aug. 2, two days before the deadline for the GAO to rule on protests filed by two losing bidders in the Human Landing Services (HLS) competition this spring. Some in industry said the timing of NASA's NextSTEP solicitation seems to be an effort to ram through its current approach despite the protests and action in Congress that could require NASA to make a second HLS award. (7/6)

Space Command to Share Situational Awareness Data With Libre Foundation (Source: Space News)
U.S. Space Command has signed a data-sharing agreement with a non-profit organization. The agreement last week with the Libre Space Foundation, a non-profit based in Greece that promotes open access to information about space, is the 100th commercial space situational awareness data sharing agreement signed to date by Space Command. The command says data sharing is increasingly important as space becomes more congested with the rise of megaconstellations. (7/6)

Square Kilometer Array Enters Construction Phase Amid Megaconstellation Concerns (Source: Space News)
A multibillion-dollar radio telescope is moving ahead despite growing concerns about interference from satellite constellations. The Square Kilometer Array (SKA) Observatory moved into its construction phase last week to build two large arrays of radio telescopes in Australia and South Africa. SKA has been in development for decades, but the rise of megaconstellations "change the game for us," observatory leaders said, because of the increased interference. SKA is also still working to fund the $2.4 billion it needs to complete and operate the telescope over the next decade, with officials saying they have raised "the large majority" of the money but not giving a specific figure. (7/6)

JWST Passes Another Pre-Launch Review (Source: Space News)
The James Webb Space Telescope has passed a review for its launch later this year. ESA said Thursday that it and Arianespace completed the final mission analysis review for the launch of the space telescope on an Ariane 5. The review did not provide an updated launch date for the mission, but the Ariane 5 is scheduled to return to flight July 27 on the first of two missions before JWST, suggesting the telescope would launch no earlier than the second half of November. NASA officials said last week that while other launch preparations for the telescope are going well, the agency is continuing a historical review of the telescope's namesake, former NASA Administrator James Webb, to determine if the spacecraft should be renamed. (7/6)
 
ICEYE First in the World to Achieve Revolutionary Daily Coherent Ground Track Repeat (Source: Parabolic Arc)
ICEYE has achieved Daily Coherent Ground Track Repeat (GTR) imaging with ICEYE radar satellites. This new, world-first capability enables detecting everything from large changes, such as monitoring if ships have moved, all the way to such detailed changes on-ground that a person on-site would not be able to recognize. The data enables performing Coherent Change Detection (CCD) every 24 hours, which has use cases in detailed monitoring of patterns of life, site activity, ground subsidence, infrastructure integrity, construction, and more.

ICEYE now provides the world’s most frequent coherent radar satellite data coverage to a selected initial set of customers. The capability is delivered to customers as daily imagery delivered from individual customer-selected locations. This newly demonstrated capability is expected to be available for a wider customer base in 2022, after the initial early access period. (7/6)

Commercial Partnerships for Artemis Go Beyond Lunar Landers (Source: Space News)
NASA's use of services to support the Artemis program goes beyond developing lunar landers. NASA is studying the use of services to provide communications and navigation at the moon to support human and robotic missions. ESA is carrying out similar studies through its Moonlight program that issued study contracts to two consortia in May. NASA is also exploring the use of services contracts for lunar spacesuits, effectively renting rather than buying the suits. (7/6)

D-Orbit Signs Launch Contract with Aistech Space (Source: Parabolic Arc)
Space transportation and logistics company D-Orbit has signed a contract with Aistech Space for the launch and deployment of a 6U CubeSat aboard ION Satellite Carrier (ION), D-Orbit’s orbital transportation vehicle. The nanosatellite, named Guardian, carries a multispectral telescope designed by Aistech Space, with a variety of sensors from the visible (RGB), near infrared (NIR), and thermal infrared (TIR) spectrum.

Guardian will be launched and deployed with ION Satellite Carrier, the orbital transportation vehicle designed, manufactured, and operated by D-Orbit to transport a batch of satellites into space, perform orbital manoeuvres, and deploy them with precision into their operational orbits. Guardian will be integrated inside ION’s dispensers, alongside other spacecraft, and deployed according to Aistech Space’s requirements. (7/6)

In-Space Transport Now a Crowded Marketplace (Source: Space News)
The in-space transportation service market is becoming crowded. Newcomers are flooding into a space tug industry that has only emerged in recent years, pushing their own ideas to give operators greater flexibility for deploying and maintaining satellites. Only a few companies have actually provided such services so far, such as D-Orbit and Spaceflight, but others are developing plans for tugs that can transport satellites to different orbits after launch and provide other services. (7/6)

Why a Galaxy of Musicians are Turning to Space for Inspiration (Source: Guardian)
Influenced by everything from declassified UFO files to Elon Musk, the likes of Grimes, Doja Cat and Demi Lovato are taking off into another realm. Then there is pop-punk’s leading UFO expert Tom DeLonge, whose band Angels & Airwaves recently announced their new album by literally launching it into space, in a renewable hydrogen capsule. Click here. (7/6)

Elsa Weather Delays Dragon Departure From ISS (Source: NASA)
Weather is delaying the departure of a Dragon cargo spacecraft from the International Space Station. The CRS-22 Dragon spacecraft was scheduled to undock from the station Tuesday morning, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean after the Florida coast early Thursday. However, NASA has delayed the spacecraft's departure by at least two days because of "extreme weather" linked to Tropical Storm Elsa. (7/7)

Retired Generals Join Effort to Keep Space Command HQ in Colorado (Source: Colorado Springs Gazette)
Former generals are joining the lobbying effort to keep the headquarters of U.S. Space Command in Colorado. In a paper, retired Air Force Gen. Ed Eberhart, who led the previous version of Space Command, and retired Army Lt. Gen. Ed Anderson, who led Army Space and Missile Defense Command, said it would save time and money to keep Space Command's current headquarters in Colorado rather than move it to Redstone Arsenal in Alabama. The paper is part of a broader effort to convince the Pentagon to overturn its decision in January to move Space Command to Alabama. (7/6)

New Solar Flare Biggest in Four Years (Source: Space.com)
The sun unleashed its biggest flare in four years over the weekend. The flare took place Saturday from a new sunspot region and was powerful enough to cause minor radio blackouts. The flare was the most powerful observed since 2017 as the sun emerges from a low point in its 11-year activity cycle. (7/6)