July 9, 2021

Georgia Grants Approval To Spaceport Camden, Clearing Path To License (Source: WABE)
The Georgia Department of Natural Resources has given its approval to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for a proposed spaceport on Georgia’s coast. It’s a milestone in Camden County’s quest towards a commercial spaceport that has been plagued by opposition from environmental groups and owners of property on Little Cumberland Island, which lies beneath the proposed rocket trajectories.

More than 3,000 county residents have signed a petition to force a referendum on the project, which county officials have pushed as an economic development opportunity. After nearly a decade since Camden first began contemplating a spaceport, the FAA is expected to decide this month whether to grant the county spaceport operator license. (All actual rocket launches would require additional licenses from the agency.) (7/8)

Reaction Engines Secures New UK Government Funding for Space Access Program (Source: Gov.UK)
New government funding will help leading UK space technology company Reaction Engines bring low-carbon space propulsion one step closer. The £3.9 million grant from the UK Space Agency will support the development of Reaction Engines’ ground-breaking SABRE technology, enabling low-carbon air-breathing space access propulsion technology to be applied more widely in the space sector and beyond. (7/8)

‘Huge Leap’ for NASA’s Mars Helicopter Ushers New Mission Support Role (Source: The Verge)
The Séítah region on Mars, filled with rocks and sand dunes, was too treacherous for NASA’s Perseverance rover to drive across. So Ingenuity, the tiny helicopter accompanying the rover, flew over the area on Monday and snapped some photos of a key spot on the other side. In less than three minutes, Ingenuity spared Perseverance the months it would have had to spend driving to take its own photos.

The quick Monday morning jump across Séítah was Ingenuity’s ninth flight on Mars so far, but it marked the first time the chopper lent a helping hand to Perseverance in its hunt for ancient signs of life at the Red Planet’s Jezero Crater. The four-pound helicopter arrived on Mars on Feb. 14, attached to Perseverance’s underside, and became the first object to take powered flight on another world on Apr.l 19. Its initial set of flights served as increasingly complex practice tests to demonstrate how off-world rotorcraft can buzz around places that wheeled rovers can’t go.

But on Monday, NASA engineers pushed Ingenuity’s limits further than ever. In 166 seconds, Ingenuity flew roughly 11mph for almost a half-mile, or 2,050 feet — a far greater distance than its most recent flight in June, which tallied 525 feet. “This was a big leap — big leap — in terms of what we’ve done before. [Previously] we went between sites that were 620, 625 meters apart." (7/8)

ESA Resumes Parachute Tests for ExoMars (Source: Space News)
ESA has resumed tests of the parachutes for its ExoMars lander, but not without some problems. ESA conducted two high-altitude drop tests in Sweden in late June, testing the deployment of the two parachutes that will be used to slow ExoMars as it enters the Martian atmosphere. A supersonic parachute 15 meters across worked perfectly, but a problem in the deployment of the 35-meter subsonic parachute in a second test caused a small tear. That problem does not appear related to problems found in similar drop tests in 2019 that contributed to ESA's decision to delay the mission's launch from July 2020 to September 2022. (7/9)

China Plans Second Lunar Sample Mission (Source: Space.com)
China is planning a second lunar sample return mission, this time to the far side of the moon, by 2024. The Chang'e-6 mission will attempt to land in the South Pole-Aitken Basin region of the moon to collect samples and return them to Earth, similar to the Chang'e-5 mission last December. The mission will also carry several experiments for international partners. (7/9)

Saudi Space Commission to Launch Scholarship Program Leading to Employment (Source: Zawya)
The Saudi Space Commission has announced the launch of its first program for foreign scholarships ending with employment in the field of space.
This program provides educational opportunities for Saudi students of space sciences in the most prominent 30 universities around the world, the commission said in a statement on Wednesday.

The first phase of the scholarship program will include bachelor’s and master’s degrees in disciplines, including aerospace engineering, space science and space policy. Applications for the program will be received beginning July 25. Applicants must be Saudi nationals who have either been accepted onto the relevant courses at the specified universities or already be studying there. (7/8)

SLS Upper Stage Attached at KSC (Source: SpaceFlight Insider)
The upper stage of the first Space Launch System rocket is now in place. Crews this week installed the Interim Cryogenic Propulsion Stage atop the core stage of the SLS inside the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center. The stage, based on the Delta 4's upper stage, will be used on the first three SLS missions before NASA shifts to the more powerful Exploration Upper Stage. (7/9)

Skyrora Challenges Retrieval of Prospero (Source: BBC)
A U.K. company is challenging the British space industry to bring down a satellite launched 50 years ago. Prospero is the first, and to date only, British satellite launched on a British rocket, the Black Arrow, in Australia in 1971. The defunct 66-kg satellite is in an elliptical low Earth orbit. Skyrora, a U.K. launch startup, says it's looking for ideas to retrieve the satellite and either deorbit it or bring it back to Earth intact. While Skyrora is working on a small launch vehicle and space tug it's unclear what would be needed, both in technology and regulatory approvals, to deorbit the satellite. (7/9)

New Jupiter Moon Discovered (Source: Sky & Telescope)
An amateur astronomer has discovered a moon of Jupiter. Kai Ly used archival images from observatories dating back to 2003 to find the previously undetected moon, provisionally named S/2003 J 24. The moon is part of a group of nearly two dozen other small moons in retrograde orbits around Jupiter, and may be fragments of an impact on a larger moon. (7/9)

Regulate Us! Commercial Space Tourism Providers Want Safe Regulation (Source: Politico)
Karina Drees of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation maintains that upcoming space tourism flights are about far more than joy rides for the rich and famous. The push to take private citizens to orbit is “to really perfect the technology, perfect vehicles and then be able to manufacture those vehicles en masse as a new transportation system, which will be significant to people around the world....When we think about transporting not only people in an emergency situation, or organs, things that don’t have the luxury of time when it comes to transporting around the world.”

But is Washington ready to regulate this industry? “The fear is if we are writing regulations based on old vehicles that weren’t very safe, then there’s a potential implication here that these vehicles will also not be safe because the regulations are also not safe. We are still very much in data collection mode. "The industry is not concerned about regulation,” she added. “We want regulation. We just want safe regulation. The vehicles are just now coming online. How does anyone in government know how to regulate those vehicles when they are brand new?”

Drees, the former CEO and general manager of Mojave Air & Space Port in California, believes better regulation also means enlisting more knowledgeable government personnel, particularly in the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation, to design and execute those regulations. “There’s so much talk about how we need more regulation, but our regulator is a team of 100 people,” Drees said. “They have not grown, they have not been able to keep up with industry, they do not have the expertise in-house." (7/9)

NASA Orders Satellite Container and Trolley From RUAG (Source: Space Daily)
RUAG Space received a direct order from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory for a large satellite container and a multipurpose trolley for NASA satellites. The total order volume for both container and trolley is worth approximately 2 million Euros. From 2022 onwards this container will enable ground handling of satellites on Earth for up to three NASA missions, including the deep space mission Europa Clipper, the Psyche asteroid mission and the NISAR earth observation mission from NASA and the Indian Space Research Organization. (7/8)

Space Force Opens Facility in New Mexico to Improve War-Fighting Capabilities (Source: C4ISRnet)
The U.S. Space Force opened a new satellite operations center July 7 at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico designed to advance the still nascent service’s space war-fighting capabilities. The Rendezvous and Proximity (REPR) Satellite Operations Center was established by the Space and Missile Systems Center’s Innovation and Prototyping Directorate as a new workspace to drive on-orbit experimentation and demonstrations with prototype satellites and payloads. (7/8)

Billionaire Space Race Is a Tragically Wasteful Ego Contest (Source: New Republic)
While shuttling tourists into space for a few minutes of weightlessness may have its appeal, it’s a fleeting luxury only affordable by an elite class. Even so, companies like Virgin Galactic would have you think that this only slightly dystopian future is just around the corner. Branson has dubbed himself Astronaut 001, whose job is “evaluating customer spaceflight experience.”

We have been failed by our science fiction–inspired visions of seamless space travel, where the cancer-inducing, bone-rotting effects of cosmic radiation and low gravity have already been dealt with, and life on Earth is a peaceful agora, harmoniously supporting regular space travel. Branson may be keen to improve the experience for some of his friends who plop down for the next ride, but what he is really selling is the Virgin name and an image of innovation and safety that will help his group of companies pick off a satellite launch contract or two that might have gone to SpaceX. (7/9)

Homemade Spacesuits Ensure Safety of Chinese Astronauts in Space (Source: Space Daily)
China's self-developed spacesuits have ensured the safety of astronauts during their stay in the space station core module Tianhe and while performing extravehicular activities (EVAs) outside the module. Intravehicular spacesuits, which are for astronauts to wear inside the spacecraft, ensure ventilation and heat dissipation of the astronauts under normal circumstances and provide oxygen to ensure their safety if the spacecraft leaks.

The extravehicular suit, like a small spacecraft, provides safe and effective environmental protection, environmental control and life support for astronauts when they work outside the spacecraft, he said, adding that extravehicular suits should not only meet the life support needs of astronauts but also allow them to complete extravehicular activities.

The new-generation homemade extravehicular spacesuit used in the extravehicular mission is about 2 meters in height and weighs more than 100 kilograms, with longer service life, higher reliability and better flexibility compared to the previous versions. The spacesuit helmet is equipped with a camera, a light and a high-tech window. It can contain water and food for long-duration EVAs. (7/8)

Rocket Lab's Peter Beck Defends Contracts with US military, Says Space Industry 'Intertwined' With Defense (Source: NewsHub)
Rocket Lab founder and CEO Peter Beck has defended the company's contracts with the US military, saying the space industry is "very, very intertwined with defense." He's denying claims they've been putting satellites into orbit which could be used to "hurt people." Minister for Economic Development Stuart Nash, who has veto power over any space launch from New Zealand soil, gave it the go-ahead.

"From day one we've always been very clear, but we've also been very clear about what we will do and what we don't do… we're certainly not going to launch weapons or anything that damages the environment or goes and hurts people. But the reality is in the space industry it's very, very intertwined with defence."

In March protesters opposed Rocket Lab's launch of a satellite called Gunsmoke-J, which the company described as "an experimental 3U CubeSat that will test technologies that support development of new capabilities for the US Army." Minister for Economic Development Stuart Nash, who has veto power over any space launch from New Zealand soil, gave it the go-ahead. (7/8)

Space Billionaires, Please Read the Room (Source: The Atlantic)
Dear billionaires, no one cares whom you beat to space. After Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest person, announced that he would join the first crewed flight by his rocket company, Blue Origin, later this month, Richard Branson just couldn’t let himself be outdone.* So now Branson, merely the world’s 589th richest person, is joining the crew of his next Virgin Galactic flight on Sunday, nine days before Bezos goes vertical.

All of this to go to “space.” Branson will go only about 50 miles up, where the military says space starts. Bezos will go 12 miles higher, just past the internationally recognized Karman Line, but he’ll be there for only four minutes. Could there be a worse time for two über-rich rocket owners to take a quick jaunt toward the dark? Especially in the United States, the climate crisis is now actually starting to feel like a crisis. (7/7)

Branson is Taking a Big Risk Going to Space (Source: CNN)
Richard Branson will take a rocket-powered space plane on a 2,400 mile-per-hour ride to the edge of space this weekend. That's if everything goes according to plan. And there's plenty that could go wrong. The rocket motor could fail to light up. The cabin could lose pressure and threaten the passengers' lives. And the intense physics involved when hurtling out of — and back into — the Earth's atmosphere could tear the vehicle apart.

Still, Virgin Galactic has built safety backstops into its spaceplane, completed more than 20 test flights, three of which have successfully reached the edge of space, received the go-ahead from an internal safety review board and a green light from federal regulators to host passengers. Any time humans are on an airborne vehicle, there's risk involved. Here's a breakdown of just how much danger Branson -— and the three people going with him — will be taking on. Click here. (7/7)

No, Billionaires Won’t "Escape" to Space While the World Burns (Source: Salon)
What caught me by surprise was the number of folks who seem to believe that Musk, Bezos and Branson are trying to "escape" the ravages of climate change for a life in space — and might even succeed in doing so. The notion that the rich will live comfortably high above the Earth while the planet becomes an uninhabitable wasteland has been popularized by movies like "Elysium" and "WALL-E."

The New York Times fueled this fantasy back in 2018 with a story about Axiom's proposed luxury space hotel, under the headline "The Rich are Planning to Leave this Wretched Planet." But as a scifi writer and the spouse of a NASA flight controller, let me assure you that the rich escaping the earth for a space utopia is only a trope in fiction — at least in our lifetimes. (7/7)

Bezos Vs. Branson Space Race: Billionaire Ego Trip Or Dawn Of A New Era? (Source: Forbes)
Branson will only be the second-oldest man, after John Glenn, to fly into space. And even that has been one-upped by Bezos, who announced that the fourth crew member on the Blue Origin flight will be an 82-year woman. A veteran of the Mercury 13 testing program for female astronauts, Wally Funk will be oldest person ever to fly in space. Bezos showed an additional Barnum-like touch, as another seat on the flight went to a “mystery bidder” who paid $28 million .

Billionaires in space is actually not a new thing—and neither is space tourism. The first true space tourist, Dennis Tito, paid $20 million for his ticket, working with Space Adventures to fly on a Russian space craft to the International Space Station in April 2001. An engineer by training, Tito applied his expertise in algorithms to the stock market. Tito’s net worth is one billion, so it can be argued he beat fellow billionaires Jeff Bezos and Sir Richard Branson into space by 20 years.

Tito was followed to the ISS by six more wealthy private citizens including Hungarian-American software billionaire Charles Simonyi (twice), Canadian billionaire Guy Laliberté, (co-founder of Cirque du Soleil) and the first female space tourist, Iranian-American engineer Anousheh Ansari. (7/8)

Sunday’s Spaceport America Launch to Increase New Mexico Tourism (Source: KTSM)
Virgin Galactic’s first fully crew spaceflight with founder Sir Richard Branson is lifting off from New Mexico’s Spaceport America Sunday at 7AM. The State of New Mexico said industry estimates for the suborbital space tourism market could be worth $8 billion by 2030. State officials said this flight is the future of space tourism as the New Mexico Tourism Department teams up with Virgin Galactic. (7/7)

Small-Launch Startup Astra Aiming for 300 Missions Per Year by 2025 (Source: Space.com)
Astra plans to get to Earth orbit for the first time this summer — and to return many times in the ensuing weeks, months and years. The Bay Area small-launch startup reached space for the first time last December, on a test flight with its 38-foot-tall (12 meters) Rocket 3.2 vehicle from the Pacific Spaceport Complex on Alaska's Kodiak Island.

"In the fall, we'll start this monthly cadence, and then we're going to continue that cadence as we start to ramp towards weekly [orbital launches] late next year, " Astra CEO Chris Kemp, who co-founded the company in 2016, told Space.com."Then we'll cross through weekly," Kemp said, and target "daily space delivery, or roughly 300 launches, in 2025."

Astra already holds contracts for more than 50 launches, which represent more than $150 million in revenue, Kemp said. And this past February, Astra won a $7.95 million contract to launch NASA's Time-Resolved Observations of Precipitation Structure and Storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS) mission. (7/7)

NASA is Actively Searching for Intelligent life in the Universe and is Looking for Habitable Planets (Source: CNBC)
Intelligent life may exist elsewhere in the universe besides Earth, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said Tuesday, and NASA is actively searching for signs. "If you have a universe that is 13.5 billion years old — it is so big — is there another chance for another Sun and another planet that has an atmosphere like ours? I would say yes,” said Nelson. Nelson said NASA has been involved in searching for intelligent life for years, and noted that the agency is looking for life on the planets in our solar system and elsewhere in the cosmos to determine other Suns that have planets with a habitable atmosphere. (7/6)

NASA and Northrop Grumman Plan August Launch to ISS From Virginia Spaceport (Source: NASA)
Northrop Grumman’s 16th commercial resupply services mission will deliver NASA science investigations, supplies, and equipment to the International Space Station aboard its Cygnus spacecraft. Liftoff of the Antares rocket is set for no earlier than 5:55 p.m. EDT Aug. 10, from Pad-0A of the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on Wallops Island. (7/7)

Experiments Make Speedy Return from Space Station Aboard SpaceX Dragon (Source: NASA)
A suite of International Space Station scientific experiments soon journey back to Earth aboard the 22nd SpaceX commercial resupply services mission for NASA. Scientists on the ground look forward to having their experiments back within hours, an advantage that could provide better results. Dragon undocks from the space station July 7.

The combination of a spacecraft redesign allowing for faster unloading of research and the splashdown location near NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida makes it possible to return time-sensitive experiments to scientists much faster. In addition, Kennedy’s Space Station Processing Facility is home to world-class laboratories offering tools and workspace to collect data and analyze samples. Scientists can look at experiments immediately, before gravity has a chance to fully take effect, and follow up with more in-depth analysis at their home labs. (7/1)

Repurposed Communications Satellites Could Help Save Humanity From an Asteroid Impact (Source: Space.com)
Large satellites used for TV broadcasting could be quickly and easily repurposed as asteroid deflectors if a space rock were to threaten Earth, according to a study by the European aerospace company Airbus. The study, part of a mission concept called Fast Kinetic Deflection (FastKD), was commissioned by the European Space Agency (ESA), as part of its effort to prepare for an apocalyptic scenario that will certainly happen one day (even though that day might be in a very distant future).

Telecommunication satellites that sit in the so-called geostationary orbit at the altitude of 22,000 miles (36,000 kilometers) circle Earth at a speed that matches the rotation of the planet, thus appearing permanently suspended above a certain region. These satellites are usually very large, like a small bus. They might weigh 4 to 6 tons, which would give them enough force to affect the trajectory of an approaching space rock. Still, as Albert Falke, who led the FastKD study at Airbus, told Space.com, it would require maybe 10 such spacecraft hitting a 1,000-foot-wide (300 meters) asteroid within a short period of time to sufficiently change its trajectory to avoid the planet. (7/8)

FAA Begins Use of System to Reduce Impact of Launches on Airspace (Source: Space News)
The FAA has started to use a new tool intended to better integrate commercial launches and reentries into the National Airspace System, reducing the disruptions those events have on aviation. The FAA formally started use of the Space Data Integrator (SDI) with the June 30 launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral on the Transporter-2 rideshare mission. It will be used again when the CRS-22 cargo Dragon spacecraft splashes down off the Florida cost late July 9.

SDI, under development by the FAA for several years, automates the transfer of data about launches and reentries to air traffic controllers so they have up-to-date information on the progress of those activities, including any anomalies that might create debris or other aviation hazards. That can allow controllers to more efficiently manage air traffic around those closures.

The intent is to allow quicker reopening of airspace once a launch or reentry has safely transited airspace. “We’re able to more dynamically adjust those closures,” Tim Arel said. “What it means is that those flights moved out of the way to accommodate a safe operation of that space mission will be able to more quickly get back on to their normal flight path, or maybe even get some shortcuts.” (7/8)

Planet Labs Strikes a SPAC Deal at $2.8 Billion Valuation (Source: Bloomberg)
Planet Labs, which uses a network of satellites to photograph the daily happenings on Earth, plans to become the latest private space company to go public. Planet revealed that it will join with dMY Technology Group IV, Inc., a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), with the hopes of trading on the NYSE by the fourth quarter. Planet expects to raise about $545 million to put toward its business of manufacturing, launching and operating hundreds of satellites in Low Earth Orbit. Planet reported more than $100 million in revenue during its last fiscal year and is being valued at $2.8 billion for the SPAC deal. (7/7)

Space Junk Approaching ISS Closer Than Predicted (Source: TASS)
The minimum distance between the International Space Station (ISS) and a piece of space junk that may fly close to it has narrowed to 1.5 km from its earlier predicted figure of 4.6 km, Russia’s Roscosmos reported on Wednesday. The Automated Warning System of Hazardous Situations in near-Earth Space estimated debris flyby at a distance of 1.5 km from the ISS on July 8. (7/7)

Why Does the Cosmonaut School Need an Orange Moon Rover, Extreme Scuba Divers and a Correspondence Robot (Source: KP.ru)
A gray long fence in the middle of a pine forest. Two-story checkpoint. Guarded barriers. One - to get to the territory of the Star City. The next one is to go to the Cosmonaut Training Center itself. I know that many people think that Star City and CPC are one and the same. But this is not at all the case. There are two territories in Zvezdnoye - residential and office. The cosmonauts are being prepared - at the office, behind the second barrier. But not only astronauts are engaged there. Click here. (7/8)

Virgin Galactic's SpaceShip III, a More Durable Spaceplane (Source: Astronomy)
VSS Unity has been through a lot over the past year — from technical issues to unexpected groundings to, most recently, a nominal spaceflight on May 22. Also known as SpaceShipTwo, this second iteration of the company's commercial craft has been the workhorse that's proven to the FAA that Virgin Galactic is ready to begin commercial operations. And though SpaceShipTwo will likely take paying customers to space in the coming years, it's not the only spacecraft the company plans to fly.

In late March, Virgin Galactic revealed the new design for its sleek SpaceShip III prototype, called VSS Imagine. It’s a spaceplane clad with a mirror-like finish that’s intended to carry six passengers and two pilots just beyond the edge of space. VSS Imagine, like the other spacecraft in Virgin’s fleet, will launch from beneath a uniquely designed carrier aircraft called WhiteKnightTwo. And the company is already building a second spacecraft of the same class, dubbed VSS Inspire.

Though SpaceShipTwo has had recent success, the craft has been beset with issues in the past, resulting in the company missing a number of publicly announced test flights. SpaceShip III is meant to help overcome some of the problems of its predecessor. The new design is more modular and should bring scalability and improved performance to Virgin Galactic's spaceflight program, according to company officials. Specifically, the more efficient design is meant to make the craft easier to manufacture, maintain, and quickly turnaround between flights. (7/8)