November 28, 2021

Houston Nonprofit to Use $1M From Blue Origin Foundation Toward 'Ultimate Vision' of Space and Art (Source: Houston Chronicle)
Jancy McPhee kept meeting people who did not know about the International Space Station. At the time, humans had been living in space for nearly 10 years. How could people not know? Her day job was managing scientific research for NASA’s Human Research Program, but McPhee couldn’t let go of this question.

“I was getting more and more interested in how we talk about space,” McPhee said. “They have to be motivated. They have to care in order to remember the details given to them about the future of space exploration.” So McPhee, whose hobbies have always revolved around music and theater, created a student art competition to motivate a younger generation. This contest accompanied an international human spaceflight symposium held in Houston in 2011, and she received 550 entries from 22 countries.

This contest was followed by another, and another, until the program became too large to be included with her day job at the nonprofit research corporation Universities Space Research Association. McPhee created the SciArt Exchange nonprofit in 2015. And this year, it was one of 19 nonprofits to each be offered $1 million in grant money from Blue Origin’s Club for the Future, its foundation focused on STEM education. (11/26)

Blue Origin Seeks Permit to Expand Facilities at Cape Canaveral Spaceport (Source: Florida Today)
The world's second-richest man's rocket company has applied to modify an environmental permit to expand its factory at the Cape Canaveral Spaceport. Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin seeks to modify a stormwater management system for an almost 90-acre project and has applied for a permit from the St. Johns River Water Management District.

Labeled as "South Campus" in water management district documents, the expansion will link to the factory at Exploration Park, a publicly accessible region just west of KSC's main gate. The two-lane Space Commerce Way winds through the area, connecting others like satellite company OneWeb, economic development agency Space Florida and the main entrance to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

The south campus will nearly double the size of land Blue Origin already leases from NASA, enabling the Bezos-led company to establish "programs complimentary to those constructed on the adjacent North Campus," according to SJRWMD documents. Blue Origin plans to build 322-foot New Glenn rockets in the massive blue-and-white factory on the north campus, which will launch no sooner than late 2022. (11/26)

Vast Satellite Constellations are Alarming Astronomers (Source: The Economist)
On may 24th 2019 a Falcon 9 rocket built by SpaceX launched 60 communication satellites into a low orbit around the Earth. That evening they appeared as a string of sunlit dots moving across the sky, many of them as bright as the brightest stars, a source of passing wonder and mystery to casual observers—and a portent of doom to astronomers.

“There were all these panic messages,” remembers Olivier Hainaut of the European Southern Observatory (eso): “‘Oh my God, it's the end, it's the end of astronomy as we know it!’” Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, says he was “gobsmacked” by how bright the satellites were. “I did some quick mental arithmetic and realised that thousands of satellites that bright would be a substantial fraction of the visible things in the sky…I felt an increasingly large pit in my stomach.”

The panicked messages and the abdominal unease stemmed from the knowledge that those 60 lights were just the beginning. Up until that point communication satellites dealing with large amounts of data had been, for the most part, few and distant, sitting high and invisible over the equator. The largest “constellation” in low Earth orbit was that of Iridium, a satellite phone company, which had around 70 of the things. With 60 satellites SpaceX had almost equalled that with one launch. And there were a lot more launches to come. (11/27)

China Launches Satellite Industry Zone in Shanghai (Source: Global Times)
China launched a "G60 Star Chain" satellite industry zone in Songjiang District, Shanghai on Friday. The area is set to lead China's satellite industry and offer examples, experience, and become the benchmark of the industry. The industry area will be constructed by the Songjiang district government, Shanghai Alliance Investment and state-owned Lingang Group. The manufacturing capacity will reach 300 satellites each year and reduce the cost of single unit by 35 percent.

The whole program is separated into three phases with the first phase expected to enter service in 2023. The "G60 Star Chain" is aiming to construct a communication constellation consisting of LEO (Low Earth Orbit) satellites, build a 500 mu (33.33 hectares) satellite manufacturing area and produce over 20 billion satellites during the 14th Five-Year Plan 2021-25. At present, seven enterprises have signed contracts to settle in the "G60 Star Chain" satellite industry zone, which will cover multiple aspects of the satellite manufacturing chain, marking the "G60 Star Chain" is taking shape. (11/28)

Inside Blue Origin's Astronaut Village (Source: Business Insider)
Space tourists about to blast 62 miles above Earth on board a rocket made by Jeff Bezos' company have to sleep in Airstream trailers on a campsite in the Texas desert. Chris Boshuizen, who was on a Blue Origin flight with the "Star Trek" actor William Shatner and two other passengers in October, said he was based in a campsite called Astronaut Village in the days before the launch. Astronaut Village is about 15 miles away from the launch site in Van Horn, Texas, says Don DiCostanzo, a business owner who was Shatner's wingman before and after the spaceflight.

The campsite is down a long dirt path with "tight security," said DiCostanzo, who slept in a hotel room nearby, which he said was paid for by the company.
Boshuizen, an Australian former NASA engineer, described the rural Astronaut Village as a "perfect little campsite." Each astronaut is given a silver Airstream trailer to sleep in before the flight. Boshuizen said the trailers' interiors were redone to be "more like a hotel than camper van." (11/28)

Space Perspective Is Redefining How Space Tourism Works (Source: Worth)
Space: The final frontier or the next hot tourist destination? Two entrepreneurs are banking on the latter. Jane Poynter and Taber MacCallum are spearheading Space Perspective, a space tourism company that aims to ferry travelers to the edge of space with the help of a giant balloon. The venture is the latest chapter in the lives of its founders, who are best-known for participating in Biosphere 2, a project from the 90s where eight people sealed themselves in an artificial world for two years. The project was designed to simulate a prototype space outpost.

Poynter and MacCallum say they will float travelers into space in a pressurized, luxury cabin called Spaceship Neptune. Spaceship Neptune will be able to carry eight passengers to an altitude of 100,000 feet via massive helium-filled balloons similar to those that have been used for decades by weather services. Space Perspective’s founders say the experience will be vastly different from the brief, rocket-powered flight that both Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin are promising.

Passengers will strap into their seats (like on an airplane) and slowly climb to the target altitude and a leisurely pace of just 12 mph. The entire trip will last approximately 6 hours, ending with a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. The luxury space cruise costs $125,000 and the couple says that to date, they’ve sold over 500 tickets. They say the first paying passenger flight is set to launch in 2024 from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, with roughly 25 flights planned initially. The company will then build up its cadence, with the ability to launch hundreds of flights from all around the world. (11/24)

Every Space Tourism Package Available in 2021 Ranked: From $125K to $60 Million (Source: Observer)
2021 is a historic year for commercial space travel. A record number of civilian orbital and suborbital missions launched successfully: Elon Musk’s SpaceX launched four amateur astronauts into Earth’s orbit for the first time; a Russian film crew spent 12 days on the International Space Station shooting the world’s first movie in space; and two multi-billionaires flew to the edge of Earth’s atmosphere as the first passengers of their respective space companies to show the public that their new spacecrafts are safe and fun. Click here. (11/27)

Five Planned Space Stations for Tourists and Astronauts (Source: The National)
There has been a continuous presence of humans in space since 2000, when the International Space Station became operational. Now, as the floating laboratory gets closer to its inevitable retirement, there are questions around what would replace it. Private companies are looking to commercialise low Earth orbit, with space stations that would welcome tourists, researchers and astronauts. Meanwhile, government space agencies have increased their focus on the Moon, with NASA, China and Russia looking to build a lunar base. The National highlights some of the space stations that were announced by private companies and governments. Click here. (11/27)

Why Space Tourists Won’t Find the Awe They Seek (Source: New York Times)
Why would a tourist want to take a trip to space? For the wealthy thrill seekers able to pay upwards of $450,000 for a seat with commercial space projects such as Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, the answer is likely to involve the pursuit of awe or wonder. Philosophers call the type of sensory and aesthetic stimuli that provoke it the sublime.

On its face, the kind of short flight to the edge of space that looks set to be the predominant mode of space tourism, at least in the short term, seems the very definition of what the psychologist Abraham Maslow called a “peak experience.” The kinetic thrill of rocketing to an altitude of over 50 miles, combined with the astonishing perspective it affords of our planet, invites us to believe that few adventures could be more profound.

The ride, controlled by cutting-edge A.I. technology, is disconcertingly smooth. Champagne is waiting for the passengers on the landing pad. Under such contrived conditions, awe will always be a chimera. That which we explicitly pursue will always, to a greater or lesser extent, remain out of reach. But chasing it misses an essential element of awe, which is that so much of its potency depends on factors that commercial spaceflight seems custom designed to negate. (11/27)

AAC Clyde Space Wins Order for U.S. DoD Satellite Mission Led by Aegis Aerospace (Source: Bequoted)
AAC Clyde Space AB, a leading new space company, has won an order from U.S. Aegis Aerospace to supply its Starbuck power systems and battery solutions worth 500 kUSD (approx. 4.5 MSEK) for a satellite mission carried out on behalf of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD). The mission, the STPSat-7 led by Aegis Aerospace, is a 150 kg satellite that will host research and technology demonstration payloads for the Department of Defense Space Test Program. It will operate in Low Earth Orbit (LEO). (11/22)

Roskosmos is Discussing with NASA the Possibility of Docking Crew Dragon with Prichal ISS Node (Source: RIA Novosti)
US manned spacecraft Crew Dragon will be able to dock to the Russian module "Prichal" of the ISS, NASA and Roskosmos are discussing this, Dmitry Rogozin, general director of Roscosmos, told reporters on Friday. Rogozin specified that a docking interface, that is, a special adapter, would be required for American ships. (11/26)

New Possibilities for Life at the Bottom of Earth's Oceans, and Perhaps in Oceans on Other Planets (Source: ASU)
In the strange, dark world of the ocean floor, underwater fissures, called hydrothermal vents, host complex communities of life. These vents belch scorching hot fluids into extremely cold seawater, creating the chemical forces necessary for the small organisms that inhabit this extreme environment to live.

In a newly published study, biogeoscientists Jeffrey Dick and Everett Shock have determined that specific hydrothermal seafloor environments provide a unique habitat where certain organisms can thrive. In so doing, they have opened up new possibilities for life in the dark at the bottom of oceans on Earth, as well as throughout the solar system. Their results have been published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences. (11/22)