February 26, 2022

Space Micro Lands SDA Contract for Optical Communications (Source: Space Daily)
Voyager Space and Space Micro has announced an award from the Space Development Agency (SDA) for a 24-month development contract for advanced one-to-many optical communications using Managed Optical Communication Array (MOCA) technology to support Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations. Space Micro partnered with BridgeComm Inc., a global leader in optical wireless communications solutions and services. (2/24)

L3Harris High-Resolution Weather Instrument Set to Launch on NOAA's GOES-T (Source: Space Daily)
L3Harris Technologies' third high-resolution weather instrument is set to launch March 1 onboard a NOAA satellite - strengthening the nation's ability to monitor the environment and rapidly detect severe weather. The Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) is the primary instrument for the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite-T (GOES-T), the third in a series of four advanced geostationary weather satellites with L3Harris' ABI onboard. The ABIs are controlled by L3Harris' enterprise ground system. (2/24)

Roman Space Telescope Could Snap First Image of a Jupiter-Like World (Source: Space Daily)
NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, now under construction, will test new technologies for space-based planet hunting. The mission aims to photograph worlds and dusty disks around nearby stars with detail up to a thousand times better than possible with other observatories. Roman will use its Coronagraph Instrument - a system of masks, prisms, detectors, and even self-flexing mirrors built to block out the glare from distant stars and reveal the planets in orbit around them - to demonstrate that direct imaging technologies can perform even better in space than they have with ground-based telescopes. (2/25)

Tiny Probes Could Sail to Outer Planets with the Help of Low-Power Lasers (Source: Space Daily)
Space travel can be agonizingly slow: For example, the New Horizons probe took almost 10 years to reach Pluto. Traveling to Proxima Centauri b, the closest habitable planet to Earth, would require thousands of years with even the biggest rockets. Now, researchers calculate in ACS' Nano Letters that low-power lasers on Earth could launch and maneuver small probes equipped with silicon or boron nitride sails, propelling them to much faster speeds than rocket engines.

Instead of catching wind, like the sails on boats, "laser sails" would catch laser beams and could, in principle, push spacecraft to nearly the speed of light. Scientists have been working on this concept for a while. For example, one privately funded project called the Breakthrough Starshot initiative aims to send a small, sailed probe weighing about a gram to Proxima Centauri b with a flight taking only 20 years. It would be propelled to 20% of light speed by a 100 GW, kilometer-square laser array. Ho-Ting Tung and Artur Davoyan wondered if much lower-power, smaller laser arrays could find use in applications where conventional electric and chemical rockets are now used. (2/24)

Space Themed Hotel Opens at Disney World (Source: New York Times)
Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser, opening at Walt Disney World, is part luxury hotel, part theme park ride, part role-playing game. Rather than checking in, guests “board” a ship that travels to a Star Wars planet. But a two-day excursion will cost you – roughly $6,000 for a family of 4. The reporter Brooks Barnes tries it out. (2/25)

Globalstar Reports Q4 Loss, Tops Revenue Estimates (Source: Nasdaq)
Globalstar came out with a quarterly loss of $0.01 per share versus the Zacks Consensus Estimate of a loss of $0.02. This compares to loss of $0.01 per share a year ago. These figures are adjusted for non-recurring items. This quarterly report represents an earnings surprise of 50%. A quarter ago, it was expected that this satellite communications company would post a loss of $0.01 per share when it actually produced a loss of $0.02, delivering a surprise of -100%. (2/25)

US Space Officials Expect Russia, Ukraine Conflict to Extend Into Space (Source: C4ISRnet)
Top U.S. space officials this week said it’s likely Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will extend to space, predicting continued GPS jamming and spoofing and urging military and commercial space operators to be prepared for possible cyber attacks. “Ensure that your systems are secure and that you’re watching them very closely because we know that the Russians are effective cyber actors,” said NRO Director Chris Scolese. “It’s hard to say how far their reach is going to go in order to achieve their objectives, but it’s better to be prepared than surprised.” (2/24)

Brownsville Activist Speaks Out After Arrest Over Anti-SpaceX Graffiti on Musk-Funded Mural (Source: Texas Public Radio)
Rebekah Lynn Hinojosa was home last week when she heard a loud knock on the door. When she got up to answer it, four police officers barged in and arrested her. She spent the next 26 hours in Brownsville’s city jail. When she was arrested, officers didn’t allow her to properly dress. They took her glasses, and they placed her in a cold cell after she was interrogated. She stayed awake for most of the ordeal.

Her attorney, Mike Siegel, believes Mayor Mendez politically retaliated against Hinojosa for speaking out against SpaceX. Her arrest wasn’t necessary at all, he said. “It seems to be a very specific and targeted enforcement action by the police,” Siegel, who is also Political Director for Ground Game Texas, told TPR. Siegel is investigating how Hinojosa’s arrest was organized and whether Brownsville PD has sought people for graffiti offenses and arrested them in their homes. TPR has filed a public information request with Brownsville PD on all information related to Hinojosa’s arrest.

According to Texas Penal Code, most graffiti offenses are misdemeanors, depending on how much the “loss,” or removal cost, is. Brownsville PD charged Hinojosa with a Class B Misdemeanor, meaning the removal cost was between $100-$750. A Class B Misdemeanor charge can end with a $2,000 fine and up to 180 days in jail. (2/24)

SpaceX Beats $20 Million Wrongful Death Claim in Texas Crash (Source: Bloomberg)
Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s SpaceX wasn’t responsible for a fatal crash involving an 18-wheeler delivering supplies to a south Texas rocket facility, a federal judge determined. The family of Carlos Venegas sued SpaceX for $20 million after the 35-year-old man was killed while driving his family home from a beach camping trip at 4 a.m. in July 2020. Venegas’s wife and three children were also injured when the family’s car slammed into the back of a tractor-trailer attempting to negotiate a tight turn onto SpaceX’s one-lane access road from an unlighted public highway.

Tony Buzbee, the family’s lawyer, claimed SpaceX skimped on safety in its rush to develop commercial rockets on a profitable timeline. SpaceX should’ve widened the access roadway, installed safety lighting and implemented other warning systems to help truckers navigate the turn in the dark. Buzbee also said the company should’ve warned beachgoers there could be trucks stopped on the unlighted highway. SpaceX claimed it didn’t owe a duty of care to travelers on a public highway because the accident happened off company property and no SpaceX vehicles or employees were involved. (2/25)

Two New Major Developments Coming to Houston Spaceport (Source: Bloomberg)
The Bay Area Houston Economic Partnership is in the midst of securing two new projects for the Houston Spaceport, and they will be bigger than the developments already occurring there. BAHEP President Bob Mitchell shared updates about the spaceport. The Houston Spaceport, which is part of Ellington Airport in Clear Lake, will soon be home to Axiom Space, Collins Aerospace, Venus Aerospace, and Intuitive Machines. However, there are other spaceport projects in the works. BAHEP is working to secure two new projects that will be bigger than the others combined. The two projects will total over 600,000 square feet and create 1,800 new jobs, including manufacturing on-site. (2/23)