February 7, 2022

SpaceX Secures Multi-Launch Agreement for Rideshare Missions (Source: Space News)
Launcher has signed a multi-launch agreement with SpaceX for a series of rideshare missions. Launcher will fly the Orbiter tug it is developing on three SpaceX rideshare missions in 2023 under the deal announced Monday, in addition to an earlier SpaceX contract for an Orbiter mission in October 2022. The Orbiter tug is designed to deploy cubesats and smallsats in their desired orbits after launch from the Falcon 9 and support hosted payloads. Launcher will also use Orbiter on its Launcher Lite small launch vehicle it is developing for a first launch in 2024. (2/7)

Australia Plans Four-Satellite Procurement (Source: Breaking Defense)
The Australian military is seeking proposals for its largest space program to date. Under the JP 9102 program, the Australian military will procure two to four communications satellites and associated ground systems, with an award expected before year-end. The satellites will be Australia's first dedicated military satellites, and several American and European companies are expected to bid on them. The program has an estimated cost of nearly $2.9 billion. (2/7)

Globalstar Selling Louisiana HQ Building (Source: Baton Rouge Advocate)
Globalstar is selling its headquarters building but plans to keep its offices there. Thermo Development Corp., Globalstar's majority shareholder, is seeking to sell the building in Louisiana for $20 million. Globalstar's CEO says despite the sale, it plans to maintain a 10-year lease there, subleasing some office space because of a shift to a hybrid work model during the pandemic. (2/7)

Spaceflight Federation Gets New Policy Director (Source: CSF)
The Commercial Spaceflight Federation has hired a new policy director. The industry group announced that it hired Mary Guenther as its director of space policy, handling policy development and advocacy efforts for the commercial space industry. Guenther was previously on the staff of the Senate Commerce Committee working on space and science legislation. (2/7)

InSight Mars Lander Recovers From Safe Mode (Source: Space News)
NASA's InSight Mars lander has recovered from a safe mode last month, but the spacecraft's long-term outlook is unchanged. InSight went into a safe mode in early January when a regional dust storm blocked sunlight for the solar-powered lander. The mission's principal investigator said last week that the lander is back to normal, and the dust storm never got bad enough to threaten the spacecraft's survival. However, power levels continue their gradual long-term drop because of dust accumulating on the lander's solar arrays. InSight's power is expected to drop below the level needed to run its science payload by summer and below what's needed for the lander to operate at all by the end of the year. (2/7)

Russia Launches Military Satellite at Plesetsk (Source: NasaSpaceFlight.com)
Russia launched a military satellite over the weekend. A Soyuz-2 rocket lifted off at 2 a.m. Eastern Saturday from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia. The rocket carried a military intelligence satellite called Neitron, about which few details have been disclosed. This was the first Russian launch of 2022. (2/7)

DoD SDA Laser Comm Cubesats Malfunction After Launch (Source: Space News)
A pair of cubesats designed to test laser communications for the Space Development Agency (SDA) malfunctioned after launch. The two Laser Interconnect and Networking Communications System (LINCS) cubesats, built by General Atomics, launched on the SpaceX Transporter-2 rideshare mission last June, but the company and SDA said they have been unable to establish communications with the satellites. SDA hasn't explained the cause of the problem, but a General Atomics executive claimed Friday there was "an issue with the launch vehicle." LINCS was intended to demonstrate in-space communication and attempt space-to-air laser links between a satellite and an optical terminal on an MQ-9 Reaper crewless aerial vehicle made by General Atomics. (2/7)

SpaceX Parachute Issue Maybe Not a Big Deal (Source: Space News)
NASA and SpaceX say the delayed opening of a parachute on two recent Dragon missions may be a normal phenomenon. In a briefing Friday, officials said one possible explanation for why one of four parachutes opened later than the other three on both the Crew-2 splashdown last November and CRS-24 splashdown last month was because that parachute was aerodynamically "shaded" by the other three, causing it to open more slowly. In both missions, all four parachutes eventually opened fully, and the spacecraft splashed down at normal speeds.

NASA and SpaceX said they plan to look into the issue to better understand what is going on, adding they don't believe there is any serious problem affecting safety. Those reviews will be completed before a commercial Crew Dragon mission, Axiom Space's Ax-1, launches in late March, as well as the mid-April launch of NASA's Crew-4 mission. (2/7)

Pandemic Workforce Shortage Delays ViaSat Satellite Preparation (Source: Space News)
A shortage of skilled workers has delayed the launch of the first ViaSat-3 broadband satellite. ViaSat said that the satellite, previously scheduled for launch in the first half of this year, is now scheduled to launch in late summer on a Falcon Heavy. The company said "limited availability of specific critical skill workers" during the latest wave of the pandemic contributed to the delay. The delay in the first ViaSat-3 launch will also push back the launch of the second and third satellites in the $2.3 billion system. (2/7)

NASA Expects Billions Saved From ISS Transition (Source: Space News)
NASA expects to save up to $1.8 billion a year once it transitions from the International Space Station to commercial stations. NASA outlined the cost savings in an ISS transition report published last week that discussed its plans to both retire the ISS after 2030 and to shift to purchasing services from commercial stations whose development NASA is supporting. NASA spends more than $3 billion a year on ISS operations, research and transportation, but expects to spend about $1 billion a year on commercial space station services, with a few hundred million dollars in additional costs, like mission control, shifted to other agency programs. The cost savings come from NASA being one of several customers for those stations and the smaller size of future commercial space stations. (2/7)

Tesat-Spacecom to Establish U.S. Manufacturing Facility (Source: Space News)
ith more than 500,000 hours of operation and 10 Optical Communication Terminals (OCTs) in space, TESAT is the only provider worldwide for in-orbit-verified OCTs. As the market leader for space communication equipment, TESAT is setting-up manufacturing operations in the U.S. to meet the growing demand for OCTs from the U.S. Government and the commercial space industry. TESAT is currently providing OCTs for four different U.S. spacecraft primes in support of the Space Development Agency’s (SDA) Transport Layer and Tracking Layer and DARPA’s Blackjack program.

“We are in final negotiations for a facility in the U.S. up to 25,000 square feet and intend to start manufacturing our Optical Communications Terminals there in early 2023. Together with our established global supply chain we are well prepared for a production rate of 160 affordable constellation OCTs per month and are already designing the next generation of 100 Gpbs terminals”, says Matthias Motzigemba, Director of Laser Communication at TESAT. (2/7)

In Space Race, Europe Faces Choice: Passenger or Pilot (Source: Space Daily)
"We will be on the Moon and we believe we will be living there. We will use the Moon as an economic zone. This is a new frontier," ESA director general Josef Aschbacher told the 14th European Space Congress last week in Brussels. "The big question is, do we want, as Europeans, to be part of it, or do we want to be watching others going to the Moon?"

NASA is aiming to return to the Moon with its Artemis programme by 2025, while China plans to send one of its taikonauts there by 2030. India plans an uncrewed test flight for its Gaganyaan programme this year to prepare for a manned mission. Europe, meanwhile, has no manned vessels to speak of, having relied on US and Russian spacecraft to take more than 30 astronauts into orbit over the years. (2/1)

Small Rockets Could Bring Big Boom for Space Coast Economy (Source: WMFE)
“There’s a clear growing market segment of the smaller launch vehicles that believe there’s a robust market growing out there to support the small satellite launches,” says Space Florida’s Dale Ketcham. ” There’s every reason to believe that that is a growing market.” Astra is not the only small launcher. SpaceX packs dozens of small payloads and its Starlink satellites, which are quite small. Two other small launch companies plan to come online possibly this year: Firefly Aerospace and Relativity Space.

Organizations like Space Florida have worked to rebuild the Space Coast’s economy after the end of the Space Shuttle program back in 2011. This focus on private aerospace has really helped bolster the economy and according to Space Florida, it has replaced all those jobs lost after Shuttle. It’s not just rockets bolster the economy. Florida has been working to bring manufacturing companies that make the things that get launched into space. “It’s having a dramatic effect on the Space Coast economy,” says economic analyst Dr. Hank Fishkind. “The Space Coast economy is out performing the state, it’s out performing Central Florida and that’s in large part because of this big surge in the space sector.”

It’s not just these small launch companies that are bringing new rockets to Florida. Jeff Bezos’ company Blue Origin plans to launch an orbital called New Glenn from Cape Canaveral. ULA plans to debut its new rocket Vulcan later this year. And Elon Musk says his Starship spacecraft, which will help land humans on the moon, will launch from Kennedy Space Center. “I think it’s a given that Florida is well positioned to capture more than its fair share of this new market,” says Ketcham. “That’s what we’re trying to do.” (2/4)

OneWeb Founder Plans to Launch 100,000 Satellites in Space Comeback (Source: Financial Times)
Greg Wyler, the space entrepreneur who founded Britain’s OneWeb, plans to put up to 100,000 satellites in orbit this decade with his latest business venture E-Space. The company on Monday said it had raised $50mn in seed funding from Prime Movers Lab, a fund that invests in breakthrough scientific start-ups. E-Space aims to create a vast “mesh” network of small satellites that can deliver bespoke and commercial services to business and government, from secure communications to remote infrastructure management.

Wyler’s plans come as the world becomes increasingly concerned about the risk of collisions in orbit and resulting space debris. Wyler insisted E-Space will leave low-earth orbit cleaner than before its satellites are launched, with a network that will collect and deorbit debris even as it provides connectivity services. The satellites have a substantially smaller cross section than rivals, Wyler told the Financial Times, and will be designed to “crumple” rather than break apart when struck. They will also “entrain” any debris they encounter and automatically deorbit when a certain amount has been collected.

“Like oysters in the river that filter the river and clean it, our satellites are the first to be designed to clean space,” he said. “The more satellites we have, the cleaner space will be.” Anton Brevde, partner at Prime Movers Lab and on the board of E-Space, suggested Wyler’s innovative design would do for satellites what Apple’s iPhone did for mobile phones. (2/6)