March 13, 2022

Study of Pluto’s Subsurface Ocean Drives Potential Return Mission (Source: SpaceFlight Insider)
A $3 billion return mission to Pluto with an orbiter is being proposed to further study the subsurface oceans of both Pluto and its large moon Charon. When New Horizons flew by Pluto in 2015, it found evidence for a subsurface ocean of liquid water, adding the small world to a growing list of solar system worlds harboring underground oceans that could potentially support microbial life. These worlds include dwarf planet Ceres, Jupiter’s moons Europa and Ganymede, and Saturn’s moons Enceladus and Titan.

Located more than three billion miles from the Sun, worlds like Pluto and Charon can harbor underground oceans due to internal heating caused by the radioactive decay of rock. Tidal stretching by each world of its companion is not a heat source because of both worlds’ small sizes. By measuring the energy balance between heating and cooling within Pluto and Charon, the researchers obtained a record of temperature and depth changes in both worlds’ underground oceans. (3/12)

Russia’s Lost Space Customers Could be Boon to SpaceX and ESA (Source: Independent)
On Thursday, Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Russian space agency, Roscosmos, told Russian state media that despite the painful economic sanctions the west has laid on Russia over its invasion of Ukraine, his agency has the west right where they want them. “The total amount of damage that we have already inflicted on them, we are already counting about $8bn,” Mr Rogozin said, citing Russia’s decisions to stop selling rocket engines to the US and its refusal to continue with scheduled satellite launches for OneWeb.

But Rocosmos’s win is likely a Pyrrhic victory, if it can even be called that. OneWeb voluntarily suspended launches with Roscosmos over the war in Ukraine, and as Laura Forczyk, a physicist, and founder of space analytics firm Astralytical, told The Independent, Russia has few space activities outside those of its customers. Combined with US sanctions president Joe Biden said were designed to “degrade the Russian space program, Russia does not look to hold a winning hand.

US space launch company SpaceX and its billionaire CEO Elon Musk, however, may be poised to win the pool. The company already aims to launch a Falcon 9 rocket a week in 2022 to set up its own Starlink network of satellites, and is currently the sole company providing crew flight services to the International Space Station through Nasa’s commercial crew program. Now they may see an influx of customers. (3/11)

One Musk Tweet Supercharged a Texas Region’s Transformation (Source: Bloomberg)
Evan Wood routinely gets text messages from strangers asking if he wants to sell his South Padre Island condo, which boasts a direct view of Elon Musk’s Texas spaceport six miles to the south. “There's no way I would even consider it,” said Wood, a software engineer and space enthusiast based outside of Austin, who bought the condo during the pandemic after visiting with his family. To him, it’s “mind-blowing” to see what Musk’s SpaceX is doing at its launch site near the Gulf of Mexico.

Over in Brownsville, the first semblance of civilization you hit when exiting the barren 20-mile road from SpaceX’s Starbase, similar tales are common. Bruno Zavaleta, a local real estate agent, had one client drive 16 hours from Atlanta and snap up two properties in cash the day he arrived. That buyer is now under contract for two more homes that are being built in a development called Palo Alto Groves, which touts its location as “home of Elon Musk’s SpaceX Control Center.”

SpaceX has been in the area for years. But the craze really intensified, as these things do with Musk, after a tweet: “Please consider moving to Starbase or greater Brownsville/South Padre area in Texas,” Musk wrote in March 2021 to his millions of followers, 10 minutes before he promised $10 million to Brownsville’s downtown revitalization and $20 million to its Cameron County schools. (3/11)

The Future of the Low Earth Orbit Space Economy (Source: Newsweek)
As the New Space sector becomes more robust, various industries are looking to push what is possible and encourage an innovative future that will allow humans to explore deeper into space. Click here. (3/11)

Georgia's Camden County Could Still Pursue Spaceport (Source: Brunswick News)
The battle over the future of Spaceport Camden may not be over. According to the Federal Aviation Administration's requirement to grant a launch site operator's license, the county needs to do one of three things: own the 4,000-acre tract owned by Union Carbide, negotiate a lease agreement, or have a site access agreement.

"It might not be over," said Steve Weinkle, one of the people who initiated the petition drive that led to the referendum giving voters the choice of supporting the spaceport or stopping commissioners from spending more money. So far, the county has spent more than $10.4 million. More than $4.1 million was paid to a consultant, $3.1 million for land, $1.1 million for lobbying, $850,000 for promotions, $711,000 for legal expenses and $389,000 for other expenses.

"While Camden County hasn't given up yet, it's clear that no matter what happens next, this has already been a monumental and groundbreaking effort: one built by the hundreds of volunteers who stuffed thousands of envelopes, gathered petition signatures, spoke at hearings, and educated their friends and neighbors—and ultimately, the thousands of Camden residents who showed up to vote," Megan Desrosiers said. (3/12)

NASA's New Budget Means it Won't Be Going Back to the Moon Anytime Soon (Source: TIME)
Congress completed work on an omnibus spending bill that allocates the space agency just over $24 billion dollars—or $760 million less than the White House requested, and less than half of what the space agency was getting back in its golden era. The details of the spending bill reveal a lot about why it has been half a century since human beings last landed on the moon.

In 2020, NASA requested $3.4 billion to build its Human Landing System (HLS). Congress responded with a check for just $850 million, barely enough for basic R&D. This year NASA lowered its sights, requesting $1.195 billion—and getting it. That’s good as far as it goes, but remains less than half of what NASA needs to build the ship for real. If you want to know why that much-touted 2024 date for getting boots back on the moon—under the new Artemis program—has slipped to a more generalized “sometime this decade,” look no further than the HLS.

Then too, there’s the SLS (the 21st century Saturn V moon rocket), which is budgeted at just $2.6 billion for 2022, a funding level that allows for launching one rocket per year. Back in the Apollo days, 11 Saturn Vs were launched—nine of them on crewed lunar missions—from just 1968 to 1972. Similarly, the Orion spacecraft—the modern-day version of the Apollo orbiter—was budgeted at just $1.4 billion this year. Orion has been in development in one form or another since 2004 and has never yet carried a crew. By contrast, 15 different Apollo capsules carried 15 different crews from just 1968 to 1974. (3/11)

China Planning Global System for Precision Meteorological Monitoring (Source: Xinhua)
China is planning the construction of a new global system for gathering high-precision meteorological data based on the interpretation of signals beamed down from satellites, according to CASIC. The "global occultation meteorological detection constellation" will measure the frequency, phase and amplitude of signals transmitted by navigation satellites, recording how they change after passing through the ionosphere and atmosphere.

The resulting data will allow meteorologists to calculate the temperature, humidity and pressure of the atmosphere, as well as the ionospheric electron density. According to CASIC, the occultation detection technique is capable of providing uniformly distributed neutral atmosphere and ionosphere information around the globe, permitting the monitoring and forecasting of the ionospheric environment, numerical weather forecasts, typhoon forecasts, near-space environment monitoring and aviation meteorology. (3/11)

AST SpaceMobile Books More SpaceX rides Months After Canceling Soyuz Reservation (Source: Space News)
AST SpaceMobile is expanding a launch deal with SpaceX for its cellphone-compatible broadband constellation, following a 2021 decision to move its upcoming BlueWalker-3 prototype mission from Russia’s now-embargoed Soyuz to a Falcon 9. BlueWalker-3 was booked on a Soyuz as a secondary payload but moved its reservation to Falcon 9 last August after Russia’s primary customer for the launch ran into delays, AST SpaceMobile chief strategy officer Scott Wisniewski said.

Assuming the first phase completes within the time frame, AST SpaceMobile has said it plans to start launching the additional 90 satellites “during the last quarter of 2023 and continue during 2024.” Operating at full capacity, Wisniewski said the company plans “to assemble up to six BlueBird satellites per month” from its Texas manufacturing facilities. While AST SpaceMobile is not disclosing BlueBird’s mass, Wisniewski said each satellite “is the size of a big truck” and “well north” of BlueWalker-3 at around 1,500-kilograms. (3/11)

Roscosmos Sends Letters to ISS Partners Demanding to Lift Sanctions (Source: TASS)
Roscosmos is sending appeals to its partners in the International Space Station demanding they lift sanctions from the corporation’s companies, Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin said. "State Corporation for Space Activity Roscosmos is sending written appeals to its partners in the International Space Station - the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the Canadian Space Agency and the European Space Agency - demanding they lift illegitimate sanctions from our companies," he said on Telegram.

Rogozin said the foreign partners didn’t explain the reasons for and the content of the sanctions, despite repeated requests by Roscosmos. The head of Roscosmos said that the Russian and US segments of the ISS are interconnected. The Russian segment is controlled from the Mission Control Center near Moscow (which is under sanctions), which ensures the maintenance of the station's orbit and provides backup for running the life support systems of the US segment. (3/12)

Roscosmos Space Agency Plans to Optimize Costs of ISS Project (Source: TASS)
The costs for implementing the International Space Station (ISS) project will be optimized, the Roscosmos state space agency said. "Roscosmos plans to optimize the expenses that are going to be spent on implementing the ISS project," the state agency noted following the meeting with its CEO Dmitry Rogozin. Earlier, Rogozin stated that the work on the ISS was not effective amid the current geopolitical situation. He also pointed out that huge funds would be required to extend the operation of the station until 2030, otherwise it is going to fall apart. (3/12)

Sanctions Against Russia Could Be a Blessing for India's Space Sector (Source: Orissa Post)
Industry experts say the US and Europe's economic sanctions against Russia for military action against Ukraine could create economic opportunities for the Indian space sector and not burden it with economic costs. They also feel that to capitalize on the opportunities, India should ramp up its satellite launch capabilities and announce Productivity Linked Incentive (PLI) schemes for the aerospace sector.

Industry experts are unanimous that the sanctions imposed on Russia will not have any significant impact on India. Space is an important area and there is a possibility that the US may ask India to take sides in favor or against Russia. So, what if the US and the West add India to their sanctions list because of their ties with Russia? In the case of satellites, about 60 percent of components by value are now imported from Europe. (3/12)