May 10, 2022

China Launches Cargo to Space Station (Source: Space News)
A cargo spacecraft docked with China's space station hours after its launch Monday. A Long March 7 lifted off from the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center at 1:56 p.m. Eastern and placed the Tianzhou-4 spacecraft into orbit. That spacecraft docked with the space station's Tianhe module seven hours later. The spacecraft delivered around 6.9 tons of supplies for June's Shenzhou-14 crewed mission, space station maintenance equipment, space science experiment apparatus, and a refrigerator for space science and medical experiments. (5/10)

Canada Joins US in ASAT Ban (Source: Space News)
Canada announced Monday it is joining the United States in banning tests of destructive direct-ascent ASATs. The announcement came at the start of a week-long meeting of a U.N. working group on reducing space threats in Geneva. The move is largely symbolic as Canada has never tested nor announced plans to test ASATs, but adds momentum to the U.S. ban announced last month that some hope could lead to a global norm against such tests. Several other countries expressed support for the ASAT ban during the U.N. meeting Monday without formally signing on. (5/10)

Anti-Satellite Weapons: the US has Sworn Off ASAT Tests,  Australia Should Follow Suit (Source: Space Review)
The United States announced last month it would not perform destructive direct-ascent ASAT tests and encouraged other nations to join it. Cassandra Steer explains why Australia should join the ASAT testing ban despite a lack of plans by the country’s military to develop ASATs. Click here. (5/9)

JWST in Home Stretch Preparations for Activation (Source: Space News)
The James Webb Space Telescope is entering what NASA calls the "home stretch" of its commissioning. Project officials said Monday they have completed the alignment of all the instruments on the observatory with better-than-expected performance in terms of resolution and sensitivity. They are now working on commissioning the individual instruments to prepare them for science operations this summer. The mission will finish the commissioning with a set of images called "early release observations" scheduled for release in mid-July. However, officials declined to say what objects the telescope would observe. (5/10)

CACI Plans Satellite Launch on Transporter-7 Mission (Source: Space News)
CACI International is funding an experiment to demonstrate space technologies for military use, including an alternative to GPS navigation. The defense contractor, seeking to grow its space business, will fly two demonstration payloads on a York Space satellite scheduled to launch to low Earth orbit in January aboard the SpaceX Transporter-7 rideshare mission. That will include a test of an alternative navigation system designed to work in a "contested domain" where GPS signals are jammed. If the test is successful, CACI says it will try to work with satellite operators to include that navigation payload on their satellites. (5/10)

Astra Plans UK Launch (Source: Space News)
Astra announced plans Tuesday to launch from a U.K. spaceport next year. The company said it's working with SaxaVord Spaceport in the Shetland Islands to host launches, pending regulatory and other approvals. Astra has emphasized the portability of its launch system, including in an earnings call last week, that allows it to operate from facilities worldwide. Astra will follow ABL Space Systems, another small launch vehicle developer that expects to launch from SaxaVord as soon as later this year as part of a deal with Lockheed Martin. (5/10)

Virgin Orbit Plans June Launch with Seven Satellites (Source: Virgin Orbit)
Virgin Orbit says its next launch will take place no earlier than late June. The company announced Monday that the next LauncherOne mission is scheduled for as soon as June 29, flying out of Mojave Air and Space Port. The "Straight Up" mission will carry seven satellites for government agencies arranged by the U.S. Space Force, placing them into a mid-inclination orbit. (5/10)

Blue Origin Announces Crew for Next New Shepard Suborbital Flight (Source: Bloomberg)
Blue Origin announced the crew of its next New Shepard flight Monday. The NS-21 mission will carry six people, including its first repeat customer, Evan Dick, who flew on NS-19 in December. Others include Katya Echazarreta, who will be the first Mexican-born woman in space and is flying on a seat acquired by Space for Humanity, as well as explorer Victor Vescovo.

The company said the launch date would be announced in the near future. Separately, Blue Origin auctioned a seat on a future flight Monday as part of a charity event in New York for the Robin Hood Foundation. The winning bid of $8 million came from Ken Griffin, a billionaire who founded the hedge fund Citadel. He said he would donate the seat, for a flight expected in the first half of 2023, to a New York City teacher. (5/10)

NASA Glenn Director Retiring (Source: NASA)
The director of NASA's Glenn Research Center is retiring. The agency said Monday that Marla Pérez-Davis will retire next month after nearly four decades at NASA. She has been director of the center in Cleveland since January 2020 after four years as its deputy director. NASA is starting a formal process to select a replacement for Pérez-Davis, who will retire on June 17. (5/10)

India Considers Amazon Web Services for Human Spaceflight Support (Source: Times of India)
The Indian space agency ISRO is considering using Amazon Web Services (AWS) ground stations to support future human spaceflight missions. ISRO recently tested a "proof of concept" of how the AWS network of ground stations could fill in coverage gaps for Gaganyaan missions. ISRO Chairman S. Somanath said the agency had not yet decided if it will use AWS as part of its communications network for those missions. (5/10)

Insight Records Strongest Marsquake (Source: NASA)
NASA's InSight lander has recorded its strongest "Marsquake" to date. The quake on May 4 was approximately magnitude 5, significantly stronger than a magnitude 4.2 quake the spacecraft detected last August. The quake was near the upper limit of what project scientists hoped to detect with the seismometer on InSight. That spacecraft continues to experience dropping power levels and its mission may end later this year. (5/10)

The Future of Mars Science Missions (Source: Space Review)
The planetary science decadal survey final report released last month recommended flagship missions to the outer solar system but also endorsed continued work on Mars Sample Return. Jeff Foust reports other Mars exploration recommendations in the report are still shrouded in uncertainty, such as a radar mapping mission that NASA wants to stop funding. Click here. (5/9)
 
Raising the Flag on the Moon and Mars: Future Human Space Exploration in Japan (Source: Space Review)
In the concluding part of his examination of Japanese space exploration policy, Makusu Tsuizaki discusses how lessons learned from the ISS could support new plans for human exploration of the Moon and Mars. Click here. (5/9)

ULA Prepares to Evolve Centaur V with Vulcan (Source: NasaSpaceFlight.com)
With 24 launches remaining, the Atlas V rocket will be retired marking the end of the Atlas family. This, however, does not mark the end of the Centaur upper stage. The largest upgrade to Centaur will take place for the ULA’s Vulcan-Centaur rocket. Vulcan will use a new variant of Centaur. Named Centaur V, it is built specifically for the new rocket. Centaur V will return to the normal dual-engine configuration with the RL10C-1-1. The two RL10 engines will provide a total thrust of 212 kN with a specific impulse of 453 seconds. This will also see Centaur’s largest size increase to 5.4-meters in diameter with a height of 12.6-meters. (5/10)

AST SpaceMobile Announces $75M Committed Equity Facility (Source: Space Daily)
AST SpaceMobile, the company building the first and only space-based cellular broadband network designed to be accessible directly by standard mobile phones, has entered into a common stock purchase agreement. The agreement governs a Committed Equity Facility that provides AST SpaceMobile with the right, without obligation, to sell and issue up to $75 million of its Class A Common Stock over a period of 24 months at AST SpaceMobile's sole discretion, subject to certain limitations and conditions. (5/8)

South Korea’s New President Seeks Independent Space Agency, Deeper US Space Cooperation (Source: Space News)
South Korea’s newly elected president Yoon Suk-yeol will take office May 10 with a set of ambitious space projects aimed at making the country a major space power by 2035. They include establishing an independent aerospace agency offering integrated management of civil and military space programs in Sacheon, home to nearly 100 aerospace companies, and developing a high-power rocket for independent satellite launches and exploration missions.

Early completion of the country’s own GNSS system, which is on track to launch a full-fledged service by 2035, is another mission the new leader wants to accomplish to bolster the nation’s economic and military prowess. Yoon has also promised to facilitate the public-to-private transfer of space technologies, reform regulations and launch a space industry cluster to grow the country’s nascent domestic space industry. The science ministry selected five universities that will be subsidized $4 million each over the next five years for education programs designed to nurture skilled space engineers. (5/9)

Shotwell Sees Starship Launch From Texas This Summer (Source: Bloomberg)
SpaceX’s massive new Starship rocket -- designed to land NASA astronauts on the moon and eventually take humans to Mars -- will conduct a test flight from Texas in June or July, President Gwynne Shotwell said Thursday. She didn’t elaborate.. The timing marks another slip in the schedule; as recently as February, SpaceX founder Elon Musk said Starship could be ready to launch in May. (5/5)

A Magnetic Bubble Could Protect Astronauts from Dangerous Space Radiation (Source: Phys.org)
Sending astronauts on long-duration missions to other worlds would be impossible because of the hazardous radiation levels in space, outside of Earth's protective magnetic field. However, a new concept offers hope on the horizon, and the researchers behind it have received funding from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program to build a prototype.

Called CREW HaT, the proposal takes advantage of the latest advances in superconducting magnet technology to effectively shield spacecraft from harmful space radiation. HaT stands for a Halbach Torus, a circular array of magnets that creates a stronger field on one side while reducing the field on the other side. Researchers came up with a design for lightweight, deployable, mechanically supported magnetic coils activated by a new generation of high-temperature superconducting tapes, which have only recently become available. (5/6)

Globalstar Mystery Deepens (Source: Space News)
Globalstar’s latest financial update raises a mystery project when it said it had signed a term sheet with “a large, global customer” to start deploying some of its spectrum for terrestrial use “in the U.S. and beyond.” The satellite operator, which has been exploring ways to use its frequencies terrestrially for applications including connecting internet of things (IoT) devices, said the deal is for a “significant opportunity that will take time.”

There were also no meaningful updates about the “potential customer” funding a set of 17 satellites to replenish Globalstar’s existing constellation. Even still, B. Riley analyst Mike Crawford continues to believe Apple is “the most probable” wholesale buyer of this capacity, saying the release of the iPhone 14 later this year could be a potential catalyst. Reports last fall had suggested the iPhone 13 line could come with Globalstar-enabled connectivity. (5/9)

Why is FAA Approval for SpaceX Starship Orbital Launches Taking So Long? (Source: The Hill)
The latest FAA delay of SpaceX's Starbase PEA until the end of May, has caused a proliferation of conspiracy theories on social media. Some Ars Technica readers have suggested the environmental process was being slow walked or even rigged. One common sentiment is that the FAA is delaying so that the NASA Space Launch System will fly before the orbital SpaceX Starship.

However, a sound principle where government bureaucracy is concerned is to be careful about ascribing to malice what can also be explained by inefficacy common with the federal government. The FAA suggests that the reason includes the need to wade through about 18,000 public comments and that SpaceX has made some last-minute changes to the application that has resulted in the need for further analysis. The announcement raises a number of questions, however.

First, why is the FAA constantly blowing past its own self-imposed deadlines for getting the environmental review completed? Can that agency not perform accurate project estimates? Second, while the volume of work seems to be enormous, given the stakes, how many resources is the FAA devoting to the review? Could assigning more people speed the process up? Finally, one wonders whether the FAA comprehends the true importance of the SpaceX Starship and the ability to launch it on a regular basis from the Boca Chica site. (5/9)

Russian Space Chief Dmitry Rogozin Apparently Threatens Elon Musk (Source: Space.com)
Russian space chief Dmitry Rogozin has apparently threatened Elon Musk, but the SpaceX founder and CEO doesn't seem too bothered. On May 8, Musk posted on Twitter a note that he said Rogozin had sent out to Russian media. The note claimed that equipment for SpaceX's Starlink satellite-internet system had been delivered to Ukrainian marines and "militants of the Nazi Azov battalion" by the U.S. military.

"Elon Musk, thus, is involved in supplying the fascist forces in Ukraine with military communication equipment," Rogozin wrote, according to an English translation that Musk posted. (He also tweeted out a Russian version.) "And for this, Elon, you will be held accountable like an adult — no matter how much you'll play the fool." This sounds very much like a threat, as Musk acknowledged in a follow-up tweet on Sunday. "If I die under mysterious circumstances, it's been nice knowin ya," he wrote.

SpaceX, Musk and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) have been open about sending Starlink terminals to Ukraine, to help the country maintain some of its communications infrastructure during the ongoing invasion by Russia. Ukrainian officials asked for such equipment in late February, shortly after the invasion began. (5/9)

UCF Student Team Named Finalists in NASA Aerospace Competition (Source: UCF)
Ateam of UCF students has been named a finalist in the NASA Revolutionary Aerospace Systems Concepts – Academic Linkage (RASC-AL) competition, which aims to develop innovative technologies that further human space exploration. This is the first time a team from UCF has advanced to the final round in this competition.

The Knights will compete against 15 other collegiate teams, who will present their research at a NASA forum in Cocoa Beach this June. The team includes 19 students from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and the College of Business. Mechanical engineering major Austin Hacker leads the team under the guidance of faculty members Jeff Kauffman and Kawai Kwok, and is proud of representing UCF at this event.

The UCF team is working hard on its mission design, which is titled “Project Vitality.” They aim to autonomously develop methane on Mars, with the goal of using it for rocket fuel. Creating the fuel in space reduces the need to transport it from Earth to Mars. Ultimately, it can lighten the load of future missions or leave room for additional scientific equipment to be transported. This project, along with the rest of the finalists, was chosen for its originality and creativity in the areas of engineering and analysis. (5/9)

Winners Announced for Lunar Exploration with a Miniaturized Payload Prototype Challenge (Source: HeroX)
HeroX, the leading platform and open marketplace for crowdsourced solutions, announced the winners of the "Honey, I Shrunk the NASA Payload, the Sequel" Challenge. The Challenge sought designs for miniature payload prototypes that could be sent to the Moon to help fill gaps in lunar knowledge.

The first "Honey, I Shrunk the NASA Payload Challenge" launched on April 9, 2020. Fourteen teams were recognized and rewarded for their innovative approaches to miniature payload development. These fourteen teams were invited to participate in the sequel challenge, which launched on October 15, 2020. From among those fourteen teams, four finalist teams were selected who then relied on crowdsourcing to recruit new team members and fill any resource gaps they might have.

Two of these expanded teams completed the next step of the challenge and were each awarded up to $225,000 that was used to develop their proposals into functioning, flight-ready payloads. In addition, a third team was awarded $65,000 to develop their proposal. Two years later, these teams have completed their hardware development and testing, and could one day see their payloads operate on the Moon. Click here. (5/4)

What a 1970s Philosophical Concept Can Teach Us About Space Governance (Source: Fast Company)
Currently, there are no international binding rules that would address these growing threats. In fact, the international community has not been able to agree to any new binding, broadly supported rules for space since 1976, a time when space was dominated by just two powers—the US and the USSR—and the biggest concern was launching nuclear weapons beyond the stratosphere.

This suggests that it may be time to consider new rules for this new space era. One potentially useful approach to governance could be to adopt a rule-making thought device, famous in political philosophy, called the “veil of ignorance.” Philosopher John Rawls presented the veil idea with a thought experiment: to create fair rules for society, everyone must first agree to the rules before knowing how, exactly, the rules would apply to them.

His notion was that if you didn’t know whether you would be a Black, White, or Brown person, a woman or a man, or if you would end up rich or poor until after the rules were created, the rules everyone would agree upon would wind up being more equitable for all. The best time to make rules for society, it turns out, is while society is still living under the veil of ignorance. It is perhaps remarkably useful and relevant to space. (5/9)

Phantom Space Corp. Places Order for More Than 200 Ursa Major Rocket Engines (Source: Phantom Space)
Phantom Space Corporation, a space applications company, today announced an agreement to purchase more than 200 rocket engines from Ursa Major, America's only independent pure-play rocket propulsion company. The order includes Ursa Major's 5,000-Pound Thrust Hadley engines and the new 50,000-pound thrust Ripley engines. By using Ursa Major's Hadley engines, Phantom's Daytona rocket is slated for orbital launch in 2023, just three years after Phantom Space was formed. (5/4)

Northern Sky Research (NSR) to Become Part of Analysys Mason (Source: NSR)
Analysys Mason, a world-leading management consultancy focused on telecoms, media and technology (TMT), today announced the acquisition of Northern Sky Research (NSR), a specialist satellite and space research and consulting firm. Founded in 2000, NSR is a prominent global provider of satellite and space market research and consulting services specializing in the analysis of growth opportunities across four core industry sectors: satellite communications, satellite & space applications, financial analysis and satellite & space infrastructure. (5/3)

UK Space Start-up NORSS Wins Deal for MoD Satellite Simulator (Source: The Times)
A space start-up has won a near-£1m contract with UK Space Command to develop a new simulator system for testing out future British satellite launches. Northumberland-based Northern Space Security (NORSS), founded in 2017 by RAF veteran Ralph Dinsley, will develop spacecraft and missions simulator software called ARTSIM to support the MOD’s satellite plans. It will partner on the contract with Nominal Systems, a space simulator developer based in Canberra, Australia. (5/8)

German Launcher Project Plans Australia Liftoff (Source: Southern Launch)
In preparation for their ReFEx rocket launch campaign from Australia, the DLR team are visiting spaceport partner Southern Launch. As part of their visit, the DLR team will be visiting Southern Launch’s spaceports; the Whalers Way Orbital Launch Complex and the Koonibba Test Range, as well as meeting with key personnel across the Australian space industry. 

DLR is the Federal Republic of Germany's research centre for aeronautics and space. They conduct research and development activities in the fields of aeronautics, space, energy, transport, security, and digitalisation. DLR have selected Southern Launch as their partner to conduct testing of the Reusability Flight Experiment (ReFEx). (5/5)