May 15, 2022

Second-Generation Space Worker Janet Petro Continues to Oversee Dramatic Change at KSC (Source: Florida Today)
Janet Petro was named Director of the Kennedy Space Center June 30, 2021. As she winds down her first year in the top job at KSC, she’s focused on transitioning the center to what she bills as a launch “mecca” — a facility serving not only NASA, but also private space companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin with the possibilities of 50+ of launches a year. Click here. (5/1)

The UK Wants to Build a Space Solar Power Plant by 2035 (Source: Space.com)
The United Kingdom is getting serious about beaming solar power from space and thinks it could have a demonstrator in orbit by 2035. Over 50 British organizations, including aerospace manufacturer Airbus, Cambridge University and satellite maker SSTL, have joined the UK Space Energy Initiative, which launched last year in a quest to explore options for developing a space-based solar power plant. (5/11)

Astronaut Compares the SpaceX, NASA and Russian Spacecraft He's Flown In (Source: Futurism)
After 177 days in space, SpaceX’s Crew-3 astronauts Raja Chari, Tom Marshburn, Kayla Barron, and Matthias Maurer returned to Earth aboard one of the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft. Marshburn was part of a panel for Crew-3 members that just splashed down last week following their stay on the ISS as part of a joint NASA and SpaceX mission.

During the live conference, Marshburn said that while the NASA, SpaceX and Russian-made ships he’s flown in are all different, they also feel more or less the same during launch and while re-entering the atmosphere because of simple physics. “SpaceX was quite a bit smoother [especially] through staging,” Marshburn said. “[Landing in] the Shuttle was very smooth. We almost didn’t know we we landed. But distinct differences were enjoyable to observe at both launch and landing.” Click here. (5/12)

SpaceX Launches Another 53 Starlink Satellites From Cape Canaveral Spaceport (Source: WFTV)
On Saturday, SpaceX successfully launched another batch of Starlink satellites from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport. The Falcon 8 rocket carrying 53 Starlink satellites lifted off at 4:40 p.m., and about 8 minutes later the rocket’s first stage successfully landed at sea on the droneship Just Read the Instructions. (5/15)

Astra’s Playing the Long Game (Source: Tech Crunch)
“The expectation I think that a lot of people have is every launch has to be perfect,” said Astra CEO Chris Kemp. “I think what Astra has to do, really, is we have to have so many launches nobody thinks about it anymore.” How many launches? Eventually, Astra wants to achieve a daily launch cadence; in the interim, the company is aiming for weekly launches as early as next year.

It’s a critical part of how the company aims to win amongst an increasingly crowded field of small launch developers — not by being flawless, but by being so low-cost and high-volume that the relative risk of a few catastrophic failures ceases to matter. To get there, Astra is moving at breakneck speed. Notably, it became the fastest company in history to reach orbit in November, six years after the company was founded.

“The approach that we took was not to design and create PowerPoints and do all the analysis and then five or 10 years later, finally maybe build a rocket,” he said. “It was within 18 months of founding the company in that garage, getting a launch license and launching our first rocket and then doing it again a few months later, and again and again and again...This was not the popular way to approach this problem,” he added. (5/13)