November 16, 2022

Satellite Signals-Intel Startup Kleos Space Appoints U.S. CEO, Needs to Get Satellites Commissioned to Avert Cash Crunch (Source: Space Intel Report)
Satellite signals intelligence service provider Kleos Space S.A. is replacing its founding chief executive with a U.S. citizen to facility interaction with U.S. defense and intelligence customers as the company navigates a difficult transition to revenue-generating operations. Alan Khalili, who joined Kleos in July 2022 as the company’s chief financial officer, will become CEO at the end of the year, replacing co-founder Andy Bowyer, who will remain with Kleos as a strategic director. (11/16)

ITU Refuses AST SpaceMobile Request for 18-Month Deadline Extension for Q/V Band Use (Source: Space Intel Report)
International regulators declined to approve startup satellite-to-cellphone provider AST SpaceMobile’s request for an 18-month extension of the deadline to bring into service the BlueWalker-3 (BW3) satellite’s Q/V-band spectrum pending further information. BW3, which AST said fully deployed its 693-square-foot (64.4 square meter) phased array antenna on Nov. 14, was launched in September aboard a SpaceX ride-share mission. (11/15)

NASA Receives 12th Successive 'Clean' Financial Audit Rating (Source: NASA)
For the 12th consecutive year, NASA has received an unmodified or “clean” opinion from an external auditor on its fiscal year 2022 financial statements. The rating is the best possible audit opinion, certifying that NASA’s financial statements conform with accepted accounting principles for federal agencies and accurately present the agency’s financial position. (11/15)

Mars Probe Spotted Something Weird During a Dust Storm (Source: Daily Beast)
The European Space Agency just spotted some Earth-like clouds more than 53 million miles away from our planet. ESA’s Mars Express probe observed two 2019 dust storms on the Red Planet that produced cloud patterns eerily reminiscent of those on Earth. Despite the fact that the two planets have incredibly different atmospheres—Mars being dry and cold while Earth is dense, wet, and warm—the dust clouds would spiral and move much like those during extratropical cyclones on Earth.

The storms occurred during springtime at the Martian North Pole, which is a period when storms typically form on the Red Planet. As the dust entered the atmosphere, it began to form smaller cloud cells with a grain-like texture—which is reminiscent of those on Earth. This occurs when hot air rises as a result of the denser cooler air surrounding it. (11/15)

Scientists Created a Black Hole in The Lab, And Then It Started to Glow (Source: Science Alert)
A new kind of black hole analog could tell us a thing or two about an elusive radiation theoretically emitted by the real thing. Using a chain of atoms in single-file to simulate the event horizon of a black hole, a team of physicists has observed the equivalent of what we call Hawking radiation – particles born from disturbances in the quantum fluctuations caused by the black hole's break in spacetime.

This, they say, could help resolve the tension between two currently irreconcilable frameworks for describing the Universe: the general theory of relativity, which describes the behavior of gravity as a continuous field known as spacetime; and quantum mechanics, which describes the behavior of discrete particles using the mathematics of probability.

If this Hawking radiation exists, it's way too faint for us to detect yet. It's possible we'll never sift it out of the hissing static of the Universe. But we can probe its properties by creating black hole analogs in laboratory settings. The effect of this fake event horizon produced a rise in temperature that matched theoretical expectations of an equivalent black hole system, the team said, but only when part of the chain extended beyond the event horizon. This could mean the entanglement of particles that straddle the event horizon is instrumental in generating Hawking radiation. (11/16)

Virgin Orbit’s Planned UK Launch in 2022 Looks to be Slipping Away as Operating License Remains Under Review (Source: Space Intel Report)
Virgin Orbit’s plans for a first launch from Britain’s Spaceport Cornwall this year appear to be slipping beyond reach as the UK Civil Aviation Authority continues to work through the company's licensing documentation. The delay, even if only to January, will make it impossible for Virgin Orbit to reach its revenue target of $40 million. Virgin Orbit has conducted four consecutive successful launches since June 2021. (11/16)

ISS Spacewalk Focuses on Solar Arrays (Source: Space.com)
Two NASA astronauts performed their first spacewalks Tuesday. Josh Cassada and Frank Rubio started their spacewalk outside the International Space Station at 9:14 a.m. Eastern, more than an hour late to fix an issue with Cassada's suit. The two spent 7 hours and 11 minutes outside the station, attaching brackets and routing cables for new solar arrays that will be installed on later spacewalks. (11/16)

China's Galactic Energy Launches Five Imaging Satellites (Source: Xinhua)
Chinese company Galactic Energy launched a Ceres-1 rocket Wednesday. The rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 1:20 a.m. Eastern and placed five Jilin-1 Gaofen 03D imaging satellites into orbit. The launch was the fourth for the Ceres-1, a small solid-propellant launch vehicle. (11/16)

SpaceX Seeks to Raise More Funding (Source: Bloomberg)
SpaceX is reportedly in talks to raise more funding at a valuation of more than $150 billion. The size of the funding round wasn't disclosed, but the valuation would be a significant increase over the $125 billion from earlier this year. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the report was "false" but did not elaborate. (11/16)

GeoOptics to Provide Radio Occultation Data to NASA (Source: Space News)
GeoOptics Inc. won a NASA contract to provide researchers with data acquired by the company's small satellite constellation. The contract, through NASA's Commercial SmallSat Data Acquisition program, covers radio occultation data similar to what it provides NOAA today, but processed to a higher degree of accuracy. The contract is worth up to $7 million over five years. (11/16)

MyRadar Aims to Support Wildfire Detection and Mitigation (Source: Space News)
MyRadar is looking beyond weather forecasts to wildfire detection and mitigation with the support of NOAA. The company won a SBIR award from NOAA to test artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms using data from the urban-wildland interface, where buildings are adjacent to wilderness areas. MyRadar launched three prototype satellites in May on a Rocket Lab Electron for its Hyperspectral Orbital Remote Imaging Spectrometer (HORIS) constellation, which may eventually number up to 150 satellites. (11/16)

LEOcloud Partners with Axiom for Computing Support (Source: Space News)
LEOcloud is partnering with Axiom Space on space-based edge computing projects. Under the agreement, the companies will work together to develop and deliver space-based cloud services linked to terrestrial cloud computers. LEOcloud has been establishing relationships with industrial partners since the company was founded in 2021 to offer edge computing for space operations and to establish a constellation of space-based data centers. (11/16)

South Korea's Lunar Mission Demonstrates Space Internet (Source: Space News)
South Korea's first lunar mission has demonstrated "space internet" technologies on its way to the moon. The Danuri spacecraft tested an interplanetary internet connection using delay-disruption tolerant networking by sending video and photo files, including a popular Korean band's music video.  Danuri was more than 1.2 million kilometers from the Earth in the tests. Danuri, taking a low-energy trajectory to the moon, is scheduled to enter orbit around the moon in December. (11/16)

Artemis I SLS Launches Orion to Moon From Cape Canaveral Spaceport (Source: Space News)
NASA's Orion spacecraft is on its way to the moon after a successful launch overnight. The Space Launch System lifted off on its inaugural flight at 1:47 a.m. Eastern from the Kennedy Space Center. The liftoff was delayed by more than 40 minutes to fix a leaky valve and a tracking radar. The SLS upper stage released Orion nearly two hours later after performing a translunar injection burn. Orion will fly a 25-day uncrewed mission called Artemis 1, going into a distant retrograde orbit around the moon before returning to Earth and splashing down off the California coast. The mission will demonstrate the performance of Orion ahead of the Artemis 2 crewed mission around the moon no earlier than 2024. (11/16)

SpaceX Wins $1.15B Contract Mod for Artemis Landing Mission (Source: Space News)
NASA awarded SpaceX a $1.15 billion contract modification Tuesday for a second Artemis landing mission. The modification funds Option B of SpaceX's Human Landing System award, covering work to upgrade its Starship lunar lander for later, more ambitious Artemis missions and includes a second crewed demonstration landing. NASA officials previously said they would exercise Option B and use that flight for the Artemis 4 mission. NASA is separately soliciting proposals for a second lander. (11/16)

Space Command Component to Speed Satellite Services to Other Military Forces (Source: Space News)
U.S. Space Command is adding a new component to help coordinate operations and speed up the delivery of satellite-based services to military forces in the field. The new organization, called Combined Joint Task Force-Space Operations (CJTF-SO), marks another step in the evolution of the U.S. military's space enterprise, officials said. CJTF-SO will serve as a bridge between the command's headquarters and its two large field organizations, the Combined Force Space Component Command and the Joint Task Force Space Defense. The organization is intended to provide the "operational integration and warfighting focus that space needed, the layer between strategic and tactical," one general explained. (11/16)

NGA Plans Budget Increase for Monitoring Space Activity (Source: Space News)
The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) plans to double spending on contracts to monitor global economic activity from space. The agency said Tuesday it will increase the contract ceiling for its Economic Indicator Monitoring (EIM) program from $29.9 million to $60 million over five years.  The program seeks to use commercial geospatial data and analytics services to improve the U.S. government's insights on economic activity and trends around the world. NGA in 2021 selected five vendors to compete for awards: BAE Systems, Ball Aerospace, BlackSky, Continental Mapping Consultants and Royce Geospatial Consultants. (11/16)

Europe Seeks Space Autonomy (Source: Space News)
European space officials are stressing a need for greater autonomy and sovereign capabilities in the wake of geopolitical trends and developments. An ESA official said at Space Tech Expo Europe on Tuesday that while Europe has strong space capabilities in general, it "lacks autonomy independence in some parts" such as space transportation and exploration technologies. A French official at the conference emphasized the need for the European Union's secure connectivity constellation, with ESA expected to fund some of its development. (11/16)

Eutelsat Board Approves OneWeb Merger (Source: Space News)
Eutelsat's board has approved the company's merger with OneWeb. Eutelsat's board gave its full backing for the deal after getting the opinions of employee representatives. OneWeb's main shareholders, which include Indian conglomerate Bharti, Japan's Softbank, South Korea's Hanwha, and the British government, signed a final combination agreement Monday with Eutelsat following the approval. Eutelsat's shareholders still need to approve the merger during a meeting the operator expects to hold in the second or third quarter of 2023. (11/16)

Boeing Satellite Payload Demonstrates Anti-Jamming Tech (Source: Space News)
Boeing says a satellite communications payload it developed for the U.S. Space Force successfully demonstrated it can prevent jamming attacks. The test is a key step toward the planned 2024 launch of the Protected Tactical Satcom Prototype, or PTS-P, a payload that the Space Force will test in orbit to assess whether it can provide secure communications in potential war scenarios when U.S. networks would be targets of electronic and cyber attacks. The payload is scalable and hostable on both commercial or government satellites. Northrop is developing a similar payload under a separate Space Force contract. (11/16)

KSC's James Wood Wins Presidential Rank Award (Source: White House)
President Biden announced the 2022 Presidential Rank Award winners on Tuesday. The Presidential Rank Awards program recognizes a select group of career members of the Senior Executive Service (SES) for exceptional performance over an extended period of time. Among this year's winners, in the category of Meritorious Senior Professionals, is James. S. Wood. Mr. Wood is NASA's Chief Engineer in the Launch Services Program, an agency-wide division headquartered at Kennedy Space Center responsible for launching uncrewed rockets delivering spacecraft that observe the Earth, visit other planets and explore the universe, ranging from weather satellites and telescopes to Mars Rovers. The awards program recognized 233 civil service leaders across the US Government. (11/15)

AFRL Awards Contract for Pioneering Spacecraft in Region of Moon (Source: Space Daily)
The Air Force Research Laboratory has awarded a $72 million contract to Advanced Space LLC to demonstrate space situational awareness, object detection and tracking in the region of the Moon, supporting a resurgence of interest in lunar exploration and development across civil, commercial and international space agencies.

AFRL's Space Vehicles Directorate awarded the contract to support the lab's Oracle spacecraft program, previously called the Cislunar Highway Patrol System, or CHPS. The project has been renamed Oracle after the Oracle of Delphi in ancient Greece. The high priestess of the Oracle would channel the knowledge of Apollo and provide wisdom and foresight to those with whom she would consult. (11/15)

Canadensys Aerospace Wins Major Contract – Will Build the First Canadian Moon Rover (Source: SpaceQ)
In the competition between prime contractor MDA and the much smaller and less known Bolton based Canadensys Aerospace, the underdog won. Canadensys Aerospace was founded in 2013 by former employees of MDA including CEO Christian Sallaberger. The goal, get Canada to the Moon. Now nine years later, and after a lot of hard work, the goal of Canada leading a mission to the Moon with a made-in Canada lunar rover is reality.

Today the Honourable François-Philippe Champagne, Minister of Innovation, Science and Industry, announced the winner of the Lunar Exploration Accelerator Program (LEAP) Lunar Rover competition, awarding a $43M contract to Canadensys. It was a year ago that MDA and Canadensys were each awarded LEAP Lunar Rover Phase A contract. (11/14)

Beyond Gravity Passes CDR for Critical Mechanism for NASA's Gateway (Source: Space Daily)
The Gateway space station, an essential element of NASA's Artemis program, will serve as humanity's first space station in lunar orbit supporting crewed and uncrewed missions to the surface of the Moon and future deep space exploration missions. NASA contracted Maxar, a provider of comprehensive space solutions and secure, precise, geospatial intelligence, to manufacture the PPE, which will provide Gateway with power and propulsion for maneuvers around the Moon and to transit between different orbits, and high-rate communications. (11/15)

An Overview of NASA's Artemis 1 Mission to the Moon (Source: Space Daily)
The 25-and-a-half day voyage beyond the far side of the Moon and back is a meticulously choreographed uncrewed flight that should yield spectacular images as well as valuable scientific data. Click here for a summary overview of the mission. (11/15)