August 15, 2024

NASA's Starlink Decision Delayed to Late August (Source: Space News)
NASA has delayed until late August a decision on Starliner's return from the International Space Station. At a briefing Wednesday, agency officials said they are continuing to study whether to have Starliner return to Earth with astronauts on board as they examine problems with the spacecraft's thrusters experienced during its approach to the station in June. NASA previously said it would make a decision in mid-August, but now expects to reach a decision late next week or early the following week. If NASA elects to return Starliner uncrewed, astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams will remain on the station until early next year, returning on the Crew-9 Crew Dragon launching next month. (8/15)

Northrop Grumman Plans Large Layoff in California (Source: Space News)
Northrop Grumman plans to lay off several hundred employees work in space programs in Southern California. The company filed this week notices of 550 layoffs at its space business facilities in Redondo Beach and Manhattan Beach, California. This latest round of layoffs follows a separate action earlier this year that resulted in 600 employees being redeployed across the company. Northrop has not specified the reasons behind the job cuts even as the company reports growth in its space business, particularly in military programs. (8/15)

Telesat Gathering Financing to Develop Lightspeed Constellation (Source: Space News)
Telesat says it is close to securing government funds needed to develop its Lightspeed broadband constellation. The Canadian federal government in March agreed on terms for a loan worth 2.14 billion Canadian dollars ($1.6 billion) for the 198-satellite constellation, and Telesat expects to finalize 400 million Canadian dollars of funding from the Quebec provincial government by the end of the summer. The satellites, built by MDA for Telesat, are scheduled to start launching in 2026. (8/15)

Redwire to Acquire Hera Systems (Source: Space News)
Jacksonville-based Redwire is acquiring small satellite manufacturer Hera Systems to bolster its defense business. Redwire announced the acquisition of Hera Systems on Thursday, terms of which the companies did not disclose. The deal is expected to close later this quarter. Hera Systems develops small satellite technologies, and its geostationary satellite platform was selected for the U.S. Space Force's Tetra 5 in-orbit refueling experiment planned for 2025. The acquisition aligns with Redwire's efforts to strengthen its foothold in the defense market and support specialized national security space missions in GEO. (8/15)

Apex Unveils GEO Bus (Source: Space News)
Apex has unveiled a GEO version of its Aries small satellite bus. The GEO Aries bus, announced Thursday, is designed for a variety of missions in GEO from space domain awareness to communications. The bus has a five-year lifetime and can accommodate payloads of up to 120 kilograms. Apex has sold the first GEO Aries to an undisclosed government customer. (8/15)

Russia Launches ISS Cargo Mission (Source: Space.com)
Russia launched a Progress cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station Wednesday night. A Soyuz-2.1a rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 11:20 p.m. Eastern and placed the Progress MS-28 spacecraft into orbit. The spacecraft, carrying nearly three tons of cargo, is scheduled to dock with the ISS early Saturday. (8/15)

Senate Bill Seeks to Mitigate Constellation Impacts on Astronomy (Source: Space News)
A Senate bill would establish a center that would study ways to mitigate the effects of satellite constellations on astronomy. The bipartisan Dark and Quiet Skies Act, introduced earlier this month, would establish a center of excellence overseen by NIST to examine how to reduce the effects of reflected sunlight and radio emissions from satellites on astronomy.

If enacted, the center would join efforts like a center established by the International Astronomical Union that recently won an NSF grant to develop software to help astronomers schedule observations around satellite passes. Separately, SpaceX and the NSF reached an agreement last week to implement a technique where Starlink satellites will adjust their beam patterns as they pass over radio observatories to avoid transmitting directly into them. (8/14)

ULA Struggling with Profit Goals, and Retaining Engineers at Florida Spaceport (Source: Bloomberg)
Over at ULA, budgets are running over and revenue is down as customer delays push back launches, according to a person familiar with the matter. Boeing and Lockheed would rather offload ULA to someone else. A ULA spokesperson said the company is profitable for the year, but making less than its own goals.

The issues explain, in part, why ULA was running behind while gearing up for its latest Pentagon mission. The space company needed more workers to meet its July 30 launch date due to quality issues, the person said. So it flew in a temporary crew to Cape Canaveral, Florida, from 500 miles away. Working around the clock, the team managed to make the fixes in time for the rocket’s 100th mission. It wasn’t the only time ULA has had to shuttle people from out-of-state to handle unexpected repairs: It did the same for work on its new rocket.

A crew from Decatur, Alabama traveled to Florida to fix “significant” out-of-sequence factory work that cropped up ahead of the Vulcan rocket’s debut, according to a company document seen by Bloomberg. The painstaking nature of the repairs would have been too big of a strain on the Florida launch operations engineers, the person said. (8/14)

GPS Advisory Committee Warns of Vulnerability (Source: GPS World)
A GPS advisory committee is frustrated with the lack of attention the navigation satellite system is getting from the government. In a recent memo, Thad Allen, chair of the President's National Space-based Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) Advisory Board, warned that the GPS network is vulnerable to disruption and that issues about it have not received "their rightful prominence in the national policy agenda." The committee called for a "fresh look" at how GPS and related PNT policies are handled. (8/15)

Perseverance Rover to Leave Jezero Crater (Source: NASA)
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover is preparing to climb out of Jezero Crater. NASA said Wednesday that the rover will soon start to ascend the western rim of the crater, two and a half years after it landed in the crater floor on the remnants of a river delta. That will involve some of the steepest climbs by the rover to date as it ascends 300 meters to the crater rim for the next phase of its mission to collect samples for return to Earth. (8/15)

Honeywell Builds Hardened Circuits for Space Applications (Source: Military & Aerospace Electronics Online)
The US Naval Surface Warfare Center has awarded Honeywell International a $25.8 million contract to sustain and enhance radiation-hardened microelectronics manufacturing for space and nuclear event applications. The contract supports Honeywell's facilities in Minnesota and Florida, which are among the few remaining US sites capable of producing integrated circuits that can endure extreme radiation. (8/14)

Astroscale Advances Apace Junk Removal Technology (Source: Space Daily)
Astroscale's Active Debris Removal has demonstrated the capability to approach space debris in orbit, maintaining a fixed distance from the objects. This achievement is critical to developing technology that can autonomously approach and capture defunct satellites and other debris. (8/14)

SpaceX Launches WorldView Satellites at Florida Spaceport (Source: Florida Today)
On Thursday morning, SpaceX launched a different kind of payload. Not a Starlink, but two imaging satellites were launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket for Maxar, a space technology and manufacturing company. The Maxar satellites are the next two in the company's WorldView Legion series − the first two satellites were launched from Vandenberg, California, on May 2, 2024. In total, the WorldView Legion series will consist of six satellites. The final two are expected to launch by the end of the year. (8/15)

UF and UCF Supported Space Startup Accelerator Begins Process for Applicants (Source: UF)
UF, UCF, ASU and Vanderbilt partnering to offer training in the new space industry; applications open Aug. 8. The Space-Edge Accelerator, an innovation-focused collaboration between the University of Florida, Blue Origin, Space Foundation, the University of Central Florida, Arizona State University and Vanderbilt University, is opening applications for its inaugural program. Designed to propel businesses into the new space economy, Space-Edge offers innovators and entrepreneurs a unique opportunity to gain a competitive edge by accessing space industry experts and resources. Click here. (8/8)