August 7, 2024

Rocket Lab Partners With KSAT To Streamline Satellite Communications for Customers with Upgraded Ground Station Service (Source: Rocket Lab)
Rocket Lab USA has partnered with Kongsberg Satellite Services (KSAT), a world leading provider of communication services for spacecraft and launch vehicles, to develop a new global ground station service for its operations and customers that enables efficient and reliable communications for future Neutron launches, increasingly ambitious Electron launches, and on-orbit operations, spacecraft deorbit, and return-to-Earth missions with Rocket Lab spacecraft. (8/6)

Germany's Dcubed Raises $4.8 Million for In-Space Manufacturing, US Expansion (Source: Space News)
German startup Dcubed raised $4.8 million to expand production, demonstrate in-space manufacturing and open a U.S. office. Dcubed’s Westminster, Colorado, office will serve as a sales and distribution hub to support U.S. customers, who make up more than half of the firm’s client base. To demonstrate in-space manufacturing, Dcubed is buying SpaceX rideshare launches. “We want to launch at least twice next year with an in-space demonstrator and at least once in 2026,” an executive said. (8/6)

Impulse Space Offers GEO Rideshares (Source: Space News)
Impulse Space is offering a rideshare program for GEO spacecraft. The company announced Tuesday it is working with Exolaunch on the program that will use Helios, a high-energy kick stage that Impulse is developing, to offer rides to GEO for smaller spacecraft. Such spacecraft, the company argues, have few good options to get to GEO today. The first rideshare mission is planned for 2027. Impulse Space also announced upgrades to its smaller Mira tug that will allow it to be used in conjunction with Helios. Mira completed its first mission in low Earth orbit in July and Impulse plans to launch a second this fall. (8/7)

Army Considers Dedicated Space Career Field (Source: Space News)
The U.S. Army is considering the creation of a dedicated space career field for enlisted soldiers. Such a career field could allow the service to expand its pool of space experts needed to face the technological challenges of modern warfare. The proposal, yet to be approved by Army leadership, has the support of Lt. Gen. Sean Gainey, commander of the Army's Space and Missile Defense Command, who mentioned it at the Space and Missile Defense Conference Tuesday. This initiative is part of a broader effort to establish an Army space branch, which has gained renewed momentum after previously slowing down due to the establishment of the U.S. Space Force. (8/7)

Italy's Leaf Space Deploys First Ka-Band Ground Station (Source: Space News)
Italian ground segment service provider Leaf Space has deployed its first ground station with a Ka-band link. The company said this week the new antenna in Iceland, which started service in June, can support X-, S- and Ka-band communications. Other Leaf Space antennas supported only X- and S-band and UHF communications. The company says current and potential customers are demanding the faster speeds Ka-band offers to downlink increasingly larger amounts of data generated in orbit. (8/7)

Space Weather Startup Raises $2.8 Million (Source: Space News)
Space weather startup Perceptive Space raised $2.8 million in a pre-seed round. The Toronto-based company is developing a space weather forecasting system it says will be more accurate and offer longer lead times than existing government forecasts. Perceptive Space plans to introduce its space weather platform to space and defense organizations in the United States and allied countries, with its first product scheduled for release in 2025. (8/7)

Florida Agencies Urge Port's Attention to Space Industry Needs (Source: News Service of Florida)
Florida government officials are concerned that Port Canaveral is favoring cruise lines over the space industry. In a letter last week, the state's commerce and transportation secretaries said they were dismayed that the port was investing in infrastructure for cruise lines to the "direct detriment" of the space industry, which also uses the port for booster recoveries and other logistics. State officials said they would review whether the port was following the terms of a grant awarded in 2018 primarily to support aerospace industry operations there and would not certify applications for projects related to the cruise industry. Port Canaveral is the second-busiest cruise port in the world, behind only Miami. (8/7)

World's First True Spaceliner Inching Closer to Launch, ISS Is Its First Target (Source: AutoEvolution)
They call it the Dream Chaser, and according to its maker, Sierra Space, the machine is not only America's but the world's first true spaceliner. Building on the legacy of the Space Shuttle, and based on a spacecraft design dating back to the 1960s, the Dream Chaser will put a new spin on reusability, taking stuff up to various orbits and then landing just like regular aircraft do. The main reason for the spaceplane coming into existence is to resupply the International Space Station (ISS) for the few more years it is allowed to stay in orbit.

The first version of the Dream Chaser is being developed as an uncrewed piece of hardware meant to haul cargo. The thing is 30-foot (nine-meter) long and 15-foot wide and it will be capable of carrying up to 11,500 pounds (5,200 kg) of cargo. Cargo won't be carried in a single space, but divided between the spaceplane's own payload bays and an attached cargo module the company is calling the Shooting Star. (8/6)

Firefly Signs Multi-Launch Agreement with L3Harris (Source: Space News)
Firefly Aerospace has won a contract from L3Harris for as many as 20 launches of its Alpha rocket over five years. Firefly signed a contract with L3Harris for between two and four launches annually from 2027 through 2031. The contract is in addition to an earlier deal between the companies for three Alpha launches in 2026. The companies did not disclose the satellites that L3Harris would be launching on Alpha. The rocket, currently operating from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, can place up to one metric ton into low Earth orbit. (8/7)

It Turns Out Boeing's Derelict Starliner Is Unable to Fly Without a Crew on Board (Source: Futurism)
Having the Starliner return to the surface without any astronauts on board — reportedly a key option for NASA at this point — may not even be on the table. According to sources, Starliner's current flight software isn't able to autonomously undock from the space station and reenter through the Earth's atmosphere — if confirmed, a confounding new ripple for what has already turned out to be a disastrous crewed flight test for Boeing and NASA. (8/6)

NASA Delays SpaceX Astronaut Mission as Rumors Swirl About Boeing’s Starliner Safety (Source: CNN)
The launch of SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission, an endeavor planned to ferry four astronauts to the International Space Station — which could also serve as a backup vehicle for the crew assigned to Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft — will be delayed, NASA announced Tuesday. The space agency said the move “allows more time for mission managers to finalize return planning” for the Starliner and its crew, according to a written update from the space agency.

NASA had said July 26 that it expected to begin a “flight readiness review” for the Starliner in the first couple days of August. That review process still has not started, NASA confirmed to CNN, because the space agency has not yet decided on a target return date. (8/6)

New Study Simulates Gravitational Waves From Failing Warp Drive (Source: Phys.org)
Imagine a spaceship driven not by engines, but by compressing the spacetime in front of it. That's the realm of science fiction, right? Well, not entirely. Physicists have been exploring the theoretical possibility of "warp drives" for decades, and a new study takes things a step further—simulating the gravitational waves such a drive might emit if it broke down. (7/29)

SpaceX Needs Permit for Texas Launchpad Flame Trench (Source: Valley Central)
SpaceX is asking the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) permission for an update at Starbase. The update is for something called a “deluge water system.” It is designed to vent rocket flames underground and flush them out with recycled water. “This one is a little different, they’re permitting for a flame trench,” Louis Balderas said. “Plumbing fixtures that blast water through that trench to help suppress sound and suppress the fire.”

SpaceX has been testing it since last year but was threatened with a lawsuit by SaveRGV, an ecological rights organization, for not having a permit. “I’m not sure how many times they’re going to reuse that water, but they do,” Deyoe said. “That’s why they’re applying for the permit, getting rid of that water. It’s going to be going to the Rio Grande.” (8/6)

Scientists Simulated a Black Hole in Lab to Test a Theory, Then it Started Glowing Extremely Bright (Source: Good)
Scientists have used a chain of atoms in a single file to simulate the event horizon of a black hole and experienced what is known as the "Hawking radiation." The phenomenon can be described as particles born from disturbances in the quantum fluctuations caused by the black hole's break in spacetime.

They tried to analyze the properties of Hawking radiation and were quite surprised when the black hole analog started to glow. Hawking radiation is an odd phenomenon as it causes the black hole to glow while the event horizon of a black hole is supposed to be an area from which even light cannot escape. The team also observed that the glow or the Hawking radiation occurred only when a part of the chain extended beyond the event horizon. This shows that an entanglement of particles in the event horizon is necessary to create the radiation. (8/6)

Space Force Asks Industry to Critique Draft Civil Reserve Framework, Including ‘Incentives’ (Source: Breaking Defense)
The Space Force is asking industry to answer a list of questions about its draft plan to create a commercial space reserve fleet, including whether the service’s proposed “incentives” for companies to volunteer are “sufficient.” The service’s new request for information (RFI) also seeks industry input on three alternatives for how contracting modifications might occur in the case that the US government decides to demand “direct denial of service to vendor customers or denial of service over designated geographic areas” to support military operations in times of crisis or war. (8/6)

Space Tech Boom Offers Militaries the "Ultimate High Ground" (Source: Axios)
A ballooning number of spying technologies inside and outside Earth's atmosphere are making military maneuvers and materiel nearly impossible to hide. New photos from Maxar's first pair of WorldView Legion satellites, launched in May, catalog on-the-ground details, such as the amount of people in a given area, open cargo holds on a ship and the height of buildings.

Myriad companies are jockeying to fulfill imagery orders. The National Reconnaissance Office in 2022 awarded BlackSky, Maxar and Planet satellite imagery contracts totaling billions of dollars. Capella Space in July secured a nearly $15 million deal with the Air Force. "The real pivot point," Jason Mallare said, "was launch going from $100 million a ride to $1 million a ride." (8/6)

SpaceX Warns of ‘Sonic Booms’ Ahead of Fifth Starship Test Flight (Source: Valley Central)
SpaceX announced the fifth Starship test will aim to catch the Super Heavy booster at the launch site and warns of sonic booms. In a news release, SpaceX said the fifth flight test will be a potentially major step in building a reusable rocket. For the first time, SpaceX will attempt to catch the Super Heavy booster after it separates from the Starship vehicle. “In addition to being a pretty spectacular visual for residents in Cameron County, the rocket’s return will be accompanied by a sonic boom,” SpaceX stated. A date for the fifth launch has not been scheduled, as it remains pending regulatory approval. (8/5)

Cesium Moon Terrain Now Available (Source: Cesium)
3D geospatial company Cesium has announced the release of Cesium Moon Terrain, the first comprehensive, precise, and readily-available 3D dataset of the moon.  Although Cesium Moon Terrain was developed to support NASA’s Artemis mission and other international space agencies, the dataset can be accessed and used by anyone to build advanced visualizations and simulations. Cesium Moon Terrain is composed of precise terrain and imagery from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) program and other sources, and is provided as 3D Tiles, the Open Geospatial Consortium Community Standard created by Cesium. (8/6)

L3Harris Showcases New DiSCO Spectrum Collaboration System (Source: ExecutiveBiz)
L3Harris Technologies successfully demonstrated its Distributed Spectrum Collaboration and Operations electronic warfare capability at the recent Valiant Shield training exercise. "DiSCO helps the warfighter to identify new threats through the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning tools to rapidly reprogram EW systems at the edge and make more informed, faster decisions across a network of distributed platforms," said the company's Ed Zoiss. (8/5)

Sierra Nevada Commissions 3 Muon Satellites, Announces Fundraising (Sources: Tech Crunch, Bloomberg)
Muon Space will produce a trio of spacecraft for Sierra Nevada, contributing to the Vindlér remote sensing constellation. Separately, Muon announced a Series B funding round as the company works to fulfill $100 million in contract commitments. (8/5)

Axiom Space CEO Transitions to Board of Directors (Source: Axiom)
Axiom Space today announced the transition of CEO Mike Suffredini to a position on the company’s Board of Directors, following eight years of leading the company to significant achievements in the space industry. Suffredini will continue to play a pivotal role within Axiom Space as an advisor and long-term board member. Dr. Kam Ghaffarian, Axiom Space's Executive Chairman and co-founder, will assume the role of interim CEO until a permanent successor is appointed. (8/6)

BAE Wins $48 Million U.S. Air Force Contract for Data Analytics Platform (Source: Space News)
U.S. defense contractor BAE Systems secured a $48 million contract from the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) to further develop an existing data analytics platform used by military intelligence analysts. The contract is to add new features and enhancements to a data analytics platform called Insight. AFRL wants to improve the system’s capabilities to integrate and analyze data from multiple sources, including sensors, satellites, drones, and human intelligence. (8/6)

Lynker Space Unveils New Operational Space Weather Forecasting Capability (Source: Space News)
Lynker Space announced a new capability for predicting and mitigating space weather threats to numerous industries and critical services. Leading the effort is Scott McIntosh, a solar and astrophysical researcher of more than 25 years, who has joined Lynker as Vice President of Space Operations. Lynker Space’s operational and strategic space weather dashboards provide highly skilled, industry-specific forecasts on timescales ranging from seconds to years, and from the regional to global scale. (8/5)