September 12, 2024

Russia Launches Crew to ISS (Source: Space Daily)
An American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts successfully launched Wednesday for a six-month mission to the International Space Station and the transition from one mission crew to another. Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner departed Earth in a live-streamed event with NASA astronaut Don Pettit on time at 12:23 p.m. EDT aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft atop a Soyuz rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in east-central Kazakhstan, a large former Soviet satellite nation south of western Russia. (9/11)

Slingshot Aerospace Raises $30 Million (Source: Slingshot)
Trinity Capital announced the commitment of $30 million in growth capital to Slingshot Aerospace, a leader in AI-powered solutions for satellite tracking, space traffic coordination, and space modeling and simulation. Based in El Segundo, CA, Slingshot builds mission-critical solutions for training, planning, and operations by creating a common operating picture of the entire space domain. Slingshot’s platform provides a unified, holistic, and dynamic view of space for government and commercial space operators to enhance their space situational awareness, improve their operational efficiency, and reduce risk on orbit. (9/12)

SpaceX Launches First AST SpaceMobile Direct-to-Smartphone Satellites From Florida (Source: Space News)
SpaceX launched the first five production satellites for AST SpaceMobile’s direct-to-smartphone broadband constellation Sep. 11. A Falcon 9 carrying the Block 1 BlueBird spacecraft lifted off from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport and finished releasing all five satellites into low Earth orbit about 68 minutes later. AST SpaceMobile founder, chair and CEO Abel Avellan said the operator established full contact with all five spacecraft post-launch. (9/12)

Polaris Dawn Crew Performs First Commercial Spacewalk (Source: Space News)
The crew of the Polaris Dawn private astronaut mission successfully performed the first commercial spacewalk this morning. During the spacewalk,  commander Jared Isaacman and mission specialist Sarah Gillis individually exited the hatch of their Crew Dragon spacecraft, testing the mobility of their SpaceX-designed spacesuits. The overall spacewalk started at 6:12 a.m. Eastern when the four astronauts activated their spacesuits, ending just before 8 a.m. Eastern when the cabin was repressurized. The spacewalk, the first on a non-governmental mission, was the highlight of the five-day flight that launched early Tuesday. (9/12)

How SpaceX Built a New Spacesuit for Polaris Dawn's Private Spacewalk (Source: Space.com)
SpaceX has given us a detailed look at their stylish and innovative new extravehicular activity suit ahead of it being worn during the Polaris Dawn mission's first-ever private spacewalk. Two astronauts aboard the five-day SpaceX Polaris Dawn mission, which launched on Tuesday (Sept. 10), are due to perform the first commercial spacewalk on Mission Day 3, or Thursday (Sep. 12)

The SpaceX EVA suit, designed for extravehicular activities (EVAs, or spacewalks), is based on the familiar black-and-white intravehicular activity (IVA) spacesuit, but with enhancements and improvements in key areas to make it lightweight and unobtrusive, all while protecting astronauts in the unforgiving environment of outer space. "It's kind of like a suit of armor made of fabric," SpaceX principal spacesuit engineer Erik Kraus says

New features, including enhanced mobility through new joints, a helmet and visor with a display, and a fabric-based material for ease of manufacturing, are detailed in the video. While based on the IVA suit, the EVA suit's soft portions become rigid when pressurized, requiring flexure and rotational joints for ease of movement. It also has an added Faraday layer, or a conductive cage, around the suit that shields it from external electric fields. (9/11)

Meet the NASA Science Flying on SpaceX's Polaris Dawn Mission (Source: Space.com)
Polaris Dawn is also a science mission: It's carrying 36 different experiments from 31 institutions — including a number that will gather data for NASA's Human Research Program. (The agency partners with SpaceX on cargo and crew missions to the International Space Station, but Polaris Dawn is not one of these flights; it's funded and commanded by billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, and it's flying solo around Earth, not meeting up with the ISS.)

The NASA-affiliated experiments are designed to help agency scientists better understand spaceflight's impacts on the human body — information that should aid further crewed exploration efforts down the road. For example, the Polaris Dawn crew "will test-drive a commercial device that can collect and integrate measurements of health, including blood pressure, heart rate, respiration rate and temperature," according to a NASA statement. (9/11)

Space Force Leaders Say More Funding Needed (Source: Space News)
U.S. Space Force leaders warn there is a widening gap between the service's budget and its expanding mission requirements. Brig. Gen. Brian Denaro, military assistant to the secretary of the Air Force who oversees the Space Force budget, said that current funding falls short of what is needed to meet military forces' needs for satellite service while modernizing its space architecture to counter threats from China and Russia. His comments echoed sentiments from Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall, who recently suggested that the Space Force's nearly $30 billion budget should be two to three times larger in order to address emerging needs. (9/12)

Industry Leaders Navigate Gap Between R&D and Scaled-Up Production for DoD Support (Source: Space News)
Industry officials are also looking for more funding to provide commercial capabilities for the Defense Department. Executives of venture-backed companies said that while the DoD offers support for early-stage companies to develop capabilities, there is not a clear pathway for them to move beyond R&D and secure funding to scale up production and become key suppliers in national defense. They noted commercial space services do not receive the steady, predictable funding that traditional military programs enjoy, despite the government's stated intent to leverage private-sector innovation. (9/12)

Astroscale and Clearspace Win UK Funding for Satellite Deorbiting (Source: Space News)
Astroscale and ClearSpace have won new rounds of funding from the U.K. government to develop satellite deorbiting systems. The British subsidiaries of Japan-based Astroscale and Switzerland's ClearSpace announced Wednesday they had each received about $3 million to continue de-risking their robotic arm capture system and debris de-tumbling capabilities. The grants enable the companies to continue working on their technologies until March, when the U.K. Space Agency is expected to decide which will conduct a demonstration mission n 2026 to remove two satellites from low Earth orbit. (9/12)

FAA Defends Launch Licensing Delays (Source: Space News)
The FAA defended its launch licensing process amid criticism about delays with Starship. SpaceX said Tuesday that it was informed that the FAA delayed its schedule for an updated Starship launch license for its next mission by more than two months, to late November. An FAA official said schedules for launch licenses can be affected by several factors, including changes companies make to license applications and the completeness of the information they provide. The FAA separately said that SpaceX provided just last month updated information about the environmental effects of the next Starship launch that requires consultation with other agencies. (9/12)

Amazon Kuiper Development Costs Grow Substantially (Source: Geekwire)
Amazon's costs to develop its Project Kuiper broadband constellation could be as much as double earlier estimates. A study by Quilty Space found that the cost of deploying the 3,200-satellite constellation will be between $16.5 billion and $20 billion, with launch costs alone potentially exceeding $10 billion. Amazon previously stated it expected to spend $10 billion on Project Kuiper. However, the report also found that the system could be very lucrative for Amazon. (9/12)

NASA Juno Probe Finds New Volcano on Jupiter (Source: Space.com)
A NASA spacecraft has observed a new volcano on a moon of Jupiter. Scientists using images from the JunoCam instrument on the Juno spacecraft say they found a volcano on the surface of Io, the innermost of Jupiter's four largest moons, that was not present in Galileo images of the same part of the moon taken in 1997. The finding, researchers state, illustrate how active Io is, with more volcanic activity there than any other world in the solar system. (9/12)

The Colossus of Memphis: Musk's AI Supercomputer Could Support Space Applications (Source: Space News)
Elon Musk’s Colossus supercomputer—a powerhouse featuring 100,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs—is now up and running. The supercomputer is housed in an Electrolux appliance factory in southwestern Memphis that closed amid the pandemic. Musk plans to double Colossus's capacity in the coming months with an additional 100,000 GPUs, half of which will be the more advanced Nvidia H200 GPUs.

Colossus draws 150 megawatts of power—enough for 100,000 homes—and uses 1 million gallons of water daily to stay cool. To keep it running while Tennessee's power grid catches up, xAI has reportedly installed 18 portable methane-fueled generators on-site without the necessary air permits. LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman downplayed Colossus as “table stakes” in Musk’s bid to catch up with AI leaders like Meta, which aims to have 600,000 GPUs in service by the end of 2024.

Beyond its immediate role in helping Musk and other Grok users put the AI in Agitprop, Colossus could indirectly benefit SpaceX and other Musk ventures. The advanced AI models it helps train could eventually improve spacecraft autonomy, satellite constellation management, and mission planning for future space missions. (9/12)