A sampling of links to recent space policy, politics, and government (US and international) related space news and resource items that I found of interest:
** The Emerging Space Environment, Hearing of the Senate Subcommittee on Aviation and Space, May 14, 2019
** Amending the Budget to Support Humans on the Moon in 2024 – This Week @NASA – May 17, 2019
** Will $1.6 billion Let NASA’s New Artemis Program Become Reality? – Scott Manley
** Sun, 05/19/2019 – Emily Carney talked about Space Hipsters, which she co-founded, “and lots more regarding space programs, education, outreach, policy, and getting young women interested in space”.
1. Monday, May 20, 2019; 2-3:30 pm PDT (4-5:30 pm CDT, 5-6:30 pm EDT): No show for today. Monday is for special and timely programs only.
2. Tuesday, May 21, 2019; 7-8:30 pm PDT (9-10:30 pm CDT, 10-11:30 pm EDT): We welcome back Dr. Philip Metzger on a variety of exciting space topics. Metzger is a planetary scientist at the University of Central Florida. When he was at NASA he co-founded the KSC Swamp Works laboratory that develops technologies to use resources found in space.
3. Wednesday, May 22 2019: Hotel Mars. See Upcoming Show Menu and the website newsletter for details. Hotel Mars is pre-recorded by John Batchelor. It is archived on The Space Show site after John posts it on his website.
5. Sunday, May 26, 2019; 12-1:30 pm PDT (3-4:30 pm EDT, 2-3:30 pm CDT): No show today due to the Memorial Day Holiday Weekend.
Some recent shows:
** Sun, 05/19/2019 – Emily Carney talked about Space Hipsters, which she co-founded, “and lots more regarding space programs, education, outreach, policy, and getting young women interested in space”.
** Fri, 05/17/2019 – Dr. Linda Spilker spoke about the latest findings from the Cassini Mission data, “new information on Saturn’s ring system, Titan, Enceladus, liquid methane oceans, life, NASA missions and more”.
** Mon, 05/13/2019 – John Jossy, Kim Holder, and Rick Kwan reported on the innovative and cutting edge NewSpace technologies presented and discussed at Space Access 2019. This includes the exciting innovation going on in the commercial space entrepreneurial community.
Schematic of the HyTI nanosatellite. Credit: HyTI, UH Mānoa.
A satellite designed and developed by researchers and engineers at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa is among 16 small research satellites from 10 states that NASA has selected to fly as auxiliary payloads aboard space missions planned to launch in the next three years.
Currently, 12 UH Mānoa team members, nine of whom received degrees at UH Mānoa, are working to ready the HyTI for launch. Once in orbit, the satellite will scan Earth with specialized cameras and detectors that collect information about how much thermal radiation Earth’s surface and atmosphere emits at a variety of wavelengths. From this data, researchers will map irrigated and rain-fed cropland, and measure volcanic gases from space.
Mat Kaplan visits Cal Poly San Luis Obispo for a last, clean room visit with LightSail 2, the Planetary Society’s solar sailing cubesat. While there, Mat also talked to attendees at the Cubesat Developers Workshop, including the creator of the tiny “Pocket Rocket” engine for small spacecraft. LightSail2 is now at the Air Force Research Lab for launch preparation, as we hear from Bruce Betts in this week’s What’s Up.
The Kyrgyz Space Programme was started in March 2018 and has around ten full-time members who meet several times a week to study programming and physics, contact space experts and launch providers and practice soldering. Their aim is to construct and launch a small CubeSat satellite into space by 2021.
The Kyrgyz Space Programme’s members are aged between 17 to 25 and training is led by 19-year-old Alina Anisimova, who started teaching herself engineering skills by dismantling computers at the age of six and following online tutorials. “You can teach yourself anything you want, and you can be whoever you want,” says Anisimova, who started teaching herself English online three months ago.
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Currently the Kyrgyz Space Programme is financed through a crowdfunding page aiming to raise around $150,000. Its goal is to build a CubeSat that can send and receive messages, include a camera and monitor the earth’s environment. They would like to launch their satellite from the ISS, as part of the payload of a rocket, and at this stage are still in talks with launch providers.
“The first satellite will be simple but in the future we hope to build more complex satellites and empower civil society and journalists with whatever satellites can offer them,” Iskender says. “As a long term expectation, we hope that our space programme will actually turn into something serious.”
Here is this week’s episode of NASA’s Space to Ground report on activities related to the International Space Station:
** NASA Rocket Ranch podcast discusses the proposed Gateway lunar orbit habitat:
** Expedition 59 Education Event with Mobius Science Center – May 15, 2019
Aboard the International Space Station, Expedition 59 Flight Engineer Anne McClain of NASA, a native of Spokane, Washington, discussed life and research on the complex with students gathered at the Mobius Science Center in Spokane. McClain, who arrived at the orbital laboratory in December, is the fifth month of a planned six-and-a-half- month mission on the orbiting laboratory.
** The Big Bang Juxtaposition: A Live Q&A with JPL and Caltech Scientists and Engineers
Bazinga! Watch this panel featuring real life scientists and engineers from JPL and Caltech the same night as The Big Bang Theory series finale, live from Pasadena, California. Featuring:
• Moderator: Bobak Ferdowsi, JPL systems engineer
• Varoujan Gorjian, JPL scientist and Caltech alum
• Jessie Christiansen, Caltech/IPAC staff scientist
• Vandana Desai, Caltech/IPAC astronomer
A sampling of links to recent space policy, politics, and government (US and international) related space news and resource items that I found of interest:
In Via Satellite’s debut episode of “On Orbit,” host Jeffrey Hill sits down with Geeks Without Frontiers CEO David Hartshorn to decipher Digital Divide statistics and discuss the role that hybrid networks, satellites, and specifically the new LEO/MEO constellation satellites will play in providing connectivity to the world’s 4 billion people without access to broadband. We also talk about the importance of electric power as a resource, and how private industry firms are investing in developing economies through connectivity.
A sampling of recent articles, videos, and images related to human settlements in the solar system:
** Jeff Bezos plans to develop technologies that will enable the building of enormous in-space habitats according to his statements in last week’s presentation, which included the unveiling of the Blue Moon lunar lander. The habitats would rotate to provide spin gravity and would ultimately be large enough for cities, rivers, and forests.
An imaginative rendering of a future in-space rotating habitat. Credits: Blue Origin
This club is a way to connect young people who love our home planet, who believe in the power of human ingenuity and the abundance of space, and who are unshakably optimistic about the future. We welcome students, educators, and fans of the future to join a worldwide community of dreamers sponsored by Blue Origin, builders of reusable rockets and roads to space.
O’Neill promoted large in-space habitats as alternatives to settlements on the surface of planets and moons. In 1974, SSI initiated a series of conferences that examined the methods and technologies needed to make such enormous structures a reality. Here is the latest information on registration, speakers, and agenda for the next SSI conference: SSI 50 Conference Update –
SSI 50 marks the kickoff for a new SSI project, the Space Settlement Enterprise. This multi-year project will reexamine the original High Frontier vision created by Professor Gerard O’Neill, bringing his ideas up to date with new technology, new discoveries, and new space ventures. This year’s conference will lay the groundwork that project, helping to determine the questions that need to be addressed. Our panel format is designed to allow for plenty of Q&A and audience interaction. There will be no passive lectures. We need your ideas.
** A recent update on SSI’s proposed G-Lab rotating space station and other Institute projects:
Enabling Permanent Human Settlement On The High Frontier. February 27th 2017 Space Studies Institute President Gary C Hudson spoke at the Silicon Valley Space Center/AIAA Tech Talk meeting in Santa Clara, California about two important SSI programs: G-Lab, the free flying reduced gravity spinner co-orbited with ISS and EPI, supporting fundamental R&D for true “Space Drives.”
We present a number of preliminary policy options and research directions intended to enable construction of the first space settlement starting in two or three decades. Most of the necessary technology development can be driven by either Earthbound applications or the construction and operation of a series of ever more capable space hotels as space hotel requirements are very similar to those of space settlements.
This paper examines policy options for the necessary development that will not be catalyzed by terrestrial needs or space hotels. The options include making space settlement an official goal for the relevant agencies, developing launchers a factor of 20 or more less expensive than today, and debris cleanup.We will also describe an applied research program to better understand the Equatorial Low Earth Orbit (ELEO) radiation environment, space farms, psycho social issues, and unique settlement construction and operation issues.
Globus, an engineer at NASA Ames, has written extensively about starting space settlement with modest-sized rotating habitats in equatorial earth orbit where radiation levels are quite low. See Free Space Settlement for links to several papers on the concept.
In addition, check out The High Frontier: An Easier Way by Globus and Tom Marotta. The book describes the ELEO rotating habitat concept for a general audience.
“So every plan for having a habitat on the moon involves making a trench, creating a structure and covering it with some sort of regolith, which is the soil on the moon.
“Our idea is to actually start underground, using a mechanism we already use on the earth, a tunnel boring machine, to make a continuous opening to create habitats or connect the colonies together,” he added.
Analysis of images of the lunar surface show lava tubes capable of housing large cities underground, said Rostami, director of the Earth Mechanics Institute at the US Colorado School of Mines.
** The Inflatable Lunar/Mars Analog Habitat project at the University of North Dakota recently carried out the seventh simulated space mission. The ILMAH Mission VII began on April 25th and lasted till May 7th with a three-member crew consisting of Space Studies grad students Jared Peick and Peter Henson (Mission Specialists), and Stefan Tomovic (Mission Commander). Reports on the mission can be found at
The three-member Mission-VII crew completed their first Extra Vehicular Activity (EVA-1) on Friday (04/26/19). Saturday (04/27/19) was a science-packed day for the crew members. The team conducted research with an electroencephalogram (EEG) study, practiced emergency responses with simulation software and took care of the plants in the habitat’s Plant Production Module (PPM). The habitat residents conducted EVA1 with Commander Stefan Tomović and Mission Specialist Peter Henson going out on EVA, and Mission Specialist Jared Peick serving as CAPCOM for EVA1. EVA1 lasted an hour and ten minutes with the objectives of inspecting the habitat, collecting water from a resupply drop, and gathering geological samples…
** Space base simulations are also underway in China:
The Resilient ExtraTerrestrial Habitats Institute is working to ensure that the first long-term settlement on other planetary bodies are safe from hazards such as a meteoroid colliding with the moon or violent sandstorms on Mars.
Shirley Dyke, head of Purdue University’s RETH Institute, said she noticed that the habitats on other planets portrayed on TV don’t look realistic. In order to keep occupants alive, a habitat system on another planet would have to be much more sophisticated, even smart.
… SpaceFund Reality (SFR) rating, focused on space habitats. With this rating we begin to move into areas that are more obviously related to the SpaceFund mission of supporting “frontier enabling” technologies. While the launch database showed a field that is over crowded, many other critical sectors of the space economy are not, and some are frankly, wide open.
Our research has showed that this sector, space habitats, is still underdeveloped and represents a potential opportunity for investors and entrepreneurs. If one is to believe what Musk, Bezos and governments such as the US and UAE are saying about their plans to both dramatically lower the cost of space access and enable a permanent human presence in space, within a few years we may see a ‘housing shortage’ on the frontier.
** Japan’s iSpace is building rovers to explore the Moon and has over $90M and engineers like Akane Imamura to do the job: Meet The Engineer Dreaming of a Lunar City
After a decades-long lull, interest in the moon is back — this time led by startups, including Tokyo-based ispace Inc., which is hoping to land two of its miniature rovers on the lunar surface in 2021. Akane Imamura is part of ispace’s team racing to make that deadline, and their ultimate goal is nothing short of making the moon not only habitable, but home to an ecosystem of thriving businesses. Bloomberg Technology’s Aki Ito joins Imamura’s team as they test their most recent prototypes at a lunar simulation facility run by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.
The Lunar Polar Gas-Dynamic Mining Outpost (LGMO) (see quad chart graphic [below]) is a breakthrough mission architecture that promises to greatly reduce the cost of human exploration and industrialization of the Moon. LGMO is based on two new innovations that together solve the problem of affordable lunar polar ice mining for propellant production.
The first innovation is based on a new insight into lunar topography: our analysis suggests that there are large (hundreds of meters) landing areas in small (0.5-1.5 km) nearpolar craters on which the surface is permafrost in perpetual darkness but with perpetual sunlight available at altitudes of only 10s to 100s of meters. In these prospective landing sites, deployable solar arrays held vertically on masts 100 m or so in length (lightweight and feasible in lunar gravity) can provide nearly continuous power. This means that a large lander, such as the Blue Moon vehicle proposed by Blue Origin, a BFR; or a modestly sized lunar ice mining outpost could sit on mineable permafrost with solar arrays in perpetual sunlight on masts providing affordable electric power without the need to separate power supply from the load.
Lunar Polar Gas-Dynamic Mining Outpost
The second enabling innovation for LGMO is Radiant Gas Dynamic (RGD) mining. RGD mining is a new Patent Pending technology invented by TransAstra to solve the problem of economically and reliably prospecting and extracting large quantities (1,000s of tons per year) of volatile materials from lunar regolith using landed packages of just a few tons each. To obviate the problems of mechanical digging and excavation, RGD mining uses a combination of radio frequency, microwave, and infrared radiation to heat permafrost and other types of ice deposits with a depth-controlled heating profile….
Recently, innovators like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos have taken extraordinary steps toward getting humans to other worlds cheaply and safely. But the challenge remains: How will we sustain ourselves when we get there? Just as important, what are the planetary technologies we need today to ensure our home planet remains healthy long enough for future generations to fully realize our dream of space exploration?
BetaSpace aims to build a tech industry to solve this challenge. It will bring together companies in earth-based industries to explore how to accelerate the technologies and products to sustain human life here and off-planet. Just as SynBioBeta has done for the synthetic biology industry, BetaSpace will be the innovation ecosystem for building a better, sustainable world wherever humans may live.
One hundred miles to the southeast, masses of festival heads were gathering in the desert for Coachella’s first April weekend. But this small crew of space scientists, synthetic biologists, investors, entrepreneurs and one partygoer with flamethrower had higher ambitions.
By jet, bus and more than a few Teslas, they came to this desolate valley for Betaspace: a one-night, invite-only confab for the not-quite-yet-burgeoning space settlement industry.
Through sheer force of festive networking, its organizers hoped to spawn the companies and concepts that could allow humanity to establish bases on Mars (or maybe the moon), or “terraform,” as they say, our nearest neighbors into habitable worlds and spin off technologies for us earthbound humans in the process.
To the brains behind the operation, this was also the first step on a new path for the L.A. tech scene. Once a dominant player, back when tech and aerospace were synonymous, the Southland fell from prominence as silicon, software and start-ups concentrated in the Bay Area. Should space colonization actually become a thing, however, Southern California could capitalize thanks to its long history in rocketry and its lively biotech sector.
** Living above the arctic circle has some similarities to the first space settlements. Here is a story of one man’s pursuit of self-sustaining agriculture in the arctic circle village of Longyearbyen, Norway: Trying to grow food in the Arctic – BBC News
BTW: I would certainly feel safer living in a lunar or Martian colony with today’s technology than in the first arctic settlements with the technology of many centuries ago.
A sampling of recent articles, videos, and images dealing with space transport:
** Virgin Galactic begins moving operations to the New Mexico spaceport as the final test missions in Mojave lead the way to the first commercial space tourism flights as early as the end of this year:
A pair of private American companies brought a key material sample for an upcoming space station from simple concept to testing in space in only six months, in a sign of the burgeoning commercial space industry’s responsiveness and agility.
Axiom Space and Alpha Space Test & Research Alliance (Alpha Space), both based in Houston, released photos on Wednesday of a specially formulated acrylic sample belonging to Axiom flying on the exterior of the International Space Station (ISS) in Alpha Space’s MISSE Flight Facility. It was one of more than 400 samples contained in seven MISSE carriers launched Nov. 17 on the Northrop Grumman NG-10 ISS resupply mission.
The Axiom acrylic being tested will form the large windows of its forthcoming room-sized earth observatory in space.
The Axiom Earth Observatory (AxEO) will accommodate up to eight astronauts and provide unprecedented, 360-degree views of the planet from the earth-facing side of Axiom Station.
** Boeing highlights CST-100 Starliner parachute tests soon after news of SpaceX’s problems with a parachute test for the Crew Dragon became public. Reportedly the Starliner had parachute issues of its own last year.
A flight demonstration of an inflatable heat shield that could be used to retrieve reusable engines from United Launch Alliance’s next-generation Vulcan rocket, and for the delivery of heavier cargo to the surface of Mars, is planned for launch in late 2021 or early 2022 as a piggyback payload on an Atlas 5 rocket with a NOAA weather satellite.
The inflatable re-entry decelerator will launch as a joint project between NASA and ULA, which foresee different uses for the technology.
The Planetary Society’s LightSail 2 spacecraft is ready to embark on a challenging mission to demonstrate the power of sunlight for propulsion.
Weighing just 5 kilograms, the loaf-of-bread-sized spacecraft, known as a CubeSat, is scheduled to lift off on 22 June 2019 aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Kennedy Space Center, Florida. Once in space, LightSail 2 will deploy a boxing ring-sized solar sail and attempt to raise its orbit using the gentle push from solar photons.
It’s the culmination of a 10-year project with an origin story linked to the 3 scientist-engineers who founded The Planetary Society in 1980.
Rocket upper stages are commonly made of aluminium but switching to carbon composites lowers cost and could yield two metric tonnes spare payload capacity.
MT Aerospace and ArianeGroup signed contracts with ESA today to develop “Phoebus”, a Prototype of a Highly OptimisEd Black Upper Stage.
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This project builds on legacy upper stage technologies and emerging composite cryogenic capabilities.
This low-cost lightweight Phoebus demonstrator introduces carbon composite materials, in particular for the metallic tanks containing the cryogenic propellants such as liquid hydrogen and oxygen, and for other primary and secondary structures.
Rocket Lab, the global leader in dedicated small satellite launch, announced today that its next flight will launch multiple spacecraft on a mission procured by satellite rideshare and mission management provider, Spaceflight. The launch window will open in June, with launch taking place from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 on New Zealand’s Māhia Peninsula.
The mission is Rocket Lab’s seventh Electron launch overall and the company’s third for 2019, continuing Rocket Lab’s average monthly launch cadence. The flight follows dedicated missions launched for DARPA and the U.S. Air Force’s Space Test Program in the first months of 2019.
The mission is named ‘Make it Rain’ in a nod to the high volume of rainfall in Seattle, where Spaceflight is headquartered, as well in New Zealand where Launch Complex 1 is located. Among the satellites on the mission for Spaceflight are BlackSky’s Global-4, two U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) Prometheus and Melbourne Space Program’s ACRUX-1.
The Vector-R 1001 vehicle with a full load of liquid oxygen and partial load of cryogenic propylene. Filled in less than an hour and de-tanked in about 90 minutes. Flare stack is part of how we create cryogenic propylene and keep it chilled @vectorspacesyspic.twitter.com/XI68io5CfI
*** A Falcon 9 with 60 SpaceX Starlink satellites is set to launch on Wednesday May 15th from Cape Canaveral. The 90 minute launch window opens at 010:30 pm EDT (0230 GMT on 16th).
A static test firing of the rocket took place on Monday evening. The test occurred with the satellites on top of the rocket, which differs from the approach taken since Sept. 1, 2016 when the Amos-6 satellite was destroyed while on a Falcon 9 that exploded shortly before a static firing test. Since then most all of the static fires have been done without the payload on the rocket. However, since SpaceX owns the payload this time, they were willing to take the chance and gain a day or so in time between the firing and the liftoff.
Here is a video (via www.USLaunchReport.com) from off site of the static test firing of the rocket (the firing starts at around 5:25):
** Falcon 9 booster from the CRS-17 mission leaves Port Canaveral with its legs folded back rather than removed. As mentioned in the previous Round-up, it has taken SpaceX about a year to get to this point:
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says he will provide a public update on the development status of Starship and Super Heavy in an official presentation later this summer, possibly as soon as June 20th.
Meanwhile, SpaceX’s South Texas team have been busy at work on both Starhopper and a newer Starship, said by Musk to be the first orbit-capable prototype. In the last week, technicians have begun stacking several sections of the vehicle’s stainless steel hull, all fabricated and welded together side-by-side. On Thursday, May 9th, this progressed to the installation of the Starship’s first gently tapered nose section atop its cylindrical tank section. Likely the second- or third-to-last major stack before its aeroshell is assembled into one piece, the orbital prototype is starting to truly resemble a real Starship.
According to SpaceX COO/President Gwynne Shotwell and a Turkish satellite industry official, Starship and Super Heavy may have a role to play in the launch of Turksat’s first domestically-procured communications satellite.
Per Shotwell’s specific phrasing, this comes as a bit of a surprise. Built by Airbus Defense and Space, SpaceX is already on contract to launch Turksat’s 5A and 5B communications satellites as early as Q2 2020 and Q1 2021, respectively. The spacecraft referred to in the context of Starship is the generation meant to follow 5A/5B: Turksat 6A and any follow-on variants. Turksat’s 6-series satellites will be designed and manufactured domestically rather than procured from non-Turkish heavyweights like Airbus or SSL. However, the Turksat 6A satellite’s current baseline specifications would make it an extremely odd fit for a launch vehicle as large as Starship/Super Heavy.
*** Scott Manley’s latest update focuses mostly on SpaceX activities:
In late 2017 Chylinski gave in to his obsession. He sold his belongings, left his job, and hit the road in a Capri truck camper with his dog, Tuck, to photograph rockets full-time. Most people in their mid-thirties would balk at that kind of career move, and Chylinski, now 35, admits he had reservations too. But he told himself it would just be for six months. If it didn’t work out, he’d return to corporate IT.
He’s been on the road chasing rockets ever since.
Chylinski is part of a small group of (semi-)professional rocket chasers who are obsessively documenting the new space race and paying particular attention to the happenings at SpaceX. They’ll camp out for days in a remote part of Texas just to get a glimpse of the company’s experimental rocket engine. They lurk in Florida harbors as drone ship paparazzi. They attend every single launch, no matter how unglamorous the payload or inhospitable the hour. By showing up, these rocket chasers are uncovering news about the secretive happenings at SpaceX.
1. Monday, May 13, 2019; 7 pm PDT (9 pm CDT, 10 pm EDT): This is a special program welcoming John Jossy, Kim Holder, and Rick Kwan who will talk about the innovate and cutting edge NewSpace technologies presented and discussed at Space Access 2019. This includes the exciting innovation going on in the commercial space entrepreneurial community.
3. Wednesday, May 15, 2019; Hotel Mars. See Upcoming Show Menu and the website newsletter for details. Hotel Mars is pre-recorded by John Batchelor. It is archived on The Space Show site after John posts it on his website.
4. Friday, May 17, 2019; 9:30-11 am PDT (11:30 am -1 pm CDT; 12:30-2 pm EDT): We welcome back Dr. Linda Spilker of JPL to wrap up Cassini and more.
5. Sunday, May 19 2019; 12-1:30 pm PDT (3-4:30 pm EDT, 2-3:30 pm CDT): We welcome Emily Carney to the show regarding Space Hipsters, which she co-founded.
Recent shows:
** Fri, 05/10/2019 – Professor Madhu Thangavelu of USC spoke about “lunar return policy & mission needs/planning, ISDC Moon Track, using space for better living on Earth and much more”.
** Tue, 05/07/2019 – Robert Zimmerman discussed “a variety of topics starting with the smallsat industry with launchers and ending with comments about the Boeing 737 Max and possible Boeing space impact”.
** Mon, 05/06/2019 – Dr. Greg Autry talked about “the upcoming ISDC Conference, space budgets, spending and the US national debt, and the Chinese space and lunar policy plus US concerns about China and space and the Mon”.
** Sun, 05/05/2019 – Talked with Leonard David and then followed with an open lines discussion with listeners. Topics covered included “Leonard’s new book “Moon Rush: The New Space Race, policy and budget challenges for returning to the Moon, presidential candidates and space policy, Navy-Air Force UFO policy reporting changes and more”.
A sampling of links to recent space policy, politics, and government (US and international) related space news and resource items that I found of interest:
The CubeSat was deployed on January 31, 2019 and has been sending back data since its departure.
According to a recent study, only 45% of CubeSat units last longer than 60 days in service.
The Undergraduate Nano Ionospheric Temperature Explorer CubeSat, or UNITE CubeSat, was funded by a NASA Undergraduate Student Instruments Project (USIP) grant.
This interesting spacecraft will be dubbed OSCaR and it’s intended to collect space debris, or space junk.
Standing for “Obsolete Spacecraft Capture and Removal”, it’s a three-unit CubeSat being created by a team of researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, the USA’s oldest technological research university.
Some are the size of a toaster. Others a suitcase. They can ride into space as secondary payloads in a rocket’s “trunk,” or even be tossed out of an airlock, to start their missions. Small satellites, often collectively called “cubesats,” are changing the way we explore space and monitor our home planet.
Host: Preston Dyches
Speaker: Anne Marinan (JPL) — Systems Engineer, Near Earth Asteroid Scout & Mars Cube One;
Team Xc Lead Engineer: Travis Imken (JPL) — Project Systems Engineer, RainCube
Here is the latest episode of NASA’s Space to Ground report on activities related to the International Space Station:
** NASA Johnson also posts the longer SpaceCast Weekly – May 10, 2019:
SpaceCast Weekly is a NASA Television broadcast from the Johnson Space Center in Houston featuring stories about NASA’s work in human spaceflight, including the International Space Station and its crews and scientific research activities, and the development of Orion and the Space Launch System, the next generation American spacecraft being built to take humans farther into space than they’ve ever gone before.
** Here is the latest episode of This Week @NASA reports on “Supplies, Research and Equipment Delivered to the Space Station”
For example, the UCLA team of 11 students designed and built an experimental magnetic pump named Blue Dawn that will work in zero-gravity:
“The goal was to see if we could design an efficient fluid pump without any moving parts to work in zero-gravity, which has never been done before,” said Alexander Gonzalez, fourth-year physics major and undergrad science lead on the project. Such a low-maintenance pump would be ideal for moving various liquids on the International Space Station, and could reduce the risk of motorized pump failures for rovers and even future bases on the moon or Mars.
** Living tissues embedded in 3D electronics chips were among the research projects on the recent SpaceX Dragon Cargo mission to the ISS. The company Emulate, Inc. sent “organs-on-chips” to the ISS to study the Effects of Microgravity on Human Physiology including
the effect of microgravity and other space-related stressors on the brain blood barrier. It uses fully automated tissue chip technology, a Brain-Chip, consisting of living neuronal and vascular endothelial cells in a micro-engineered environment. Results may provide insight into the relationship between inflammation and brain function and a better understanding of neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
As the Sun ramps down to minimum it will have months where there is no activity, as happened in February 2019, and months, such as in March and April, where more sunspots appear.
Eventually the quiet months will become dominate, and soon thereafter, when activity increases again (assuming it does), the solar science community will then announce the date of true minimum.
We are not there. Normally it can take a year or more for the Sun to settle down. If activity declines as indicated by the red curve, it could take as long four years, which would be a record-long minimum. The difference will tell us whether the eleven-year solar cycle is continuing, or the Sun is heading into a grand minimum, with no significant sunspots for decades.
** Measuring the magnetism of Mars and Jupiter were discussed on the recent TMRO.tv episode Orbit 12.15:
NASA’s MAVEN Magnetometer Instrument Lead Dr. Jared Espley joins us to talk about MAVEN, Juno and how we measure the magnetism of planets in our local system. More information on MAVEN can be found here: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/ma… And more information on Juno can be found here: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/ju…
Mars has been the most extensively studied planet in the Solar System, except of course Earth. For the last 25 years, these missions have focused on the search for life by “following the water.” Although we have acquired compelling evidence of flowing liquid water on early Mars, the fundamental question about how water could be stable under Martian atmospheric conditions remains unsolved. Everything we have learned about Mars points towards a freezing cold Martian climate that would be incapable of stabilizing liquid water throughout Mars’ history.
Grains of dust from the asteroid Itokawa actually contain a surprising amount of water, two cosmochemists from Arizona State University in Tempe report May 1 in Science Advances.
“We didn’t really expect water to be there in Itokawa at all,” says study coauthor Maitrayee Bose. But if similar asteroids have similar amounts of water, the space rocks could have been a major source of water for the early Earth.
The many pits surrounding Arsia Mons highlight a far greater mystery about Martian geology. Some geologists believe that the many meandering channels we see on Mars could have formed not from surface flow as generally assumed but by underground drainage that washed out voids below the ground which in turn caused the surface to subside, forming those meandering channels.
Yet, as far as I can tell, the only place where scientists have been able to identify a significant number of potential cave openings are on the volcanic slopes of Arisa Mons and its neighboring giant volcanos. There are exceptions, such as this spectacular pit at the head of a channel in the transition zone between the southern highlands and the northern lowlands, as well as two different pits, here and here, that are located in the lowlands in Utopia Basin. Overall however the bulk of pits imaged by MRO appear to be on the slopes of the giant volcanoes, with the majority so far found near Arsia Mons.
A camera on the spacecraft’s robotic arm snapped the photos on April 24 and 25, the 145th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. In local Mars time, the shots were taken starting around 5:30 a.m. and then again starting around 6:30 p.m. As a bonus, a camera under the lander’s deck also caught clouds drifting across the Martian sky at sunset.
“NASA’s InSight lander used the Instrument Deployment Camera (IDC) on the end of its robotic arm to image this sunset on Mars on April 25, 2019, the 145th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. This was taken around 6:30 p.m. Mars local time.” Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech. Full image and caption
For the first time, NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter has caught the Martian moon Phobos during a full moon phase. Each color in this new image represents a temperature range detected by Odyssey’s infrared camera, which has been studying the Martian moon since September of 2017. Looking like a rainbow-colored jawbreaker, these latest observations could help scientists understand what materials make up Phobos, the larger of Mars’ two moons.
Odyssey is NASA’s longest-lived Mars mission. Its heat-vision camera, the Thermal Emission Imaging System (THEMIS), can detect changes in surface temperature as Phobos circles Mars every seven hours. Different textures and minerals determine how much heat THEMIS detects.
Such measurements can help determine the composition of the moon, particularly the minerals and metals:
Iron and nickel are two such metals. Depending on how abundant the metals are, and how they’re mixed with other minerals, these data could help determine whether Phobos is a captured asteroid or a pile of Mars fragments, blasted into space by a giant impact long ago.
These recent observations won’t definitively explain Phobos’ origin, Bandfield added. But Odyssey is collecting vital data on a moon scientists still know little about – one that future missions might want to visit. Human exploration of Phobos has been discussed in the space community as a distant, future possibility, and a Japanese sample-return mission to the moon is scheduled for launch in the 2020s.
Astronomers developed a mosaic of the distant Universe that documents 16 years of observations from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. The image, called the Hubble Legacy Field, contains roughly 265,000 galaxies that stretch back to just 500 million years after the Big Bang.
The wavelength range of this image stretches from ultraviolet to near-infrared light, capturing all the features of galaxy assembly over time. The faintest and farthest galaxies in the image are just one ten-billionth the brightness of what the human eye can observe.
“Now that we have gone wider than in previous surveys, we are harvesting many more distant galaxies in the largest such dataset ever produced,” said Garth Illingworth of the University of California, Santa Cruz, leader of the team that assembled the image. “No image will surpass this one until future space telescopes like James Webb are launched.”
This video “takes the viewer on a journey into the Hubble Legacy Field”:
This image, a composite of several observations captured by ESO’s VLT Survey Telescope (VST), shows the ESA spacecraft Gaia as a faint trail of dots across the lower half of the star-filled field of view. These observations were taken as part of an ongoing collaborative effort to measure Gaia’s orbit and improve the accuracy of its unprecedented star map.
This image, a composite of several observations captured by ESO’s VLT Survey Telescope (VST), shows the space observatory Gaia as a faint trail of dots across the lower half of the star-filled field of view. These observations were taken as part of an ongoing collaborative effort to measure Gaia’s orbit and improve the accuracy of its unprecedented star map.
Gaia, operated by the European Space Agency (ESA), surveys the sky from orbit to create the largest, most precise, three-dimensional map of our Galaxy. One year ago, the Gaia mission produced its much-awaited second data release, which included high-precision measurements — positions, distance and proper motions — of more than one billion stars in our Milky Way galaxy. This catalogue has enabled transformational studies in many fields of astronomy, addressing the structure, origin and evolution the Milky Way and generating more than 1700 scientific publications since its launch in 2013.
In order to reach the accuracy necessary for Gaia’s sky maps, it is crucial to pinpoint the position of the spacecraft from Earth. Therefore, while Gaia scans the sky, gathering data for its stellar census, astronomers regularly monitor its position using a global network of optical telescopes, including the VST at ESO’s Paranal Observatory[1]. The VST is currently the largest survey telescope observing the sky in visible light, and records Gaia’s position in the sky every second night throughout the year.
** A Galaxy Grouping in 2D and 3D: Stephan’s Quintet;
In 1877, Edouard Stephan discovered a tight visual grouping of five galaxies located in the constellation Pegasus. The galaxies of Stephan’s Quintet are both overlapping and interacting, and have become the most famous among the compact groups of galaxies. Astronomers have long known that four of the galaxies (all of which are yellowish-white in this video) form a physical group in space, while the fifth (bluish) is a foreground galaxy. In addition, a sixth galaxy (yellowish-white and on the far left) is likely to be part of the physical grouping. Hence, this 2D quintet that is a 3D quartet may actually be a 2D sextet that is a 3D quintet.
This visualization makes apparent the spatial distribution of these galaxies. The video starts with a view that matches our 2D perspective. As the sequence travels in 3D, the foreground blue spiral, NGC 7320, quickly passes by the camera. The possible sixth galaxy member on the left, NGC 7320C, is seen at roughly the same distance as the remaining four galaxies. The camera turns to pass between two strongly interacting galaxies, NGC 7319 (left) and NGC 7318B (right), with each galaxy’s spiral structure distorted by the gravitational interaction. In contrast, NGC 7318B overlaps in 2D with the more distant elliptical NGC 7318A, but does not have a strong interaction. The other elliptical, NGC 7317, is also seen as more distant than the strongly interacting pair. In 3D, the four or five galaxies in this group are gathered together by their mutual gravity, and may collide and merge together in the future.
Credits: G. Bacon, J. DePasquale, F. Summers, Z. Levay (STScI)
A sampling of links to recent space policy, politics, and government (US and international) related space news and resource items that I found of interest:
** The Space Show – Tue, 05/07/2019 – Robert Zimmerman discussed “a variety of topics starting with the smallsat industry with launchers and ending with comments about the Boeing 737 Max and possible Boeing space impact”.
** The Space Show – Sun, 05/05/2019 – Talked with Leonard David and then followed with an open lines discussion with listeners. Topics covered included “Leonard’s new book “Moon Rush: The New Space Race, policy and budget challenges for returning to the Moon, presidential candidates and space policy, Navy-Air Force UFO policy reporting changes and more”.
A sampling of recent articles, videos, and images dealing with space transport:
[ Update: A message from Blue Origin today points to a video of the Blue Moon unveiling yesterday.
On May 9, 2019, our founder discussed his vision to go to space to benefit Earth.
Watch the full replay of this event …
In addition, he also announced the Blue Moon lunar lander, which is capable of taking people and payloads to the lunar surface. Below you’ll find more information about these announcements.
Blue Moon lunar lander: Blue Origin announced Blue Moon, its large lunar lander capable of delivering multiple metric tons of payload to the lunar surface based on configuration and mission. The cargo variant revealed today can carry 3.6 metric tons to the surface. We have also designed a variant of the lander that can stretch to be capable of carrying a 6.5-metric-ton, human-rated ascent stage. Blue also announced it can meet the current Administration’s goal of putting Americans on the Moon by 2024 with the Blue Moon lunar lander.
BE-7 engine: The Blue Moon lunar lander will be powered by the BE-7 engine, a new addition to Blue Origin’s family of engines. The BE-7’s 40 kN (10,000 lbf) thrust is designed for large lunar payload transport. The engine’s propellants are a highly-efficient combination of liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. The BE-7 will have its first hotfire this summer. The engine will be available for sale to other companies for use in in-space and lander applications.
Club For the Future: A non-profit founded by Blue Origin dedicated to inspiring and engaging the next generation of dreamers and space entrepreneurs as we journey to preserve Earth and unlock the potential of living and working in space. The Club will bring together K-12 students, educators and leaders for campaigns and initiatives utilizing Blue Origin’s unique access to space. The Club’s first activity will be to send a postcard to space and back on a future New Shepard mission—the first ever space mail. Learn more on the website (www.clubforfuture.org). Follow @ClubforFuture on Twitter and Instagram.
]
** Jeff Bezos unveiled Blue Origin‘s Blue Moon lunar lander design at an event today –
Blue Moon is a flexible lander delivering a wide variety of small, medium and large payloads to the lunar surface. Its capability to provide precise and soft landings will enable a sustained human presence on the Moon.
Initially for cargo and later for human transport:
The Blue Moon lander can deliver large infrastructure payloads with high accuracy to pre-position systems for future missions. The larger variant of Blue Moon has been designed to land an ascent vehicle that will allow us to return Americans to the Moon by 2024.
Blue Moon with ascent vehicle.
The lander is powered by the BE-7 Liquid Oxygen/Liquid Hydrogen engine, which will begin hot fire tests this summer.
… high specific impulse, deep throttling and restart capabilities of the BE-7 make the engine ideal for large lunar payload transport, while enabling Blue Moon’s oxygen/hydrogen fuel cell power system.
Blue Origin BE-7 Engine
** Highlights of engine development by PLD Space in Spain, which is developing suborbital and orbital rockets with reusable boosters:
This fact sheet lays out the envisioned launch cost and frequency, for instance, and states that SpinLaunch aims to loft its first payload by 2022. And we get the following description of the launch system:
“SpinLaunch utilizes existing technology and components from oil/gas/mining and wind turbine industries to construct an innovative mass-acceleration system, which achieves very high launch speeds without the need for enormous power generation or massive infrastructure. After ascending above the atmosphere, a relatively small, low-cost onboard rocket will be used to provide the final required velocity for orbital insertion. Because the majority of the energy required to reach orbit is sourced from ground-based electricity, as opposed to complex onboard rocket propulsion, total launch cost is reduced by an order of magnitude over existing launch systems.”
** Rocket Crafters partners with RUAG of Switzerland on development of rockets based on Rocket Crafters’s hybrid motor technology:
Rocket Crafters, a manufacturer of advanced rockets operating from the Florida Space Coast, and RUAG Space, a leading independent product supplier for spacecraft, electronics and launchers, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) at Satellite Conference 2019 in Washington D.C. – creating a new supplier agreement in the small launcher market.
Rocket Crafters will collaborate with RUAG on the design, development and procurement of a sounding rocket guidance and navigation system, nose cone and aeroshell in order to support an initial test flight, with the goal to achieve reliable, cost effective and fast time-to-market.
A Rocket Crafters suborbital rocket in flight.
** Leaders of launch services providers gave their views on the status of the industry this week during panels at the Satellite 2019 conference:
The test appears to have occurred last month at Delamar Dry Lake in Nevada, where SpaceX was conducting one of dozens of drop tests it intends to perform to demonstrate the safety of its Crew Dragon spacecraft. This was a “single-out” test in which one of Dragon’s four parachutes intentionally failed before the test. “The three remaining chutes did not operate properly,” [NASA’s chief of human spaceflight Bill Gerstenmaier] said.
A follow-up:
(Very) unofficially, a source says they may switch to a thicker parachute design to compensate for issues discovered in the test. Although not ideal, this is a fairly normal part of spacecraft development.
The Aerospace team in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is playing a major role in the flight, making sure all the satellites fit together aboard the world’s most powerful rocket. Aerospace engineers ensure the payloads don’t negatively affect each other in this complex arrangement by using a rideshare mission assurance protocol called “Do-No-Harm” (DNH). DNH is a process that focuses on ensuring no payload on a rideshare mission will negatively affect the on-orbit functionality of any other payload. The individual payloads on STP-2 are all responsible for their own mission success, but through the DNH process, Aerospace is ensuring that everyone inside the Falcon Heavy nose cone plays nice with each other.
Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s president and chief operating officer, said the launch will carry “dozens of satellites,” adding more prototypes to the two currently in low Earth orbit.
“This next batch of satellites will really be a demonstration set for us to see the deployment scheme and start putting our network together,” she said at the Satellite 2019 conference here. “We start launching satellites for actual service later this year.”
Shotwell said SpaceX anticipates launching two to six more times for its Starlink broadband constellation in addition to the May 15 launch. How many Starlink launches occur this year depend on the results of this first batch, she said.
*** Falcon 9 booster legs retracted rather than removed. SpaceX introduced the Block 5 Falcon first stage boosters in 2018, hailing the design as the culmination of many lessons learned from landing and reusing the earlier generation boosters. Blk 5 boosters should provide up to a dozen launches between overhauls and to re-fly as soon as 24 hours after a launch. This requires quick operations such as simply retracting the landing legs back into their launch positions. During the past year, though, observers at Port Canaveral saw workers removing the legs before recovered Blk 5 boosters were transported back to the hangars.
Still more video to come of Load and Transport. This is CRS-17, B1056 Booster. This video runs in real time{ No fast motion}. Takes place over three days. We know it’s long, we left out hours of footage.
SpaceX has completed the first landing leg retraction, crews locked it in place and removed the cable.
This is one of the upgraded features on Falcon 9 Block 5, for rapid reusability.
Amid a flurry of new construction at SpaceX’s Boca Chica facilities, technicians have begun to install thruster pods on Starhopper in anticipation of the prototype’s first untethered flights.
According to CEO Elon Musk, Starhopper’s “untethered hover tests” will begin with just one Raptor engine installed, potentially allowing hops to restart within the next few weeks. SpaceX is currently testing Raptor SN03 (and possibly SN02) a few hundred miles north in McGregor, Texas, just a few hours’ drive south once the engine is deemed flight-ready. Meanwhile, Starhopper itself needs a considerable amount of new hardware before it can begin Raptor-powered flight testing.
** Assembly of the demo orbital Starship prototype continues at Boca Chica as well:
SpaceX’s Starship Orbital Prototype being stacked at Boca Chica.
Exos Aerospace’s COO John Quinn joins us to talk how rapidly reusable rockets could send experiments to space and have them back in scientists hands in just hours – leading to big advancements in medicine and research. Find out more about Exos Aerospace at https://exosaero.com/ Subscribe to their Youtube channel so they can stream their next launch! https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh2d…
** The latest TMRO space news report:
In this weeks Space News from TMRO we start off with three launches: Blue Origin, SpaceX and Rocket Lab. Jared brings us an update on the SpaceX Starlink constellation and Jade talk about a very metallic universe! Our local sun has been very active this last week and Dr. Tamitha Skov bring us the latest space weather report.
In a cavernous arena outside of Peoria, Illinois, two industrial robots worked against the clock last weekend to finish their tasks. Each had been converted into a towering 3-D printer and programmed to build one-third-scale models of extraterrestrial habitats. For 30 hours over three days, generators chugged and hydraulics hissed as robotic arms moved in patterns, stacking long beads of thick “ink” into layers. Gradually, familiar forms began to emerge from the facility’s dirt floor: a gray, igloo-like dwelling and a tall, maroon egg.
Humanity’s future on Mars was taking shape.
AI SpaceFactory took first place and $500k while the Penn State team came in second and got $200k.
An overview of the contest from Caterpillar, one of the co-sponsors of the competition:
Here is a video from the AI SpaceFactory showing the construction and testing of their habitat structure:
After 30 hours of 3D printing over four days of head-to-head competition, NASA and partner Bradley University of Peoria, Illinois, have awarded $700,000 to two teams in the final round of the 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge. The top prize of $500,000 was awarded to New York based AI. SpaceFactory. Second-place and $200,000 was awarded to Pennsylvania State University of University Park.
The two teams faced off May 1-4 at Caterpillar’s Edwards Demonstration & Learning Center in Edwards, Illinois, creating subscale shelters out of recyclables and materials that could be found on deep-space destinations, like the Moon and Mars. The size of the structures had to be a one-third scale version of their architectural designs. Each team employed robotic construction techniques that allowed minimal human intervention. Such technologies will enable more sustainable and autonomous exploration missions.
“The final milestone of this competition is a culmination of extremely hard work by bright, inventive minds who are helping us advance the technologies we need for a sustainable human presence on the Moon, and then on Mars,” said Monsi Roman, program manager for NASA’s Centennial Challenges. “We celebrate their vision, dedication and innovation in developing concepts that will not only further NASA’s deep-space goals, but also provide viable housing solutions right here on Earth.”
The habitats were constructed in 10-hour increments in front of a panel of judges. Once printing was complete, the structures were subjected to several tests and evaluated for material mix, leakage, durability and strength.
Beginning in 2015, the multi-year, multi-phase competition challenged teams to demonstrate many different additive manufacturing technologies, from design to software modeling to physical construction. The unique challenge was competed in three phases: design, structural member and on-site habitat construction. The challenge structure allowed NASA to task the teams to address many facets of 3D construction, and to involve a broader range of teams with various expertise. Throughout the competition, more than 60 teams have participated, and NASA awarded over $2 million in prize money.
“It is an impressive achievement for these two teams to demonstrate this disruptive and terrific 3D-printing technology at such a large scale,” said Lex Akers, dean of Bradley’s Caterpillar College of Engineering and Technology. “By teaming up with NASA and Caterpillar, we are proud to bring these teams together in an environment where they can innovate, create and challenge our vision of what’s possible. Congratulations to both teams for their accomplishments.”
The 3D-Printed Habitat Challenge is managed through a partnership with NASA’s Centennial Challenges program and Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois. Bradley has partnered with sponsors Caterpillar, Bechtel, Brick & Mortar Ventures and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to administer the competition. NASA’s Centennial Challenges program is part of the agency’s Space Technology Mission Directorate, and is managed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
VIA SATELLITE: Do you believe the industry is entering a very uncertain period right now?
Shotwell: We believe the industry is entering an incredibly exciting period where competition is high, which is driving innovation. With innovation there’s always uncertainty, but also great opportunity. In just the last few years, Falcon 9 became the most frequently launched rocket worldwide and has taken over 50 percent of the commercial launch market. It’s exciting that the market has responded to our unique ability to provide reliable, affordable launch services.
We just launched our first commercial flight of Falcon Heavy, and last year we began testing and development for our Starship vehicle, which can carry payload greater than 100 mt. Our customers are taking advantage of these opportunities. Cost effective launches are allowing them to think about their businesses in different ways. While we may see a slowdown in the short term of traditional opportunities, as new technologies mature, new opportunities will take the place of the old.
NASA’s patience and openness to new ideas is all the more notable because while some improvements such as the Falcon 9’s lift capacity have benefitted the space agency, others such as rocket reusability haven’t provided an immediate benefit. “The agency is investing in keeping the United States on the leading edge of space travel, and that’s an important part of its founding mandate,” Autry said.
It’s safe to say the companies appreciate this approach. SpaceX founder Elon Musk recently acknowledged as much on Twitter, saying, “NASA support for reusability with high reliability, the critical breakthrough for orbital rockets, has made a big difference.”
*** CRS-17 Cargo Dragon vehicle reached the ISS on Monday morning:
SpaceX and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) have – at long last – officially announced a launch date for the Radarsat Constellation Mission (RCM), a ~$1B trio of Earth observation satellites.
Delayed from November, February, March, and May, RCM is now scheduled to launch on a flight-proven Falcon 9 booster from California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base (VAFB) no earlier than June 11th. The three flight-ready spacecraft were shipped from Canada in September 2018 and have now been awaiting launch in a Southern California storage facility for more than half a year. The blame for such an egregious delay can be largely placed on SpaceX, but CSA and launch customer Maxar Technologies are also partially responsible. On a lighter note, the location of RCM’s subsequent Falcon 9 landing might end up being decided by seal pupping – baby harbor seals, in other words.
“Chandra X-ray Close-up of the Core of M87, EHT Image of Black Hole. Credit, X-ray: NASA/CXC/Villanova University/J. Neilsen, Radio: Event Horizon Telescope Collaboration.” Via Carnival of Space #610
“The goals of the Amateur Radio station at the World Scout Jamboree are to introduce Amateur Radio to Scouts and Scout leaders through hands-on participation in two-way communication with other stations across the globe. This activity will also serve as the Amateur Radio voice of the Jamboree,” the World Scout Jamboree Amateur Radio Exhibit Operational Vision document states. Other facets of Amateur Radio at the Jamboree will include Amateur Radio direction finding (ARDF), Amateur Radio satellite contacts, and a scheduled Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact with an ISS crew member.
** Underground colonies on the Moon are the opposite approach to the ELEO habitats but might happen sooner: 
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