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 (find previous space policy roundups here):
** The Truth Behind ESA & SpaceX’s Close Encounter – Scott Manley analyzes the ESA-SpaceX orbital near miss:
The headlines spoke of ‘Rogue SpaceX Satellites’ and ‘Emergency Course Changes’ – but making avoidance maneuvers is a regular occurrence when operating lots of satellites. So what should we make of ESA’s twitter thread making a big deal about their decision to avoid a close encounter with Starlink 44?
A sampling of recent articles, videos, and images from space-related science news items (find previous roundups here):
[ Update 2: Unfortunately, contact with the Vikram lander was lost shortly before the landing:
Ground teams lost communication with India’s first lunar landing mission moments before its scheduled touchdown on the moon Friday, suggesting the robotic research craft may have crashed during final descent. FULL STORY: https://t.co/818lVLtShfpic.twitter.com/zoPr6f2DV7
Update: Below is the live feed from the Chandrayaan-2 control center. The landing is set for some time between 4:00 and 5:00 pm EDT. The webcast will start around 3:00 EDT.
]
** India’s Chandrayaan-2 mission set for landing on the Moon. The Vikram Lander separated from the orbiter spacecraft on Monday and will touch down on the surface on Friday sometime between 4:00-5:00 pm EDT.
The landing area is near the Moon’s south pole. From Space.com:
That spot is a highland that rises between two craters dubbed Manzinus C and Simpelius N. On a grid of the moon’s surface, it would fall at 70.9 degrees south latitude and 22.7 degrees east longitude. It’s about 375 miles (600 kilometers) from the south pole.
The Pragyan rover will be deployed from the lander not long after the landing. The polar regions have craters with permanently shadowed floors and orbital studies indicated they contain water ice. The extent of the exploration activities will be limited, however. The lander and rover will operate for just one lunar day, which spans 14 earth days. They are not expected to survive the extremely frigid 14 earth day long lunar night.
The Chang’e 4 lander/rover combo touched down on the far side of the Moon on Jan. 3, 2019 and 12 hours later the rover Yutu-2 was deployed. Since then, the rover has traveled few hundred meters. In late July, Chinese scientists examined images from the rover and noticed an “unusually colored, ‘gel-like’ substance”.
The mission’s rover, Yutu-2, stumbled on that surprise during lunar day 8. The discovery prompted scientists on the mission to postpone other driving plans for the rover, and instead focus its instruments on trying to figure out what the strange material is.
The rover was maneuvered back to the location where the images were taken and the mission team began studies of the material with the rover’s various cameras. So far they have not
… offered any indication as to the nature of the colored substance and have said only that it is “gel-like” and has an “unusual color.” One possible explanation, outside researchers suggested, is that the substance is melt glass created from meteorites striking the surface of the moon.
After months grappling with the rugged reality of asteroid Bennu’s surface, the team leading NASA’s first asteroid sample return mission has selected four potential sites for the Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft to “tag” its cosmic dance partner.
Since its arrival in December 2018, the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft has mapped the entire asteroid in order to identify the safest and most accessible spots for the spacecraft to collect a sample. These four sites now will be studied in further detail in order to select the final two sites – a primary and backup – in December.
The team originally had planned to choose the final two sites by this point in the mission. Initial analysis of Earth-based observations suggested the asteroid’s surface likely contains large “ponds” of fine-grain material. The spacecraft’s earliest images, however, revealed Bennu has an especially rocky terrain. Since then, the asteroid’s boulder-filled topography has created a challenge for the team to identify safe areas containing sampleable material, which must be fine enough – less than 1 inch (2.5 cm) diameter – for the spacecraft’s sampling mechanism to ingest it.
“Pictured are the four candidate sample collection sites on asteroid Bennu selected by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission. Site Nightingale (top left) is located in Bennu’s northern hemisphere. Sites Kingfisher (top right) and Osprey (bottom left) are located in Bennu’s equatorial region. Site Sandpiper (bottom right) is located in Bennu’s southern hemisphere. In December, one of these sites will be chosen for the mission’s touchdown event. Credits: NASA/University of Arizona”
** An overview of the missions – past, present, and future – to the small objects in our solar system: Asteroids, comets and moons – ESA
We have learned a lot from visiting the Moon, and even more from visiting other planets, but what about the thousands of other small objects that share our Solar System? Space agencies have sent several spacecraft to asteroids, comets, dwarf planets and small moons, and have ambitious plans to send more in the future.
Asteroids and comets are believed to be leftover debris from the formation of the Solar System, meaning they can help trace its history. What’s more, these objects may have played a vital role in the development of our planet and terrestrial life by colliding with Earth in catastrophic impact events, bringing life-sparking organic compounds. Such collisions were more common in the early Solar System, but small objects can still impact Earth, damaging life, nature and infrastructure.
Such objects may also have brought organic matter to other planets and moons, some of which – Jupiter’s moon Europa or Saturn’s moon Enceladus, for example – may possess the right conditions for hosting some form of life. For all these reasons, and many more, it is important to study these objects and find out more about them.
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals the intricate, detailed beauty of Jupiter’s clouds in this new image taken on 27 June 2019[1]. It features the planet’s trademark Great Red Spot and a more intense colour palette in the clouds swirling in the planet’s turbulent atmosphere than seen in previous years.
Among the most striking features in the image are the rich colours of the clouds moving toward the Great Red Spot. This huge anticyclonic storm is roughly the diameter of Earth and is rolling counterclockwise between two bands of clouds that are moving in opposite directions toward it.
As with previous images of Jupiter taken by Hubble, and other observations from telescopes on the ground, the new image confirms that the huge storm which has raged on Jupiter’s surface for at least 150 years continues to shrink. The reason for this is still unknown so Hubble will continue to observe Jupiter in the hope that scientists will be able to solve this stormy riddle. Much smaller storms appear on Jupiter as white or brown ovals that can last as little as a few hours or stretch on for centuries.
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope reveals the intricate, detailed beauty of Jupiter’s clouds in this new image taken on 27 June 2019 by Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3, when the planet was 644 million kilometres from Earth — its closest distance this year. The image features the planet’s trademark Great Red Spot and a more intense colour palette in the clouds swirling in the planet’s turbulent atmosphere than seen in previous years. The observations of Jupiter form part of the Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) programme.
Colourful and wispy Sharpless 2-296 forms the “wings” of an area of sky known as the Seagull Nebula — named for its resemblance to a gull in flight. This celestial bird contains a fascinating mix of intriguing astronomical objects. Glowing clouds weave amid dark dust lanes and bright stars. The Seagull Nebula — made up of dust, hydrogen, helium and traces of heavier elements — is the hot and energetic birthplace of new stars.
In the year since launch, Parker Solar Probe has collected a host of scientific data from two close passes by the Sun.
“We’re very happy,” said Nicky Fox, director of NASA’s Heliophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. “We’ve managed to bring down at least twice as much data as we originally suspected we’d get from those first two perihelion passes.”
The spacecraft carries four suites of scientific instruments to gather data on the particles, solar wind plasma, electric and magnetic fields, solar radio emission, and structures in the Sun’s hot outer atmosphere, the corona. This information will help scientists unravel the physics driving the extreme temperatures in the corona — which is counter intuitively hotter than the solar surface below — and the mechanisms that drive particles and plasma out into the solar system.
NASA’s Curiosity rover has come a long way since touching down on Mars seven years ago. It has traveled a total of 13 miles (21 kilometers) and ascended 1,207 feet (368 meters) to its current location. Along the way, Curiosity discovered Mars had the conditions to support microbial life in the ancient past, among other things.
And the rover is far from done, having just drilled its 22nd sample from the Martian surface. It has a few more years before its nuclear power system degrades enough to significantly limit operations. After that, careful budgeting of its power will allow the rover to keep studying the Red Planet.
Curiosity is now halfway through a region scientists call the “clay-bearing unit” on the side of Mount Sharp, inside of Gale Crater. Billions of years ago, there were streams and lakes within the crater. Water altered the sediment deposited within the lakes, leaving behind lots of clay minerals in the region. That clay signal was first detected from space by NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) a few years before Curiosity launched.
Check out this 360 degree view of Mars:
Curiosity captured this 360-degree panorama of a location on Mars called “Teal Ridge” on June 18, 2019. This location is part of a larger region the rover has been exploring called the “clay-bearing unit” on the side of Mount Sharp, which is inside Gale Crater. The scene is presented with a color adjustment that approximates white balancing to resemble how the rocks and sand would appear under daytime lighting conditions on Earth. Scientists are looking for signs that Mars could have supported microbial life billions of years ago, when rivers and lakes could be found in the crater.
This map shows the route driven by NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover, from the location where it landed in August 2012 to its location in August 2019, and its planned path to additional geological layers of lower “Mount Sharp.” The blue star near top center marks “Bradbury Landing,” the site where Curiosity arrived on Mars on Aug. 5, 2012, PDT (Aug. 6, EDT and Universal Time). Curiosity landed on Aeolis Palus, the plains surrounding Aeolis Mons (Mount Sharp) in Gale Crater.
Engineers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California have attached a flying helicopter drone to the belly of the Mars 2020 rover set for launch next July.
The solar-powered Mars Helicopter stands about 2.6 feet (80 centimeters) tall when fully deployed, and will become the first aircraft to fly on another planet. The robot drone will ride to the Red Planet with NASA’s Mars 2020 rover, which has been assembled at JPL to begin testing in the coming weeks.
The Mars 2020 mission is scheduled for launch from Cape Canaveral on July 17, 2020, the first day of a nearly three-week window for the rover to depart Earth and head for Mars. The rover will blast off atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket.
The rover will land at Jezero Crater on Feb. 18, 2021.
NASA’s Mars Helicopter, a small, autonomous rotorcraft, will travel with the agency’s Mars 2020 rover to demonstrate the viability and potential of heavier-than-air vehicles on the Red Planet. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech
… The Geo-IK-2 No.13L satellite lifted off from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome at 17:00:14 Moscow Time (14:00 UTC) Friday, separating from its carrier rocket less than two hours later.
Geodesy – the study of Earth’s shape and gravitational field – is one of many sciences that underpin humanity’s use of space for both peaceful and military purposes. Accurate models of the planet’s physical parameters and surrounding gravitational forces are vital to determining accurate positions on the surface and planning trajectories for orbital and suborbital spaceflight. For a nation’s military, such a model can serve a multitude of applications, including improved targeting of weapons and predicting the flight paths of missiles.
** A Chinese KX-1A rocket launches two technology test satellites into orbit:
The Kuaizhou-1A is a high reliability, high precision and low-cost solid launch vehicle developed by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASIC) and commercialized by the China Space Sanjiang Group Corporation (EXPACE).
Chinese commercial launcher developer and launch service provider LandSpace announced during the MAKS 2019 show, that the company is seeking and accepting payloads from around the world for the maiden launch of its proprietary ZhuQue-2 (ZQ-2) launcher powered by a LOX/LCH4 liquid-propellant rocket engine (LRE).
LandSpace President Zhang Long stated, “As China’s first medium-scale launcher with LOX/LCH4 propellants, ZQ-2 is widely recognized as a reusable eco-friendly and affordable solution designed for providing launch and orbital deployment services for small and medium satellites.” LCH4 helps improve the reusability of the engine as it is widely available and low-cost and helps prevent carbon deposits when the fuel is burning in the engine.
… LandSpace has created many “firsts” in China: the first private company to develop space launchers, the first privately funded orbital launch attempt, the first private company to sign a launch agreement with international customers. And on May 17, LandSpace announced that the company’s 80-tonne-class methane and liquid oxygen (methalox) engine, TQ-12, has completed successful full-system hot-fire tests. In the week leading up to that announcement, the engine made four successful test firings, with the longest one lasting 20 seconds. The company released photos and videos showing the engine and the impressive firing at a test stand located in a mountainous area.
LandSpace claimed that their new methalox engine ranks number three in the world after SpaceX’s Raptor and Blue Origin’s BE-4. According to LandSpace, the TQ-12 engine has a sea-level thrust of 67 tonnes and a vacuum thrust of 76 tonnes. A future vacuum model will increase the thrust to 80 tonnes. LandSpace’s methalox engine project was kicked off in 2017 with a 10-tonne-class gas generator and thrust chamber test firing at the end of that year and again in March 2018. After that, LandSpace’s focus shifted to the 80-tonne engine, and in September 2018 and January 2019 it successfully tested the larger engine’s thrust chamber and the gas generator. The fast development led to a semi-system test firing in March 2019, paving the way for the May test firing.
The engine development component of a $1.5 million proposal calls for Exos Aerospace to provide a ~4800# thrust Lox Ethanol engine and conduct a customer demonstration of the same at full thrust and throttled to about 2500# thrust before the end of August.
Fenix Space, Inc. is an offshoot of Kelly Space & Technology, Inc, a privately-held aerospace, defense, technology and testing services company. Fenix is co-located with Kelly Space at its Aerospace Research and Development Center at the former Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino, California. Fenix Space’s vision is to create and commercialize technologies that will open space to large-scale commercial development and apply these space technologies to beneficial use on Earth, which harmonizes with EXOS Aerospace’s vision to make space access more affordable.
There’s almost universal agreement in the industry that there are far many more small launchers under development than can be supported by even the most optimistic forecasts of smallsat development. That inevitable shakeout of the market will give an advantage to companies that are already launching, like Rocket Lab, or those that soon plan to enter service, like Virgin Orbit.
The 2019 ISEC Space Elevator conference was held last month August 16th through the 18th at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, Washington, USA. This was our 8th year hosting the conference at this site. We had a great series of productive workshops on ISEC outreach, interplanetary Mission Support, and the environmental benefits of Earth space elevators. Michael Fitzgerald presented the keynote presentation on the Space Elevator Pathway to Technology Maturity … and Beyond, From Fountains to Tech Ready showing how close the space elevator is to becoming a reality. The weekend as full of other wonderful talks on graphene, carbon nanotubes, climber design considerations, multi-stage elevators, summary reports from this year’s ISEC interns, and more. Presentations and papers from the 2019 conference will be available at https://isec.org/conference-proceedings-2/.
According to a suite of eight FCC Special Temporary Authority licenses SpaceX filed for on August 30th, the company has plans for as many as four additional Starlink satellite launches in 2019, on top of Starlink’s May 23rd launch debut.
Additionally, SpaceX simultaneously requested that the FCC modify its current Starlink application to permit a slight change in orbital characteristics that would drastically improve the broadband satellite constellation’s coverage in its early stages. Combined, SpaceX appears to be extremely confident about the status and near-future progress to be made by its prospective Starlink constellation, confidence presumably inspired by the performance of the first 60 “v0.9” satellites launched three months ago.
SpaceX announced that it has successfully completed a routine static fire acceptance test of the Falcon 9 booster that will eventually support Crew Dragon’s inaugural astronaut launch, expected no earlier than early 2020.
The booster in question – believed to be Falcon 9 B1058 – is very likely the first new Falcon 9 booster SpaceX has shipped to McGregor, Texas and test-fired in more than four months, an unusual lull for the typically busy launch company. If all goes according to plan, B1058 will become SpaceX’s first truly human-rated commercial rocket and will support its first human spaceflight attempt ever, a huge milestone along the company’s path to the sustainable colonization of Mars.
The team at our rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas completed a static fire test last night of the Falcon 9 booster that will launch SpaceX’s first demonstration mission for @NASA’s Commercial Crew Program – one step closer to flying astronauts to the @Space_Station! pic.twitter.com/iDYNoamCvU
Less than a month after announcing a new effort to provide low-cost launch services for small satellites, SpaceX says it will increase the number of flight opportunities and reduce the prices it offers.
The revamped smallsat rideshare program, the company announced late Aug. 28, will provide launch opportunities at least once per month starting in March 2020, at a cost of $1 million for a 200-kilogram smallsat.
“Earlier this month, SpaceX announced the Smallsat Rideshare Program and received a lot of interest and great feedback from customers,” the company said in a statement. “As such, we have updated the terms of the program and have made the service even more compelling with reduced pricing and increased flight opportunities.”
The $5k/kg price is considerably less than what Rocket Lab and other smallsat launch ventures are offering. A dedicated smallsat launcher, however, can often place a smallsat directly into the optimum orbit for its particular application. Scheduling may also be more advantageous with a small launcher.
The SpaceX rideshare program does provide the option of deployment into either polar or mid-inclination orbits. Momentus Space tugs are offered as a means to move from the initial orbit to the optimum one.
SpaceX also offers scheduling reliability with
… launch opportunities to mid-inclination on a monthly basis, as well as missions to sun synchronous and/or polar orbits at approximately four month intervals. Dedicated rideshare missions will not be delayed by co-passenger readiness–if you are ready to fly during the scheduled launch period, you will fly.
BTW, when I interviewed Elon Musk back in 2003, I asked him about offering “a fixed date schedule arrangement” for smallsat launches on the Falcon 1. He responded,
Certainly a possibility, although it can be very difficult coordinating multiple customers, particularly if some want to go to different places than others. At this point, our preference is to sell the whole ride. If another company wants to buy a flight and then assume the risk and complexity of reselling slots, that would be fine with us.
… heading into September, the team has grown from 14 to 30 persons in the last 3 months (don’t worry, we are still hiring!) and the office/lab has grown from 4000 sq.ft to 10,000 sq.ft. Plenty of room for vacuum chambers and other cool space gear!
SpaceX built its launchpad about 1.5 miles (2.4 kilometers) from the eastern edge of Boca Chica Village, a hamlet that’s home to about 20 part- and full-time residents.
*** Construction of a second demo Starship in Florida interrupted by hurricane Dorian but it appears the site escaped serious damage.
*** Construction of the other Starship demo vehicle continues in Boca Chica:
SpaceX crews hard at work under heavy rains, a new section was seen lowering inside the main structural body of StarShip(1). The crews were also seen on the continuation of drilling(3). Also spotted was a new section for perhaps Super Heavy Ring construction(4). pic.twitter.com/jpfhND3Q3V
Speaking on August 28th, CEO Elon Musk says that SpaceX’s first Starship flight test(s) could occur as early as October 2019, in line with a late-July estimate that pegged the milestone at 2-3 months out.
Under construction in Cocoa, Florida and Boca Chica, Texas, SpaceX’s duo of orbital-class Starship prototypes have made immense progress in the last two or so months, part of a (hopefully friendly) internal competition to be first to flight and first to orbit. Elon Musk has been planning to present an updated overview on the next-generation SpaceX launch vehicle, originally expected in August before a variety of factors pushed it into September. Musk says that presentation is now scheduled no earlier than (NET) September 28th.
Hinted at in a brief tweet on August 28th, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says that SpaceX’s massive Starship and Super Heavy launch vehicle – set to be the most powerful rocket ever built upon completion – could eventually be followed by a rocket multiple times larger.
SpaceX is currently in the process of assembling the first full-fidelity prototypes of Starship, a 9m (30 ft) diameter, 55m (180 ft) tall reusable spacecraft and upper stage. Two prototypes – Mk1 and Mk2 – are simultaneously being built in Texas and Florida, respectively, while the beginnings of the first Super Heavy prototype has visibly begun to take shape at SpaceX’s Florida campus.
A sampling of recent articles, press releases, etc. related to student and amateur CubeSat / SmallSat projects and programs (find previous smallsat roundups here):
Oman’s first non-commercial CubeSat is a reality now. A team comprising faculty members and students from the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the College of Engineering at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) has executed the project.
It is a type of miniaturised satellite for space research. The project was proposed and supervised by Dr Amir Mohamed Abdulghani and Sayyid Dr Samir al Busaidi. The students who worked to design the satellite’s payload comprised Abdulaziz Mohammed al Qamshaoui, Luay Khalifa al Yaqoubi and Ali Abdulhamied al Shamali.
If all goes as planned, one day this October a spacecraft the size of jumbo loaf of bread will leave from Wallops, Virginia, packed aboard a cargo rocket bound for the International Space Station.
The spacecraft is a cubesat named Phoenix, and it is the creation of more than 100 science and engineering students, faculty and researchers at Arizona State University.
On Aug. 18, the Phoenix spacecraft was hand-delivered by the student team to Nanoracks, a launch integrator, at their facility in Houston. There it underwent final tests and preparations for its launch to the Space Station, planned for Oct. 21, 2019. After it arrives at the Space Station, Phoenix will be sent into low-Earth orbit sometime early next year.
The Phoenix spacecraft is designed for a two-year mission to take thermal images of several American cities (including its namesake, Phoenix) by day and by night.
1. Monday, Sept. 2, 2019; 7-8:30 pm PDT (9-10:30 pm CDT, 10-11:30 pm EDT): No show on Monday which is now reserved for special programming.
2. Tuesday, Sept. 3, 2019; 7-8:30 pm PDT (9-10:30 pm CDT, 10-11:30 pm EDT): We welcome Doug Stewart, film produce for Chesley Bonestell documentary, one of the best ever space artists.
3. Wednesday, Sept. 4, 2019: Pre-recorded Hotel Mars Program with John Batchelor. See Upcoming Show on The Space Show website for details.
4. Thursday, Sept. 5, 2019: 7-8:30 pm PDT (9-10:30 pm CDT, 10-11:30 pm EDT): We welcome George Dvorsky, Senior Staff Writer for Gizmodo, regarding his recent article Humans Will Never Colonize Mars.
5. Friday, Sept. 6, 2019; 9:30-11 am PDT (11:30 AM-1 pm CDT, 12:30-2 pm EDT): We welcome Andrew Chanin, CEO of ProcureAM to the show regarding his new company for tracking commercial space investment opportunities.
6. Sunday, Sept. 8, 2019; 12-1:30 pm PDT (3-4:30 pm EDT, 2-3:30 pm CDT): OPEN LINES with Dr. David Livingston. All callers welcome, first time callers welcome, Space, STEM, STEAM, and science calls OK. Callers can talk to one another too.
Some recent shows:
** Fri, 08/30/2019 – Ted Southern of Final Frontier Design talked about “spacesuits in detail for all types of missions. Spacesuit engineering, costs, technology, mass, life support, and challenges”.
** Wed, 08/28/2019 – Jordan Livingston discussed “DeLorean-Living The Dream indie movie, John DeLorean, the DeLorean car, Northern Ireland, Prime Minister Thatcher, John DeLorean scandal, DeLorean international car community, Back to the Future, Time Machine & more”.
** Tue, 08/27/2019 – Dr. Jeff Foust talked about “Multiple timely and current events in the private, commercial and public space sectors. Our discussion topics reflected the excitement in today’s growing space industry”.
** Sun, 08/25/2019 – John Bucknell discussed “Nuclear thermal propulsion, chemical propulsion, space solar power (SSP), the commercial case for SSP and more”.
