Category: Behind The Black

Georgia voters kill Camden spaceport project

9:41 am

The residents of Camden County in Georgia yesterday voted by a margin of 72% to 28% to end the county’s project to build a project there.

There are hints that county officials might still try to proceed, having already spent more than $10 million on the project. There are also strong indications that if they do, they will be blocked legally on many fronts.

What this vote suggests is that Americans continue to be uninterested in more commerce, and are easily convinced to put environmental claims first in any political battle. The opponents of the spaceport had said that the spaceport threatened local wildlife — something that clearly doesn’t happen based on more than a half century of data at Cape Canaveral — and the voters in Camden were quick to agree. The voters also probably had a bit of not-in-my-backyard behind their vote as well.

Whether Camden would have succeeded as a spaceport of course is unknown. There are a lot of such facilities being proposed and built, and it is unclear if their number fits the actual launch demand.

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SpaceX successfully completes 10th launch in ’22

9:25 am

Capitalism in space: SpaceX this morning successfully placed 48 Starlink satellites into orbit, using its Falcon 9 rocket.

The first stage landed successfully, completing its fourth flight. The fairings were new.

SpaceX continues to maintain a one-launch-per-week pace in ’22, suggesting it will succeed in completing more than 50 launches this year, as predicted by the company.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

10 SpaceX
5 China
2 ULA
2 Russia

The U.S. now leads China 15 to 5 in the national rankings. Note that Russia had predicted it would complete about 27 launches in ’22. With the loss of all of its international customers due to its invasion of the Ukraine, that number is likely cut by two-thirds. If Russia completes more than a dozen launches this year we should be surprised.

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Monitoring one glacier flowing off a mesa in Mars’ glacier country

1:28 pm

Vicous glacial flow on Mars
Click for full image.

Today’s cool image takes us back to the mesa in Mars’ glacier country that first clued me in on the prevalence of ice in the Martian mid-latitudes. The photo to the right, rotated, cropped, and reduced to post here, was taken on November 13, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), and shows a viscous flow coming down from a hollow on that mesa’s southern wall.

The new image has likely been taken to see if anything has changed since the previous image was taken in 2014. Based on the resolution published at the MRO website, nothing seems to have changed, though with more sophisticated software higher resolution versions of the images are available that might show some changes.

In my first post about Mars’ glacier country in December 2019, this flow was one of four that I featured coming off this same 30-mile wide mesa, as shown by the first overview map below.
» Read more

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Local Texas state/city politicians pressure congressmen to get Starship approved by FAA

11:42 am

Local state/city politicians from Brownsville are applying pressure on their local congressmen to get the FAA to approve its environmental reassessment of SpaceX’s Starship facility in Boca Chica approved.

Asked if the BND [Brownsville Navigation District] Board of commissioners had made its position known to Reps. Vela and Gonzalez, Lopez said: “Actually, right now, we are in talks with both of them. We want them to help. It is a huge economic impact, having SpaceX here. It makes the Rio Grande Valley and in this case Brownsville more lucrative. It gives global attention to our city, which is something we have needed for a long, long, time.”

A reporter put it to Lopez that the City of Brownsville is hoping to attract thousands of tourists once SpaceX starts sending rockets to the Moon and Mars. “It would be a tremendous loss if we lose that,” Lopez said.

Both Congressmen are members of the Democratic Party, so I doubt seriously if they care that much for the economic benefits brought to Brownsville by SpaceX, no matter what they say in public. For Democrats nowadays it is environmental matters that trump all other issues, and so it would shock me if either Vela or Gonzalez buck their party’s agenda to pressure the FAA to approve the environmental reassessment.

However, the November elections are looming, and the polls do not look good for Democrats. If the FAA rejects the reassessment prior to that election and demands that a full environmental impact statement be written, something I now fear will happen because the FAA cannot get NOAA and the Interior Department to sign on, SpaceX will almost certainly shift its Starship operations to Florida. An impact statement would take years to complete, a delay that SpaceX cannot afford. Such a sequence of events would likely do great harm to the reelection campaigns of both Democrats.

I thus now wonder if the Biden administration will force the FAA to continue delaying its decision, month-by-month, until after that November election, thus allowing these Democrats to mouth support without risking anything.

We shall know I think before the end of the month, which is presently the FAA’s announced target date for making a decision. I am willing to bet they delay again, for the fourth time.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Renowned cancer researcher fired for wearing Halloween costume 13 years ago

11:11 am

Cancer researcher Julie Overbaugh banned
Cancer researcher Julie Overbaugh blacklisted

The new dark age of silencing: A renowned cancer researcher, virologist Julie Overbaugh, was forced out of positions at both the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington School of Medicine because thirteen years previously she had worn a Michael Jackson Halloween costume at a Hutchinson party themed around the singer’s Thriller album.

The accusations at Washington University were especially absurd, though horribly typical of today’s blacklisting culture:

Though the incident didn’t occur at UW Medicine, its CEO and equity officer also waded into the faux controversy. UW Medicine CEO Dr. Paul Ramsey and Chief Equity Officer Paula Houston notified UW Medicine staff in an email that Overbaugh was punished for engaging in the “racist, dehumanizing, and abhorrent act” of “blackface.” During a separate formal review process for UW faculty, the email confirmed, Overbaugh resigned from her UW affiliate faculty member appointment.

Overbaugh released a short statement to me. “I did not know the association of this with blackface at the time, in 2009, but understand the offense that is associated with this now,” she said. “I have apologized for this both publicly and privately and beyond that have no other comments.”

Ramsey and Houston claim that the UW Medicine community was “harmed” by the 13-year-old photo that most staff didn’t know existed until reading about it in the Feb. 25 email. “We acknowledge that our community has been harmed by this incident and the fact that 13 years elapsed before action was taken,” they wrote. “We are convening a series of affinity group meetings in the next few weeks to provide spaces for mutual support, reflection, and response.”

Neither Ramsey nor Houston explained how the photo “harmed” anyone. Indeed, beyond one confirmed complaint, it’s unclear if anyone even cared about the old photo. [emphasis mine]

» Read more

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Iran launches military satellite

8:46 am

The new colonial movement: It appears that Iran has successfully launched a small military satellite into orbit, Noor-2, though exactly when remains unclear.

IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] said the Noor-2 satellite reached a low orbit of 500km (310 miles) above the Earth’s surface on the Ghased satellite carrier, state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA) reported. It described the Ghased as a three-phase, mixed-fuel satellite carrier.

IRGC did not immediately release photos or video of the launch. Putting the second satellite in space would be a major advance for Iran’s military.

The Ghased or Qased rocket uses a mobile launcher design, and was used for Iran’s previous successfully launch in 2020.

In confirming the launch, U.S. Space Command officials called the satellite nothing more than “a tumbling webcam in space,” suggesting it is not very sophisticated. At the same time, the first stage of Qased is essentially a ballistic missile. To be able to use this mobile launcher to get anything into orbit means that same mobile launcher, without the upper stage, could deliver missiles anywhere on Earth, and do so in a manner that is undetectable prior to launch.

This launch, the first for Iran in 2022, does not change the 2022 launch race leader board:

9 SpaceX
5 China
2 Russia
2 ULA

The U.S. leads China 14 to 5 in the national rankings.

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Fractured terrain on Mars

1:39 pm

Fractures on Mars
Click for full image.

Today’s cool image, which at first glance does not seem so puzzling, actually falls into my “What the heck?” category of baffling Martian geology. The picture to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on January 15, 2022 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). Labeled “Avernus Cavi fractures”, it shows what resembles the well-documented chaos terrain seen in many places on Mars, where erosion over eons along fault lines creates mesas with random criss-crossing canyons.

The problem is that this location is practically on the Martian equator, and chaos terrain tends to be found in the mid-latitude bands where there are many glaciers, suggesting the cyclical waxing and waning of those glaciers is what causes the erosion. Here at the Martian equator the terrain is very dry. No glaciers.

Moreover, note the higher mesa near the top center. Its flat top suggests that once this terrain was covered with an even higher layer of material, almost all of which was stripped away evenly everywhere, except where that mesa sits. As an amateur geologist I can’t think of any sequence of events that would do such a thing. I suspect professionals might have problems themselves.

Then there are the small parallel ridges. They suggest dunes, especially inside the depressions where sand and dust can get trapped. On the mesa tops however these ridges are more mysterious. Why for example are they aligned with the small ridge in some hollows, but not others? They in many ways remind me of the ridges in this earlier “What the heck?” cool image, also right on the equator.

The overview map below provides some help, though not much.
» Read more

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Pushback: Christian HS student sues school for persecuting him because of his religion

12:27 pm

How Mater Academy treats its Christians
How Mater Academy treats the Christian children under its care.

They’re coming for you next: Nicholas Ortiz, then a 14-year-old Christian freshman at the high school level of Florida’s charter school Mater Academy, has sued the school for allowing both students and teachers to slander, harass, and discriminate against him for his religious beliefs, and then punishing him when he reported the abuse to school officials.

Ortiz said he regularly brings his bible to school to read, which he alleges has made him a target for “disparaging comments” from other students, as well as school staff and administrators.

The complaint also outlines what it calls false and defamatory statements that circulated among students claiming Ortiz was planning a school shooting. Screenshots of communications between students show them discussing the rumored shooting and details their plans to physically assault Ortiz as a result.

Due to the shooting allegations, Ortiz was given the maximum allowed punishment of a 10-day suspension.

“Nicholas repeatedly made the school aware of a pattern of pervasive bullying by his fellow students, bullying that was reinforced by the words and actions of the school,” the complaint added. “Yet, the school did not just sweep Nicholas’s bullying claims under the rug — failing to report them as required under the law — they retaliated against Nicholas for reporting the harassment.”

You can read his complaint here [pdf].

Though the whole behavior of the school and its students is intolerant and disgusting, this event — which probably began the persecution — is probably the most egregious:
» Read more

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Bahrain signs Artemis Accords

8:57 am

Bahrain announced today that it has signed Artemis Accords, making it the second Arab country, after the United Arab Emirates (UAE), to do so.

The full list of signatories, now seventeen: Australia, Bahrain, Brazil, Canada, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand, Poland, Romania, South Korea, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, the Ukraine, and the United States.

In the past week both Bahrain and Romania have joined the accords. The timing suggests both actions might have been triggered by the Ukraine War. Russia opposes the Artemis Accords, and for Romania, a former Soviet block nation, and Bahrain, an Arab nation, to make such announcements so quickly after Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine suggests both are signalling their willingness to ally themselves against Russia.

For this western alliance in space to be complete however it will require that France and Germany as well as more members of the European Space Agency (ESA) to sign on. Before Russia’s invasion these two nations as well as other ESA partners were considering allying themselves with either Russia or China (which also opposes the accords) in future space endeavors. Such an alliance would have prevented them from signing the accords.

The Russian invasion has almost certainly ended any chance these European nations will partner with Russia in space. Thus, it is very likely Russia’s invasion will force them back into a more firm space alliance with the U.S., and get them to sign the accords. If the American State Department has any competence (something we should not expect) it will be jumping on this situation and ramping up its pressure on Europe to sign on.

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Astra completes investigation into February 10th launch failure

8:44 am

Capitalism in space: Astra today released the results of its investigation into its February 10th launch failure, confirming that the failure occurred because the improper separation of the fairings on the upper stage.

Through their analysis, Astra confirmed that the payload fairing on LV0008 failed to separate properly prior to upper stage engine ignition due to an electrical issue. The five separation mechanisms that are present in the Rocket 3 fairing were triggered in an incorrect order, resulting in unexpected fairing movement that caused a disconnection in the electrical wiring. This meant that one of the five separation mechanisms did not receive the command to open, thereby preventing the fairing from separating completely.

Upon further investigation, Astra narrowed the root cause of the fairing separation issue down to an error in the electrical harness engineering diagram for the separation mechanisms. The harness was built and installed as specified by the drawing and installation procedures, but an error in the drawing itself led to two of the five harness channels being inadvertently swapped.

In addition, the company identified a software problem “that left the upper stage engine, Aether, unable to utilize its thrust vector control (TVC) system – which allows the engine to gimbal and maneuver the vehicle.”

The company states that both issues have been corrected, and is now targeting March 13 for its next launch, taking place from Kodiak, Alaska, and only carrying a test dummy payload that will not be released from the upper stage. Thus, this test launch will be similar to the company’s only orbital launch on November 19, 2021.

Astra’s fast investigation, fix, and determination to launch again quickly speaks well of the company. Why however it doesn’t test its deployment system with a dummy satellite on this next test launch is somewhat puzzling, especially since it would be very easy to release that dummy into an orbit that quickly decays and burns up in the atmosphere.

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Chinese rocket stage impacts Moon

3:56 pm

What is believed to be an abandoned upper stage from a Chinese launch in 2014 is now believed to have impacted the Moon’s far side, as predicted by the estimates of its orbital mechanics.

None of this story is certain, other than amateur astronomers had identified an abandoned uppers stage that they calculated would hit the Moon on March 4th. While the data strongly suggests it was an upper stage from a Chinese launch, that is not confirmed. And so far we do not have confirmation of the impact either. Expect images identifying the impact site from Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) in the next few months.

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China launches seven satellites with Long March 2C rocket

3:50 pm

China today successfully launched six communication satellites and one remote sensing satellite using its Long March 2C rocket lifting off from its Xichang spaceport inside the Chinese interior.

No word on if the first stage crashed near habitable area, or whether it carried grid fins or parachutes to better control where it crashed.

The leaders in the 2022 launch race:

9 SpaceX
5 China
2 Russia
2 ULA

The U.S. now leads China 14 to 5 in the national rankings.

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Thank you all for making this year’s February birthday fund-raising drive the best yet!

4:00 pm

My February fund-raising campaign for Behind the Black, in honor of my personal birthday, is now over.

This year was by far the best yet. I continue to be speechless at the willingness of you, my readers, to support my work, when you have no obligation to do so. Thank you! I will try to live up to your expectations.

I will keep this thank you notice up through the end of this week, as my weak effort to thank you all. Those who decide now to donate or subscribe are of course still welcome to do so, using either Paypal, Patreon, Zelle, or by sending a check, following the instructions in the tip jar on this page. You can always buy one of histories — (Genesis, Leaving Earth, or Conscious Choice) — or my science fiction novel, Pioneer.

Please scroll down for new articles or posts.

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Today’s blacklisted American: American Indians force the removal of an American Indian from Marquette University’s school seal

12:16 pm

Marquette's old and new seals, compared
Marquette’s old seal (l) compared with its replacement

The new dark age of silencing: Because the official seal of Marquette University, in use since 1881, showed the university’s namesake standing in a canoe being rowed by an American Indian, local Indian activists demanded the seal be revised, claiming the seal was “disrespectful to Indigenous people.”

Their campaign succeeded. On March 3, 2022 Marquette University announced that it had removed entirely any image of either Father Jacques Marquette, or the American Indian who helped him in his exploration of the Mississippi River. The image to the right shows the seal, before and after.
» Read more

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UK rocket startup Skyrora badly impacted by the Ukraine War

9:16 am

The smallsat rocket startup Skyrora appears to be badly impacted by the Ukraine War, since half its employees work in the Ukraine and the founder of this United Kingdom company is Volodymyr Levykin, a Ukrainian entrepreneur.

Skyrora, headquartered in Edinburgh, Scotland, has about 80 employees in Dnipro, working on research and development of new manufacturing methods and materials, Levykin said.

“From day one, the priority for everyone in Ukraine was the family, then the country and then the company,” said Levykin, who comes from a small town near Dnipro. “And that’s what I told our team. Some of our people managed to move somewhere away from Dnipro, but the majority are staying there and showing significant resilience during this challenging time.”

It more and more appears that one of the biggest fallouts from the Ukraine War will be the destruction of that country’s aerospace industry. From the article at the link:

The Ukrainian space community will watch the developments in Dnipro anxiously. The rocket research and manufacturing facilities, worth billions of dollars, could not only fall into Russian hands but also face irreparable destruction, Ukraine’s former space chief Volodymyr Usov told Space.com in an earlier interview. Due to the amount of toxic rocket fuels and other chemicals, a rocket strike at Yuzhmash and Yuzhnoye could also cause a major environmental disaster, Usov said.

Russia certainly wants to recapture these space assets without damaging them, but that might not be possible. And even if this happens, any partnerships between western and Ukrainian aerospace companies — such as Skyrora’s — will vanish, and will likely not be renewed after the war ends. No commercial company is going to risk any investment with Russia for many years.

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Confirmed: Tomorrow’s OneWeb launch on Soyuz-2 rocket cancelled

8:57 am

Russia’s state-run press today confirmed that the launch tomorrow of another 36 OneWeb satellites on a Soyuz-2 rocket from Baikonur has been cancelled.

The decision was announced by Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin.

He also instructed to stop preparations for the launch of British OneWeb communications satellites from three spaceports. “All the launches from all Russian launch pads in Kourou, in Baikonur and at the Vostochny Cosmodrome involving the OneWeb company are to be stopped,” the Roscosmos CEO said.

Rogozin has already said that Russia will not refund OneWeb any money it paid for any of the cancelled launches. Nor will Russia return the OneWeb satellites in Kazakhstan to OneWeb.

Meanwhile, it appears that OneWeb is aggressively searching for new launch alternatives.

“We’re looking at U.S., Japanese and Indian options,” Chris McLaughlin, OneWeb’s chief of government, regulatory affairs and engagement, said March 3. “But in the first instance, we’re pointing to Ariane and saying you still owe us a number of launches.”

This statement implies that OneWeb is trying to get Arianespace to pick up the cost of any launches where Russia has been paid but will not launch. This way OneWeb won’t have to pay twice for the launch. This strategy will only work if the partners in the European Space Agency, which owns Arianespace, decide to cover OneWeb’s losses to Russia, which makes this a political decision.

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Boogie Woogie Queen (Ladyva) – Public piano

6:01 pm

An evening pause: It seems a lot of my readers like to send me videos taken of improvised boogie woogie played at this public piano. Up till now I have not found these videos that compelling. This one however, with the improvised duet of two very skilled players, made the grade.

Hat tip Mike Nelson.

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Russia blocks future rocket engine sales to U.S.

1:45 pm

Dmitry Rogozin, head of Roscosmos, today announced that Russia will no longer sell any rocket engines to U.S. companies.

The head of Roscosmos, Dmitry Rogozin, announced the new policy in an interview with the Russia 24 TV channel. “Today we have made a decision to halt the deliveries of rocket engines produced by NPO Energomash to the United States,” Rogozin said in the interview, according to Russia’s state press site Tass. “Let me remind you that these deliveries had been quite intensive somewhere since the mid-1990s.” Rogozin also added: “Let them fly on something else, their broomsticks, I don’t know what,” according to Reuters.

Russian engines are used on two American rockets, ULA’s Atlas-5 and Northrop Grumman’s Antares. The Atlas-4 however is being phased out, and has already received all the engines it needs for all of that rocket’s remaining flights. ULA plans to replace it with its new Vulcan rocket, using Blue Origin’s (long delayed) BE-4 engine.

Antares however is a more serious issue. Northrop Grumman uses this rocket to launch Cygnus freighters to ISS. It depends on two Russian engines for its Ukrainian-built first stage. The Ukraine War now probably makes building more Antares rockets impossible, which means at some point Northrop Grumman will no longer be able to supply ISS with cargo using Cygnus. Furthermore, NASA’s plan to use Cygnus’ engines to maintain ISS’s orbit will be impacted if Cygnus launches to ISS cease.

There is an option, though it too has issues. ULA has already launched one Cygnus to ISS using its Atlas-5. Though this rocket is going away, ULA could probably use its Vulcan instead — assuming Blue Origin finally gets the BE-4 engine operational so that Vulcan can finally launch.

Overall, Russia’s decision might cause a temporary blip in the American space effort, but if the government doesn’t get in the way I think that competition will force a solution. As Aesop said, necessity is the mother of invention.

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The layered Martian history exposed in Valles Marineris

12:28 pm

Overview map

The layers in Valles Marineris
Click for full image.

Cool image time! Like the Grand Canyon in the United States, Mars’ largest canyon, Valles Marineris, appears to have been carved out of a layered terrain, thus exposing those many layers in the walls of the canyon.

Valles Marineris, however, is much much larger than the Grand Canyon. You could fit dozens of Grand Canyons inside it and hardly fill it. Yet, its walls have the same layered look, suggesting that in Mars’ long geological history, first came many events that laid down new layers time after time, followed by a long period when the laying ceased and other events carved out the canyon to its almost 30,000 foot depth (which by the way is also about six times deeper than the Grand Canyon).

Today’s cool image to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, was taken on September 5, 2021 and shows a terraced terrain on the floor of Candor Chasma, one small side canyon of Valles Marineris that is still much larger than the Grand Canyon. The black dot in the overview map above indicates its location. I roughly estimate the elevation difference between the high and low spots in the picture is about 3,000 feet, a difference that while two-thirds that of the depth of the Grand Canyon is almost unnoticeable within the depths of Valles Marineris.

This layering is probably the canyon’s most important geological feature. See these previous cool images here and here for other examples. When geologists finally arrive on Mars and can begin dating these layers in detail they will likely reveal the planet’s entire geological history, going back five to six billion years.

Most of the layers are probably volcanic flood lava laid down by repeated eruptions from the giant volcanoes to the west. In between and within however will be deposits from the Martian atmosphere, telling us its composition and thickness. All told, the layers of Valles Marineris will likely unlock almost all of the most basic secrets of Martian geology.

We merely have to go there to find out.

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Launch of two South Korean satellites threatened by Russia’s Ukraine war

10:02 am

According to South Korean officials, the launch later this year of two new home-built satellites on Russian rockets is now unlikely because of the sanctions imposed because of Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine.

South Korea’s CAS500-2 remote sensing satellite is set to launch in the first half of this year on a Russian Soyuz rocket from Russia’s Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. South Korea’s KOMPSAT-6 multipurpose satellite, equipped with synthetic aperture radar (SAR), is due to launch in the second half of the year on a Russian Angara rocket from Plesetsk Cosmodrome in northern Russia.

“For now, nothing has changed to the plan,” Korea Aerospace Research Institute spokesman Roh Hyung-il told SpaceNews. “We are taking a close look at how the situation unfolds because it could have a significant impact on our missions.” He admitted that it’s “very likely” that the satellites won’t be launched as planned.

Those officials also said that losing Russia as a launch option will be a “serious blow” to South Korea’s entire space effort. I find that puzzling. There are plenty of other rocket companies now available. Why South Korea feels a need to depend on Russia seems short-sighted.

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Shetland spaceport gets third launch customer

9:52 am

Capitalism in space: The United Kingdom’s Shetland spaceport, SaxaVord, announced today that it has signed a third launch customer, the smallsat rocket startup Venture Orbital Systems.

Venture Orbital Systems (VOS), a developer of micro launchers and rocket engines based in Reims, France, plans to use the site at Unst as part of its aim to reach 15 launches of its Zephyr rocket by 2026 and 40 by 2030.

The new spaceport, presently under construction, already has ABL as a future rocket compan. ABL, mostly owned by Lockheed Martin, hopes to launch before the end of the year.

The UK’s has a second spaceport under construction in Sutherland, Scotland. It will be interesting to see if both can garner enough business to prosper.

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Former CEO of Virgin Galactic sued over his pump-and-dump stock sale

9:44 am

Buyer beware: Chamath Palihapitiya, who recently stepped down as CEO of Virgin Galactic, has been sued by some of the company’s stockholders for using his insider position to pump-and-dump his stock while keeping vital information secret illegally.

The complaint, filed on behalf of Virgin Galactic to seek damages from its directors and officers, also alleges that founder Richard Branson pocketed $301 million by dumping his shares while the stock price was “artificially inflated.”

Leaders of the company were well aware of defects in its spacecraft three years before they were publicly disclosed last year, according to the complaint filed in federal court in Brooklyn, New York.

It is unclear from the article whether Branson is being sued as well.

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Satellite photos suggest Iran had a launch failure with rocket explosion on launchpad

9:38 am

Based on new satellite photos, it appears that an attempt by Iran to launch a satellite failed this week when the rocket exploded on the launchpad.

Before and after images taken by imagery satellites from two different private companies, Maxar and Planet Labs, suggest the incident likely occurred around February 26th.

Satellite images from Maxar Technologies seen by The Associated Press show scorch marks at a launchpad at Imam Khomeini Spaceport in Iran’s rural Semnan province on Sunday. A rocket stand on the pad appears scorched and damaged, with vehicles surrounding it. An object, possibly part of the gantry, sits near it.

Successful launches typically don’t damage rocket gantries because they are lowered prior to takeoff. Iran also usually immediately trumpets launches that reach space on its state-run television channels, and it has a history of not acknowledging failed attempts.

The news reports claims that the failed rocket was Iran’s Zuljanah rocket, which uses solid rocket motors for its lower stages. Zuljanah has never made orbit, having been unveiled one year ago after a single suborbital test flight.

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OneWeb scraps further launches from Russia

9:12 am

OneWeb’s board of directors has voted to cancel all further launches of its satellites from Russia, refusing to meet Russia’s demand that the United Kingdom divest its half share in the company.

On Thursday, OneWeb said the company’s board had voted to suspend all launches from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, where the Russian spaceport operated by Roscosmos is based.

OneWeb didn’t elaborate on the vote. But the UK’s Business and Energy Secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, said his government had refused to divest from OneWeb, which received funding from British authorities in 2020 to stave off a bankruptcy. “The UK Government supports OneWeb’s decision,” Kwarteng tweeted on Thursday. “In light of Russia’s illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, we are reviewing our participation in all further projects involving Russian collaboration,” he added.

OneWeb hasn’t commented on the company’s contingency plans. But it’s almost certainly looking for a new launch partner. Russia’s Roscosmos previously helped OneWeb send up 428 of 648 satellites for its internet system, which is designed to serve enterprise users.

This decision, combined with Russia’s decision to suspend further Soyuz-2 rocket launches from French Guiana, essentially ends Russia’s partnership with Arianespace. It also likely ends for many years Russia’s place in the international launch market. OneWeb and Arianespace were its last remaining international customers, and their business is now gone. Even if the Ukraine War was settled today, I suspect neither would wish to renew their business with Russia.

As for OneWeb, it has a number of options in the growing launch market, with Arianespace’s rockets its most likely choice. Financially, the delay hurts them in two ways: First, they have paid Russia for a number of launches already, and Russia has said it will not refund the money. Thus, those launches will cost twice as much. Second, the delay hurts them in their effort to compete with SpaceX’s Starlink constellation.

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