The launches at Kennedy, delayed because of a fire at an Air Force radar facility, have now been rescheduled.
This includes a military launch by an Atlas 5 rocket on April 10 and SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 launch to supply ISS. The Falcon 9 flight will also include an attempt to bring the first stage back to a soft vertical landing over water.
In hearings today, Pentagon officials said that they are considering building American-built engines to use on our rockets rather than buy Russian-made engines.
They could do this very cheaply if they simply allowed SpaceX to bid on all military launches.
UrtheCast has released its first image of Earth, taken from one of its cameras on ISS.
The UrtheCast (pronounced Earth-Cast) system, which was installed (not without trouble) on the International Space Station at the end of 2013, is composed of two cameras. The Theia “medium resolution” camera took this shot; the full picture has a resolution of 3200×8000, or about 25 megapixels. The high-resolution device, which will capture video, is still being calibrated.
Eventually UrtheCast plans to provide free, constant, near-real-time video of the globe from far above — that is, when it’s not being rented out to parties interested in a quick satellite snap of an area. Powerful cameras able to respond quickly to such requests are in high demand by everyone from law enforcement to disaster-relief coordinators.
Brian Binnie, the man who flew SpaceShipOne for Scaled Composites, has left that company for competitor XCOR.
It might simply be the man got a promotion, but it also might be that he knows the problems SpaceShipTwo is having and sees his chances of flying there going down. His willingness to work for XCOR instead could also be looked at as a kind of endorsement of that company’s chances of success.
NASA’s short statement, in connection to the Obama administration’s decision to suspend all non-ISS related activities with Russia, is almost entirely a demand for more funding for its commercial space program.
To quote:
NASA is laser focused on a plan to return human spaceflight launches to American soil, and end our reliance on Russia to get into space. This has been a top priority of the Obama Administration’s for the past five years, and had our plan been fully funded, we would have returned American human spaceflight launches – and the jobs they support – back to the United States next year. With the reduced level of funding approved by Congress, we’re now looking at launching from U.S. soil in 2017. The choice here is between fully funding the plan to bring space launches back to America or continuing to send millions of dollars to the Russians. It’s that simple. The Obama Administration chooses to invest in America – and we are hopeful that Congress will do the same.
Though I agree with them about accelerating manned commercial space, I can’t help wondering if this suspension of activities was actually instigated to generate this lobbying effort. ISS comprises the bulk of the U.S.’s cooperative effort with Russia, and by exempting that from this suspension the Obama administration essentially exempts practically everything, making the suspension somewhat meaningless.
What the suspension does do, however, is highlight our fragile dependency on Russia, just as Congress begins debate on the 2015 budget.
The competition heats up: Six senators on Wednesday demanded the Air Force open up competition to more companies for launching its military satellites.
U.S. senators on Wednesday urged the Air Force to allow more competition in the multibillion-dollar market for launching government satellites, citing rising costs and concerns about Russian-made engines that power some of the U.S. rockets.
Lawmakers said the Air Force’s budget plan for fiscal 2015 reduced opportunities for privately held Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and others to gain a foothold in a program now dominated by the two biggest U.S. weapons makers, Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co.
This demand also bodes badly in an indirect way for SLS. It indicates that these senators are beginning to notice the cost benefit of competition and of using the private market. Such a realization is going to eventually leak into their peanut brains about SLS, and that will not do that program any good, especially if the new commercial private companies like SpaceX continue to show success.
The competition heats up: China’s new spaceport and the giant rocket it is being built for.
The combination of the planned rocket, called the Long March 5 — and its derivatives — matched with the Wenchang Launch Center, China’s new sprawling spaceport, underscores the country’s shifting space gears. It enables China’s space station ambitions, while also boosting the nation’s plans for interplanetary exploration, as well as accomplishing human treks to the moon.
Scientists have developed a bacterium that can brew high energy rocket fuel.
There are issues still that need to be solved before these bugs will be creating fuel for astronauts in space, but the process is promising, especially since it could significantly lower the cost of rocket fuel if they get it to work.
NASA has extended its commercial cargo contracts with SpaceX and Orbital Sciences until 2017.
Since the notice says that “the modifications would be made ‘at no cost’ to the agency, and that they would be “executed one year at a time,” the extension is probably just designed to give the two companies sufficient time to launch all their cargo missions in the present contracts.
Nonetheless, the posting also said that other companies could compete for NASA’s business during this extension, which leaves the door open for more competition.
The competition heats up: SpaceX has test fired its Grasshopper replacement test vehicle.
Unlike Grasshopper, which only had one engine, the Falcon 9R (pronounced “niner”) is the equivalent of a Falcon 9 nine engine first stage. They fired it on the launchpad for 5 seconds in preparation for future vehicle take off and landing tests.
SpaceShipTwo is outside its hanger today, undergoing cockpit pressure tests.
The article also provides some additional information about the rumored engine issues of the spacecraft, suggesting that the company is working hard to replace its nitrous oxide-rubber engine with a nitrous oxide-nylon engine.
