Tag: competition

China’s Long March 3B rocket launches communications satellite

10:53 am

China last night successfully put a geosynchronous communications satellite into orbit, its Long March 3B rocket lifting off from its Xichang spaceport in southern China.

No word on where the rocket’s core stage, second stage, and four side boosters crashed inside China. All use extremely toxic hypergolic fuels, so anyone approaching any wreckage risks serious health issues.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

80 SpaceX
51 China
14 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China 92 to 51 in successful launches, and the entire world combined 92 to 80. SpaceX by itself is once again tied with the rest of the world (excluding American companies) 80 to 80, but this will probably change later today, when the company launches a cargo Dragon to ISS. NASA’s live stream is here.

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NASA awards company contract to develop new advanced solar panels

9:43 am

NASA has awarded the solar panel company Solestial its second development contract, with both contracts worth more than one million dollars, to develop new advanced solar panels for use on future commercial space stations.

The 18-month SBIR Phase II contract will provide funds to support development of next generation, 50-kilowatt (kW) class solar array wings. Solestial’s silicon solar blanket technology will allow for arrays larger than any ever built, while also maintaining lower mass and competitive efficiency. The array will be developed in collaboration with Opterus Research & Development, who will develop a low-cost, novel deployment system for Solestial’s ultrathin, flexible, silicon solar blankets.

These blankets will be an upgrade from the new panels presently being deployed on ISS, that unroll like a blanket rather than unfold like hard panels. The design is lighter weight, easier to deploy, and cheaper. It will thus become a valuable product that every private space station will want to buy.

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Firefly wins Australian payload for its second Blue Ghost lunar lander mission

9:29 am

Firefly yesterday announced that the Australian commercial company, Fleet Space Technologies, will fly its seismometer on Firefly’s second Blue Ghost lunar lander mission, planned to land on the far side of the Moon in 2026.

Fleet Space’s SPIDER payload is part of the Australian Space Agency’s Moon to Mars initiative that’s aligned with NASA’s Artemis program to support future habitation on the Moon. Upon deployment of the payload, Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander will provide ongoing power and communications, enabling SPIDER to capture seismic data from the lunar surface for up to 14 days. This data will offer insights into the geological properties of the lunar subsurface and its mineral profile, such as water ice, that can support lunar infrastructure and further regolith exploration.

The mission also has payloads from NASA and the European Space Agency. Note that all three governments are buying the lunar landing services from this private company, rather than build the lander themselves.

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Next X-37B launch now scheduled for early December on SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy

9:21 am

The next X-37B launch has now been scheduled for a December 7, 2023 launch, and will be sent into orbit for the first time on SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket.

The mission, designated USSF-52, will conduct a wide range of tests, including operating the reusable spaceplane in new orbital regimes, experimenting with space domain awareness technologies, and investigating the radiation effects on materials provided by NASA, the Space Force said in a statement Nov. 8. “We are excited to expand the envelope of the reusable X-37B’s capabilities,” said Lt. Col. Joseph Fritschen, the X-37B program director. The NASA experiment onboard, known as Seeds-2, will expose plant seeds to the harsh radiation environment of long-duration spaceflight.

SpaceX was awarded a $130 million contract in June 2018 to launch USSF-52. The mission was originally scheduled to launch in 2021 and has been delayed by payload and range availability.

The use of the Falcon Heavy suggests the payloads on this next flight are heavier and require that rocket’s extra boost. This will be the seventh X-37B flight of the Space Force’s fleet of two reusable mini-shuttles, beginning in 2010. The previous mission lasted 908 days in orbit, and landed one year ago in November.

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Rocket Lab schedules next launch, plans 22 launches in 2024

9:03 am

Rocket Lab has completed its investigation into a September 2023 launch failure and has now scheduled its next Electron launch for the end of November.

More significant, it says it has 22 booked launches scheduled for 2024, a pace that would more than double its previous annual record of 9 launches in 2022.

In its third quarterly report it also revealed that it lost just over $40 million in that quarter, more than last year’s third quarter by 17%. The September launch failure impacted those numbers, though the company’s revenue in the third quarter still grew by 7% from the previous year.

To achieve 22 launches next year will require the company to launch twice a month. With three launchpads (two in New Zealand and one in the U.S.) this is possible, but challenging. Of those launches, nine will attempt to recover and reuse the first stage, and two will not be orbital but suborbital hypersonic tests for the military.

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FCC raises questions about SpaceX’s application to link cell phones to Starlink

9:20 am

The FCC has responded to SpaceX’s application to link cell phones to Starlink with a set of questions, mostly centered on finding out whether the company’s system might interfere with other communications systems.

“This analysis should take into account the worst case scenario of all satellites transmitting at the same time, including different power levels required for rain fade and cloud cover as well as clear sky conditions over a particular area of coverage,” the FCC wrote.

In addition, the same analysis should look at the “possibility of loss of service by other authorized satellite and terrestrial operators in that area,” the Commission added. Another request asks SpaceX to provide “a map with projected beam coverage” for the US, showing the maximum and typical power levels of the satellite cellular service. The FCC also wants to know how the company can shut down the cellular Starlink system in the event interference arises over certain geographic areas.

The FCC’s concerns appear reasonable, but no one should dismiss the possibility that politics are involved as well. The Biden administration, which now has a majority of appointees on the FCC, has made it clear it opposes almost everything Elon Musk is doing.

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Virgin Galactic trims staff and spending

9:08 am

Despite having completed its fifth commercial suborbital flight on November 2, 2023, Virgin Galactic announced yesterday that it is laying off staff and cutting spending.

The number of people laid off was not revealed. Supposedly the company has done this as part of its effort to develop an upgraded version of SpaceShipTwo.

The company reported having $980 million of cash and equivalents on hand at the end of the second quarter this year, when it reported a net loss of $134.4 million. The company has not disclosed its estimated costs for development of the Delta vehicles, but said it expected those vehicles to enter service in 2026. The company expects only limited revenue from VSS Unity, which is able to fly monthly carrying up to four customers at a time.

I instead suspect that demand for suborbital flights is dwindling because of the competition from orbital operations. Had this company started flying a decade ago, as promised numerous times by Richard Branson, it would have been ahead of the curve. It didn’t and thus missed the boat.

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Bulgaria to sign Artemis Accords

9:01 am

NASA yesterday announced that Bulgaria will sign the Artemis Accords tomorrow, becoming the 32nd nation to join the alliance.

The full list of signatories is as follows: Argentina, Australia, Bahrain, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Columbia, Czech Republic, Ecuador, France, Germany, India, Iceland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Poland, Romania, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, the Ukraine, and the United States.

The competing alliance of communist nations, led by China, includes only Russia, Venezuala, Pakistan, Belarus, Azerbaijan, and South Africa. That former deep Soviet block nations like Bulgaria and Romania went with the west rather than China illustrates the international distrust of China and its authoritarian methods.

Regardless, we now see a rough outline of the coming cold war in space.

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SpaceX launches 23 Starlink satellites

8:27 am

SpaceX last night successfully launched 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage successfully completed its eleventh flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

80 SpaceX
50 China
14 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China 92 to 50 in successful launches, and the entire world combined 92 to 79. SpaceX by itself once again leads the rest of the world (excluding American companies) 80 to 79.

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Three European nations sign deal with Arianegroup for use of Ariane-6

9:12 am

In a separate deal outside of the European Space Agency, Germany, France, and Italy have signed a deal with the private rocket company Arianegroup to use its still unlaunched Ariane-6, assuming the company can reduce costs.

The agreement will provide €340 million ($365 million) of financing a year for Arianespace’s Ariane 6 rocket in exchange for a commitment to an 11% cut in costs. The rocket will also be awarded at least four missions from public institutions a year, while the lighter Vega C launcher will get at least three.

Essentially the deal is intended to keep Ariane-6 afloat, as its high cost has made it difficult to attract customers. At the same time, the contract demands those costs be reduced, and adds pressure to that demand by noting that future and additional launches will be awarded on a purely competitive bidding process. It appears these three countries will open bidding not only to the new rocket startups being developed in Europe, but American rocket companies as well.

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Two Russian satellites — one thought defunct — have been tracked in rendezvous maneuvers

8:51 am

The American commercial satellite tracking company has over the past two years identified two Russian satellites — one thought defunct — that have rendezvoused and done proximity maneuvers.

Resurs-P3 — a Russian Earth observation satellite — performed a large maneuver in November 2022 after years of inactivity, and approached the Russian military satellite Cosmos-2562, according to a LeoLabs briefing.

The maneuver by Resurs-P3 “placed it in an entirely new orbit shared by Russian assets with non-publicly disclosed payloads,” said the briefing. “Based on the approaches observed by LeoLabs, it’s highly likely that Cosmos-2562 has an electro-optical payload and has collected high-resolution imagery of Resurs-P3.”

This new data further documents the long-term classified Russian effort to develop such satellite maneuvering capability, both to track and inspect its own satellites as well as do the same to the satellites of others. The unstated capability also includes the ability to destroy a satellite also, once rendezvous is achieved.

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