Real Engineering – The Secret Invention That Changed World War 2
An evening pause: How old fashioned Yankee ingenuity helped win the war, in a way you would not expect.
Hat tip Tom Biggar.
Tag: competition
India approves new spaceport for private launches of SSLV rocket
India’s two spaceports
The Modi government in India has now approved the use of its new spaceport in Kulasekarapattinam by private operators, including the private operator who wins control of the SSLV rocket that was developed by ISRO, India’s space agency.
On the new launch pad that ISRO is building at Kulasekarapattinam in Thoothukudi district along the coast in Tamil Nadu, SIRO Chairman S Somanath said that nearly 99 per cent of the 2,000 acres has been transferred to ISRO by the Tamil Nadu government. “It takes at least two years to become fully functional after the commencement of the construction work. However, we will be able to conduct some sub-orbital launches there,” he added.
In December about 80% of that land had been purchased, so the government is now close to owning everything it needs.
Though the government is accepting bids from private companies to operate SSLV, it is not clear if that will be an exclusive right, or whether ISRO will continue to do its own launches. Either way, this new spaceport is being designed to enable private operators to launch from it.
SpaceX launches another 22 Starlink satellites
In what is turning into routine clockwork, SpaceX tonight completed its fourth launch in only the first ten days of August, placing 22 Starlink satellites into orbit using its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its ninth flight, landing safely on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairings completed their tenth and eleventh flights respectively. At the time of posting the satellites themselves had not yet been deployed.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
55 SpaceX
33 China
11 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 63 to 33, and the entire world combined 63 to 55. SpaceX by itself is now tied with the entire world (excluding American companies) 55 to 55.
Russia launches Luna-25 to the Moon
Click for interactive map.
After almost two decades of development, Russia today used its Soyuz-2 rocket to launch Luna-25, its first lander to the Moon since the 1970s.
The link is cued to the live stream, just prior to launch. It will take several days to get to the Moon and enter orbit, make some orbital adjustments, then land in Boguslawsky crater, as shown on the map to the right. It is likely its landing will occur before India’s Chandrayaan-3 lands on August 23rd but not certain, depending on the adjustments needed in lunar orbit. Both could even land on the same day.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
54 SpaceX
33 China
11 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 62 to 33, and the entire world combined 62 to 55, while SpaceX by itself now trails the entire world (excluding American companies) 54 to 55.
Update on the development of a new first stage for Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket
Link here. The first stage of the Antares rocket has previously relied on Russian engines in a Ukrainian-built body. The Ukraine War made getting both impossible, and thus Northrop Grumman hired Firefly to provide it a new first stage, presently targeting mid-2025 for its first flight. In the meantime in order to meet its contractual obligations with NASA, it has hired SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket to fly the next three Cygnus freighters to ISS.
The report at the link gets some interesting details about Firefly’s engines and first stage. Both will raise the payload capabilities of Antares, which as yet has failed to garner any commercial payloads outside of Northrop’s own Cygnus capsule. That increase in capability might make it more appealing to commercial satellite companies.
Chinese pseudo-company Galactic Energy launches seven satellites
China’s spaceports
One of China’s pseudo-companies, Galactic Energy, yesterday successfully placed seven small satellites into orbit, using its Ceres-1 solid-fueled rocket that lifted off from China’s Jiuquan spaceport in the Gobi Desert.
Considering that a launch two days ago from the Taiyuan spaceport apparently dropped sections of its first stage near habitable areas, I though it worthwhile to post again the map to the right, showing which Chinese spaceports expose China’s inhabitants to risk.
It also appears that even the state-run press of China knows Galactic Energy really isn’t a privately owned commercial company, as it doesn’t even mention the company’s name in its news report at the link. While it gets investment capital and functions kind of like a private company, everything it does is supervised by the Chinese government, which can take full control of the company whenever it wants. Moreover, the technology of its solid-fueled rocket was derived entirely from military technology, which means the Chinese government supervised its development every step of the way.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
54 SpaceX
33 China
10 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 62 to 33, and the entire world combined 62 to 54, while SpaceX by itself is now tied the world (excluding American companies) 54 to 54.
South Korea’s KARI space agency releases new images taken by its Danuri lunar orbiter
To celebrate the anniversary of its launch, South Korea’s KARI space agency today released new images taken by its Danuri lunar orbiter.
Images include views of Reiner Gamma, a so-called swirl, which features a localized magnetic field and marks a bright spot within the Oceanus Procellarum region. Another shows shadows inside Amundsen Crater, close to the lunar south pole and a potential landing site for NASA’s Artemis 3 mission, which is slated to put astronauts on the moon in late 2025.
Another southern feature captured by Danuri is Drygalski Crater, showing the central peak inside the impact crater.
First stage of Chinese rocket crashes in Chinese city
Locals in the city of Shangluo, population over two million located in central China, today released video images of the remains of the first stage of a Long March 2C rocket that launched yesterday and apparently crashed in the city.
The image to the right is a screen capture. Since this two-stage rocket uses extremely toxic hypergolic fuels in both of its stages, those citizens wandering around the rocket’s remains are in great health danger.
China has in recent years has appeared taken actions to block the release of such videos by its citizens, but apparently failed in this case.
The irony is that this rocket supposedly launched what China called “a disaster reduction” satellite. That maybe so, but in the process it also dumped toxic materials on its own citizens.
Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.
China’s Long March 2C rocket launches “disaster reduction” satellite
China today used its Long March 2C rocket to place what it called a “disaster reduction” satellite into orbit, launching from its Taiyuan spaceport in the interior of China.
No other information was released, including whether the rocket’s lower stages landed near habitable areas.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
54 SpaceX
32 China
10 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 62 to 32, and the entire world combined 62 to 53, while SpaceX by itself still leads the world (excluding American companies) 54 to 53.
NOAA lifts many restrictions on the release of commercial Earth observation images
As part of a 2020 revision by Commerce to reduce regulations on satellites that monitor the Earth, NOAA has now lifted many of the restrictions it placed on the release of high resolution commercial Earth observation images.
NOAA said it lifted 39 restrictions on an unspecified number of licenses. Those restrictions include a reduction of global imaging restrictions for certain imaging modes and removal of restrictions on non-Earth imaging and rapid revisit. It also removed all temporary conditions on X-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery.
One of the companies that benefits from the removal of the conditions is SAR imaging company Umbra. The company announced Aug. 7 that, with the removal of the conditions, it can now offer SAR images to customers at a resolution of 16 centimeters, compared to no better than 25 centimeters under the old license conditions. “This means that we are finally able to offer customers the highest resolution images that our satellites are capable of capturing, setting the stage for even further expansion of products to customers,” said Gabe Dominocielo, Umbra’s co-founder and president, in a company statement.
The revision to the regulations, put in place in 2020, had been instigated by the Trump administration, and has apparently been left untouched by the Biden administration, at least up until now.
For the satellite companies it means they are much freer to produce that best imagery, and thus compete more successfully. For customers, it means that they will now have access the best imagery, in open competition. For news outlets attempting to report on things like the Ukraine War, for example, this ability will make it possible to improve the accuracy of the coverage.
Startup orbital tug company signs deal from startup solar panel company
The new orbital tug company Atomos has now signed a deal with the new solar panel company, Solestial, to use the latter company’s solar panels in its tugs.
Neither company has yet flown anything in space, though both have contracts and demo missions scheduled.
Atomos plans to test a small Solestial photovoltaic panel on an orbital transfer vehicle demonstration set to launch on a SpaceX Transporter rideshare flight in early 2024. Solestial also will supply large solar blankets for two Atomos’ solar-electric OTVs slated to begin flying in late 2024 or early 2025.
Once again, these two companies illustrate the growth in the satellite industry produced by the lowering of launch costs. With less capital required to get to orbit, there is a larger margin for profit, thus encouraging companies with new ideas.
Japanese startup signs deal to provide its smallsat thrusters to South Korean university
Pale Blue, a Japanese startup which focuses on building water-vapor thrusters for cubesats, has signed a deal with Yonsei University in South Korea to provide that school smallsat thrusters for the satellites built by its students.
“Our mission aims for demonstrating cutting-edge laser communication, orbital maneuvering and formation-keeping,” Sang-Young Park, a Yonsei University astronomy professor, said in a statement. “These thrusters perfectly meet our requirements and offer the advantage of being not only environmentally friendly, but also free from regulatory constraints.”
Pale Blue proved its Resistojet thruster in orbit for the first time in March on a Sony Corp. Star Sphere satellite. Pale Blue plans to establish mass production of Resistojet thrusters to reduce the cost and lead time for potential customers in the United States, Europe and Asia, said Yuichi Nakagawa, Pale Blue co-founder and chief technology officer.
The company is also developing both an ion and hybrid thruster for satellites, and is another example of how the lowering of launch costs has encouraged the arrival of many new space companies doing many different things.