Tag: competition

SpaceX successfully completes static fire tests of both Superheavy and Starship

12:37 pm

SpaceX today successfully completed static fire tests on both Superheavy and Starship prototypes intended to fly on its next orbital test flight.

The video at the link is four hours long. The Starship engine burn occurs at 1 hour 15 minutes and lasts about five seconds. The Superheavy burn takes place at 2 hours 42 minutes, and lasts about ten seconds. Both burns appeared to operate exactly as planned, though obviously an inspection of the launchpad under Superheavy will have to take place to see if its deluge system operated as intended.

Once again, SpaceX is demonstrating that it will be ready to go for the third orbital test launch of this rocket in mere weeks. Based on these tests today as well as past operations, it seems that all the company needs to do now is stack Starship on top of Superheavy, do another dress rehearsal countdown, and then go.

It won’t however. There is no word from the FAA on when it will issue a launch permit. Based on the previous launch, it will likely not issue the permit when SpaceX says it has completed its investigation of the last launch and is ready to fly again. Instead it will take another month or two writing up its own report (which will essentially reword what SpaceX has told it). Then, once the FAA is finished only then will the Fish and Wildlife Service begin to write up its report (as happened in the fall), causing further delays.

I repeat my prediction from November: No launch until March, at the earliest. The federal government continues to stand in the way of progress, and freedom.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay.

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Kazakhstan approves Russia use of Baikonur through 2024

9:22 am

Though Russia supposedly has a long term lease for launching rockets from its Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan, Kazakhstan this week revealed that it has just now approved the Russian plan of launches there for 2024.

The Government of Kazakhstan approves the plan of spacecraft launches for 2024 presented by the Russian side within the framework of the state program of the Russian Federation “Space Activities of Russia”, programs of international cooperation and commercial projects from Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Kazakhstan has increasingly become a bit hard-nosed about Russia’s long term lease. For example, in March seized control of the launchpad Russia hoped to use on its new Soyuz-5 rocket, leaving that rocket with no place to launch. And for the last decade there have been hints from both countries that the deal is souring, with Russia suggesting it will shift launch operations entirely to its new spaceport in Vostochny and Kazakhstan politicians eager to see Russia go.

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China completes work on first dedicated “commercial” launchpad

9:08 am

China announced today that it has completed work on first launchpad at its Wenchang spaceport on the island of Hainan off the southern coast of China that it intends to dedicate to launches by its many pseudo-private companies.

Construction of the No. 1 launch pad started in July 2022, and the equipment-installation phase is almost complete. The No. 2 launch pad is still at the construction phase, with the capping of the diversion trough’s main body now finished. On-site equipment installation is due to be completed by the end of May 2024.

The article also notes that this pad is a dedicated site for launching China’s new Long March 8 rocket, which means it isn’t really dedicated to commercial launches at all. These pseudo-companies might use it, but they will do so under orders from the communist Chinese government, which supervises everything they do.

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Russia and NASA agree to extend ISS astronaut exchanges on each other’s spacecraft through 2025

9:01 am

Russia and NASA have agreed to extend their barter deal through 2025, whereby each nation sends astronauts to ISS periodically on the other nation’s rockets and capsules.

This is a barter deal, with no exchange of money. The fundamental idea is to make sure astronauts on board ISS understand how the capsules from each nation operate in case of emergency. Russia had initially resisted signing such a deal after SpaceX began providing NASA its Dragon capsules and Falcon 9 rocket to get astronauts to ISS. It said this was because it did not trust SpaceX’s technology, but I suspect Roscosmos was also hoping to squeeze some cash from NASA as it was no longer being paid to fly U.S. astronauts on its Soyuz rocket and capsule. That attempt was futile. For numerous political reasons there was no way NASA was going to pay Russia anything in this barter deal.

Russia then signed on, and will keep extending this agreement until the day ISS is retired, or it finally launches its own station (something that is becoming increasingly unlikely).

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SpaceX completes its second launch in less than 3 hours at Cape Canaveral

9:11 pm

SpaceX tonight launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral less than three hours after a Falcon Heavy lifted off from its second launchpad at Cape Canaveral, carrying an X-37B mini-shuttle.

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

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

96 SpaceX
65 China
19 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 110 to 65, and the entire world combined 110 to 102. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 96 to 102.

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SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket launches the Space Force’s X-37B

6:15 pm

SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket tonight successfully launched one of the two X-37B reuseable mini-shuttles in the Space Force’s fleet, lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

This was the seventh X-37B flight. It is not clear which of the two vehicles was flying, and how many flights it has completed previously. The previous X-37B flight stayed in orbit for a record 908 days, landing safely in November 2022.

The two side boosters completed their fifth flight, landing safely back at Cape Canaveral. The center core was treated as expendable, and was not recovered.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

95 SpaceX (with another launch scheduled later tonight)
65 China
19 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 109 to 65, and the entire world combined 109 to 102. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 95 to 102.

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Japan’s SLIM lunar lander releases its first pictures of Moon

9:50 am

Oblique view of Moon by SLIM
Oblique view of the Moon, as seen by SLIM.
Click for original image.

Japan’s space agency JAXA today released the first pictures taken of the Moon by its SLIM lunar lander after entering lunar orbit on December 25, 2023.

Three images were included in the tweet. The one to the right, reduced to post here, gives an oblique view of the Moon, including its horizon. None of the images are of great scientific value, but all are very significant in terms of SLIM’s engineering. They prove the spacecraft is operating as designed, able to orient itself precisely as well as point its camera correctly. These facts bode well for the precision landing attempt, which is SLIM’s main purpose, now targeting January 24, 2024. The primary goal is to demonstrate the ability for an unmanned spacecraft to land autonomously within a tiny landing zone only 300 feet across.

If SLIM succeeds, it will then hopefully operate for one lunar day, about two weeks. It is not expected to survive the lunar night that follows.

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Japan’s space agency JAXA schedules next H3 rocket launch

9:11 am

JAXA, Japan’s space agency, announced today that it has now scheduled the next test launch of its new H3 rocket for February 15, 2024.

This rocket, built by Mitsubishi for JAXA, is supposed to replace the H2A rocket, which completed its last launch in September 2023. The H3 was supposed to be flying years ago, but has experienced numerous engineering problems throughout its development. It was initially supposed to launch in 2020, but was first delayed to 2021 because of “engine issues,” which were later described as cracks and holes in the engine’s combustion chamber.

That launch date was never met. When JAXA was gearing up to launch in 2022 news sources revealed another yearlong delay until 2023 because of new engine problems, which appeared to require a complete engine redesign.

Then in February 2023 the rocket’s first launch attempt was aborted at T-0 when the two strap-on solid rocket boosters failed to ignite. A second launch attempt a month later failed when the second stage failed during launch.

Even if the rocket successfully launches in February, it still leaves Japan far behind the rest of the space-faring industry. The H3 is entirely expendable, and is far more expensive to launch than the new reuseable rockets in use or being developed by numerous private American companies or other nations. JAXA says it hopes to launch it six times a year, but I can’t imagine it getting even a third that number of customers.

What Japan’s government really needs to do is to get the launch business away from JAXA completely. Let other companies besides Mitsubishi build their own rockets and have JAXA buy their services, rather than try to design its own rockets. This system is working marvelously in the U.S., so much so that India is now aggressively trying to copy it, while communist China has made its own pseudo attempt, somewhat successfully, to do the same for the past five years.

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China launches four more weather satellites

11:43 am

Continuing its annual rush of launches at year’s end, China today used its solid-fueled Kuaizhou-1A rocket to place four weather satellites into orbit, lifting off from its Jiuquan spaceport in the northwest of China. This was the second launch of this rocket with four weather satellites in less than three days.

No word on where the rocket’s lower stages crashed in China, or whether they landed on anyone’s home, as did the core stage of yesterday’s Long March 3B rocket.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
65 China
19 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 108 to 65, and the entire world combined 108 to 102. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 102.

Hat tip to Jay, as I had missed this because I had mistakenly first thought it was the Kuaizhou-1A launch from two days ago, not a second launch.

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Russia launches military satellite

8:49 am

Russia today successfully placed a classified military satellite into orbit, its Soyuz-2 rocket lifting off from its Plesetsk spaceport in the north of Russia.

No other information was released, including where the rocket’s strap-on boosters and core stage crashed inside Russia.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
64 China
19 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 108 to 64, and the entire world combined 108 to 101. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 101.

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Record-setting Falcon 9 1st stage booster lost after landing

3:27 pm

The SpaceX Falcon 9 first stage booster that launched on December 23, 2023 for a record-setting nineteenth time was damaged beyond repair when, after landing on its drone ship successfully, experienced rough seas that caused it to fall over.

The picture at the link shows the crushed booster on its side on the drone ship. SpaceX noted the spectacular history of this booster in a separate tweet:

This one reusable rocket booster alone launched to orbit 2 astronauts and more than 860 satellites — totaling 260+ metric tons — in ~3.5 years.

In a sense, it actually put more mass into orbit that a Saturn 5 rocket, for significant less money though over a much longer period of time.

For SpaceX the loss of this booster is hardly a set back, because it has several other boosters with only a few less total launches in its fleet. Expect one to exceed twenty launches in the near future.

Hat tip to out stringer Jay as well as several readers.

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China launches two GPS-type satellites

8:39 am

China today successfully placed two more of its BeiDou GPS-type satellites into orbit, its Long March 3B rocket lifting off from its Xichang spaceport in the southwest of China.

This footage shows that the rocket’s core stage crashed near homes in China. No word on where the four strap-on boosters and second stage crashed. All use very toxic hypergolic fuels.

This launch continues China’s annual rush of launches at the end of the year. Since everything is owned and run by the Chinese government, one wonders if this pattern is because of the typical government mentality that requires agencies to rush to spend a lot at the end of each year so as to make sure their budgets are not cut.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
64 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 108 to 64, and the entire world combined 108 to 100. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 100.

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Core stage of China’s Long March 5 launched on December 15th about to hit the Earth

10:41 pm

According to the Chinese government, the core stage of Long March 5 that China launched on December 15th will hit the Earth tomorrow, somewhere in the South China Sea.

China warned that remnants of a rocket would hit an area in the South China Sea on Tuesday, following the sixth deployment of its most powerful launch vehicle eleven days ago.

Rocket debris, which generally burns up in the atmosphere on re-entry, is expected to fall off the coast of China’s island province of Hainan between 11:00 a.m. (0300 GMT) and noon (0400 GMT), said the China Maritime Safety Administration.

I have not been able to find out any further information about this rocket body from sources like the Aerospace Corporation that normally track such things. However, that China is predicting a landing spot suggests they have upgraded the engines on the Long March 5’s core stage so that they can be restarted and used to control the stage’s descent over the ocean. If so, this is excellent news, as China has stated that it intends to ramp up launches of this rocket as well as its Long March 5B variation. Prevous launches produced the threat of impacts anywhere on Earth, with one launch in 2020 missing the New York metropolitan area by only a few minutes.

That China wants to bring this down so close to China suggests it also wants to salvage the material.

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China launches three classified satellites into orbit

10:31 pm

China today successfully launched three classified satellites into orbit, its Long March 11 rocket lifting off from a barge off the coast of China in the South China Sea.

No information at all was released about the three satellites, other than they were “experimental.”

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
63 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 108 to 63, and the entire world combined 108 to 99. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 99.

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Japan & NASA negotiating plan to put Japanese astronaut on later Moon landing mission

3:15 pm

According to the Japanese press, Japanese and American government officials are negotiating a plan to include a Japanese astronaut on one of the later Artemis Moon landing missions, presently hoping to fly in the late 2020s.

Japan has been negotiating with the United States, aiming for its first landing on the moon in the late 2020s. Tokyo and Washington will establish and sign an agreement on the activities of Japanese astronauts on the moon as early as next month, according to several government sources.

These stories are likely linked to the blather from Vice President Harris last week saying the U.S. will fly an international astronaut to the Moon before the end of the decade. At the time NASA officials would not confirm her statement, other than to say that NASA had agreed to fly European, Canadian, and Japanese astronauts to its Lunar Gateway station as part of its Artemis lunar program.

Several important details must be noted. First, the schedule for Artemis, as designed by NASA using SLS, Orion, Lunar Gateway, and Starship, is incredibly optimistic. The first manned mission is presently scheduled for 2025, but no one believes that date, including many at NASA. It will likely slip to 2026 or even 2027.

Second, the program is very fluid, and could undergo major changes with a new administration, especially because of the high cost of SLS. Once Starship/Superheavy is flying, at a cost expected to less than 1% of SLS, with an ability to fly frequently instead of once every two or three years, a new government might scrap the entire Artemis program as designed. A shift from SLS to Starship entirely might actually increase the number of astronauts going to the Moon, both from the U.S. and the entire Artemis Accords alliance.

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Japan’s SLIM lunar lander enters orbit around Moon

3:01 pm

SLIM's landing zone
Map showing SLIM landing zone on the Moon.
Click for interactive map.

After almost four months of orbital maneuvers since its launch on September 7, 2023, Japan’s SLIM lunar lander entered lunar orbit today, with a targeted landing date of January 20, 2024.

The landing site is indicated by the map to the right near Shioli Crater. SLIM is mostly an engineering test mission, with its primary goal to test an autonomous unmanned landing system capable of putting a lander down within a small target zone of less than 300 feet across. It has some science instruments on board, but any data obtained from them will be an added bonus, since the lander is only designed to operate for about two weeks, during the first lunar day. It is not expected to survive the two-week long lunar night to follow.

Because of launch delays for both of the American landers, Intuitive Machine’s Nova-C and Astrobotic’s Peregrine, SLIM will make its attempt first.

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China launches four weather satellites

12:08 am

China late today used its Kuaizhou-1A solid-fueled rocket to place four weather satellites into orbit, lifting off from its Jiuquan spaceport in the northwest of China.

No word on where the rocket’s lower stages crashed within China. This launch is the first of four Chinese launches known to be scheduled in the next few days, part of China’s typical rush of launches that seems to happen at the end of every year.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
62 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise still leads China in successful launches 108 to 62, and the entire world combined 108 to 98. SpaceX in turn trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 98.

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SpaceX launches two German military radar satellites

10:39 am

SpaceX today successfully launched two German military radar surveillance satellites, completing a planned three-satellite constellation, with its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.

The first stage completed its eighth flight, landing back at Vandenberg.

This launch almost certainly in the past would have launched on a Arianespace rocket, but Arianespace presently has no operational rocket, its Ariane-5 rocket retired and its Ariane-6 rocket not yet operational. Furthermore, its Vega and Vega-C rockets are grounded due to launch failures, and its partnership with Russia ended with Russia’s invasion of the Ukraine. Thus, SpaceX gets the business, being less expensive than ULA (which also has no rockets available right now to handle this launch) and there being no other company capable of launching such a payload.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

94 SpaceX
61 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 108 to 61, and the entire world combined 108 to 97. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 94 to 97.

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SpaceX launches 23 Starlink satellites

8:54 pm

Early on December 23, 2023 SpaceX successfully launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage successfully completed its 19th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic. This reuse was new record. In fact, the reuse numbers of SpaceX’s fleet Falcon 9 first stages are beginning to resemble the reuse numbers of NASA’s shuttle fleet, and are doing so in a significantly shorter period of time and for a lot less money.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race remain the same:

93 SpaceX
61 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 107 to 61, and the entire world combined 107 to 97. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 93 to 97.

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Firefly successfully launches for the second time in 2023

10:41 am

Alpha seven seconds after liftoff
Alpha seven seconds after liftoff

UPDATE #2: According to a Firefly tweet on X, the second stage failed to fire its second burn. The satellite however was deployed, communications established, and mission operations started. Though its orbit will decay prematurely, it appears the customer, the Space Force, will achieve most of its mission objectives. This should be considered a successful launch, albeit not one that Firefly will want to repeat in this manner.

UPDATE: It appears the upper stage might have had a problem in its final engine burn intended to circularize the orbit for deployment. Either the burn failed to occur, or did not fire correctly. See this tweet. (Hat tip Jay.) I have found other reports that indicate the same question.

The question now is whether this is considered a successful launch. One of its main tasks was to demonstrate fast assembly and prelaunch procedures, for the Space Force. This was accomplished. If the satellite cannot function however is isn’t a full success. I will wait for more information before deciding whether to remove it from the launch stats.

Original post:
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Firefly today successfully completed its second launch in 2023, its third launch overall, its Alpha rocket lifting off from its launchpad at Vandenberg in California.

With this launch Firefly also met its launch prediction for 2023, two launches. The mission was its second for the Space Force this year, both designed to test quick launch procedures. As of posting the payload has not been deployed.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race remain the same:

92 SpaceX
61 China
18 Russia
8 Rocket Lab
7 India

American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 106 to 61, and the entire world combined 106 to 97. SpaceX still trails the rest of the world (excluding other American companies) 92 to 97.

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Chinese astronauts do spacewalk to repair Tiangong-3 solar panel

9:27 am

Two Chinese astronauts yesterday completed a 7.5 hour spacewalk on that country’s Tiangong-3 space station to test a repair technique to what the state-run press said was minor damage on a solar panel from micrometeorites.

The EVA posed new challenges for the astronauts, according to Dong Nengli, deputy chief designer of China’s human spaceflight program. “For the previous extravehicular activities, the major tasks for astronauts were to install and check. This round of extravehicular activities on Thursday we call experimental servicing,” Dong told CCTV. “This time the astronauts operated on one of the solar wings. It is flexible, to a certain extent, and also very thin, which limits the space of operation to a certain degree,” Dong said.

Dong added that the successful EVA meant the teams had mastered the ability for some extravehicular repairs. Success was thus, “laying a solid foundation for us to guarantee the space station’s safety and reliability in the future.”

It must be noted that no specific details about what was done were provided, nor did the short video released by China showing highlights of the spacewalk show the specific repair work.

Nonetheless, there is an aspect of China’s space station that makes it a far more powerful national symbol than ISS: It is China’s alone, built, launched, occupied, and maintained by China alone. It fuels national pride in a way that ISS never has, because President Bill Clinton decided to use it in the 1990s for foreign policy concerns by giving the Russians an equal partnership. Neither the U.S. nor Russia have obtained the same kind of prestige at home and abroad because neither really built ISS on their own. It was a shared effort, which meant neither could claim it.

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ULA’s Vulcan rocket fully stacked for the first time

9:39 am

Peregrine landing site
The landing site for Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander

In preparation for its targeted January 8, 2024 launch, ULA’s Vulcan rocket has now been fully stacked for first time in its assembly building at Cape Canaveral.

ULA’s new rocket has rolled between its vertical hangar and the launch pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station several times for countdown rehearsals and fueling tests. But ULA only needed the Vulcan rocket’s first stage and upper stage to complete those tests. The addition of the payload shroud Wednesday marked the first time ULA has fully stacked a Vulcan rocket, standing some 202 feet (61.6 meters) tall, still surrounded by scaffolding and work platforms inside its assembly building.

It will next be rolled to the launchpad for some final checks prior to launch on January 8, 2023. Unlike most first launches, it carries a real payload, Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander, which hopes to softly place several NASA and commercial payloads near the Gruithuisen Domes in the northwest quadrant of the Moon’s visible hemisphere, as shown on the map above.

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White House issues “policy framework” to lobby for its space regulatory proposal

9:28 am

Faced with stiff opposition from industry and politicians from both parties in Congress to its regulatory proposal issued in mid-November, the White House yesterday released what it called a “policy framework” for implementing that proposal.

You can read this policy framework here [pdf]. It is filled with high-sounding claims about its goal is to encourage private development and reduce red tape, but in the end it only adds more government entities to the entire bureaucracy that regulates commercial space. From the framework itself:

The Secretaries of Commerce and Transportation will co-lead a Private Sector Space Activities Interagency Steering Group in consultation with the Chairperson of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), comprising representation from the Departments of Defense, Energy, Homeland Security, Interior, and State, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the Office of Science and Technology Policy, and any other Federal entities with expertise or equities pertaining to private sector novel space activities, including relevant stakeholders from the Executive Office of the President. The Steering Group serves as a coordinating body to ensure that the U.S. Government oversight system is prepared to meet U.S. priorities while taking into consideration the competitiveness of U.S. industry now and into the future.

One of the criticisms of the White House proposal from mid-November was that it would split regulation between Commerce and Transportation, thus increasing the complexity for commerical companies. This steering group is clearly an effort to answer those complaints, but based on this proposal, it simply adds one more bureaucratic layer to the mix, making things even more complicated.

The framework also calls for the expansion of the government’s regulatory footprint on several fronts, such as controlling orbital debris, and achieved through “expanding existing, or establish new, federal advisory committees to account for all expanded space authorities in furtherance of this Framework and related legislative proposals.”

From the viewpoint of freedom, this entire proposal reads like a zombie end-of-the-world horror film, with bureaucratic zombies appearing endlessly from all directions, aimed at consuming any independent private company as quickly and as thoroughly as possible.

The original commercial space act proposal from Congress, that the Biden administration (and most Democrats) oppose but carries the endorsement of the private commercial space industry, was passed by its House committee, but still needs to be voted on by the full House, as well as the Senate. Because it remains in limbo, the White House has issued this framework, in the hope it can give its side the ammunition needed to defeat that bill and replace it with the White House’s.

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Starship prototype #28 completes full duration static fire test

8:49 pm

Gearing up for Starship/Superheavy orbital test flight #3: Starship prototype #28 today successfully completed a full duration static fire test, with all six engines firing for about five seconds.

The link goes to SpaceX’s X feed, and shows that test.

This is more evidence that SpaceX intends to be ready in all ways to do that third orbital test flight of Superheavy/Starship by mid-January, at the latest. It also suggests the company is getting close to finishing its investigation into the previous test flight in mid-November.

Of course, none of this means it will launch in mid-January. I predict SpaceX will be stuck twiddling its thumbs waiting for a launch license from the FAA, which will also be waiting for an okay from Fish & Wildlife. Both will likely be forced to work as slowly as possible, likely because of interference from the White House.

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Congress passes short term extension of commercial space regulatory “learning period”

9:19 am

The Senate yesterday passed a short term extension of the regulatory “learning period” at the FAA that limits its ability to regulate commercial space.

[The Senate] quickly passed an extension of the FAA’s authorization, a final piece of “must pass” legislation before the end of the year. The bill (H.R. 6503) passed the House on December 11. Among other things, it extends the “learning period” for commercial human spaceflight until March 9, 2024 that otherwise would have expired on January 1. The learning period, or “moratorium,” prohibits the FAA from promulgating new regulations on commercial human spaceflight while the industry is in its infancy.

The president still needs to sign this bill, but that is expected.

Originally passed in 2004 as an eight-year period, this “learning period” has been extended several times since. The industry wants a longer extension, as it still considers itself quite rightly to be in an experimental test phase, not operational in the sense of airplane manufacture.

Not that this extension matters. It appears in the past two years that the regulators at the FAA have decided to ignore the law and make believe this learning period really doesn’t exist, based on how that agency has treated test launches by SpaceX and others. Rather than let their launches proceed quickly as tests, the FAA has begun to treat each test as an operational flight that requires a long investigation before further launch approvals are given.

Unless there is a major change in leadership in the White House, we should expect a major slow-down of the American launch industry in the coming years, regardless of whether this “learning period” is extended or not.

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Launch of Intuitive Machines Nova-C lunar lander delayed until February

8:45 am

South Pole of Moon with landing sites

Because of scheduling conflicts impacting other SpaceX launches now, SpaceX and Intuitive Machines have delayed the launch of the latter’s Nova-C lunar lander from a mid-January to a mid-February launch window.

The conflict involves the use of the launchpad, that the Falcon Heavy also uses. Technical issues had forced SpaceX to reschedule its next launch to December 28, 2023, leaving little time afterward to reconfigure the pad for the Falcon 9 Nova-C mid-January launch window. Any Falcon Heavy launch delays due to weather would likely make that mid-January window impossible, so the companies have decided better to reschedule now.

Nova-C is targeting a crater rim near the Moon’s south pole, as shown on the map to the right. The floor of that crater is thought to be permanently shadowed, but Nova-C does not have the capability to enter it. This mission is mostly an engineering test mission, to prove Intuitive Machine’s design. If it works, it will operate on the Moon surface for one lunar day, about two weeks. The company then has two more lunar missions contracted with NASA, with the next mission aiming to fly in 2024 as well.

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Spain’s new space agency

9:32 am

Link here. The article provides a detailed description of the history leading up to the formation in March 2023 of Spain’s new space agency, Agencia Espacial Española (AEE) (the Spanish Space Agency in English).

It appears the goal was to consolidate Spain’s government space operations from eleven different agencies so as to better coordinate that government’s work with the nation’s burgeoning new commercial space sector.

By law, Spain has created the AEE without any increase in public spending. The new agency has been allocated an initial budget of 700 million euros per year, which was primarily drawn from funding for ESA [European Space Agency] participation, the CDTI, and INTA [two other Spanish agencies]. However, it is expected that the AEE will receive higher budgets in the future for the development of its own programs outside those directly linked to the ESA. The task of financing space activity public and private alike is of utmost importance, and one of the agency’s roles should be to create mechanisms for making investment attractive and effective, either directly or through public-private partnerships — a model that is producing excellent results in several countries around the world, like the United States. [emphasis mine]

It appears the goal is to emulate the policies followed by NASA in the past few years, buy services and products from the private sector rather than build these things within the government. If so, AEE will likely help jumpstart that new space industry. Whether it can stay focused on this goal, or shift into a typical government empire-building operation that sucks the life out of everything, will be its real fundamental test.

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Firefly schedules second launch in 2023

9:19 am

Firefly has now scheduled the second launch of its Alpha rocket in 2023, with a launch window of about 20 minutes on the morning of Decmeber 20, 2023.

The payload is a smallsat from Lockheed Martin testing new antenna technology, but the launch is for the Space Force. Like the previous September 15, 2023 launch, it is designed to test the ability of Firefly to get a payload into orbit quickly, from assembly to launch.

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China’s X-37B copy deploys six independent satellites

8:56 am

Four days after it was launched last week, China’s unnamed reuseable mini-shuttle, essentially a copy of the Space Force’s X-37B, deployed six independent small satellites that appear to be emitting a variety of signals.

The objects have been given letter names, A through F. Because their deployment occurred at different times they are in different orbits than the mini-shuttle, though all orbits cross at some point. The radio signals appear to be either simple beacons or signals of an as-yet undetermined nature.

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UK finally gives Saxavord spaceport a license

11:33 am

Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea
Proposed spaceports surrounding Norwegian Sea.

The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) in the United Kingdom finally issued a spaceport license today to the Saxavord spaceport on the Shetland Islands, thirteen months after the application was submitted.

This license however does not mean that launches will take place anytime soon. First, Saxavord will have to resume construction of its facilities, which ceased earlier this year because of the CAA hadn’t issued the permit. Moreover, this license does not allow launches. As noted by the CAA:

Spaceport licences allow a person or organisation to operate a spaceport, they are granted in the UK under the Space Industry Act 2018 (SIA). For a launch to happen an operator will need to have developed and proven their technology, be operationally ready, and have a launch licence from the UK Civil Aviation Authority. [emphasis mine]

The highlighted language is especially crushing, because it literally forbids the launch of any new untested rocket. Since every single rocket so far being developed for these two spaceports is new and untested, none will be allowed to launch unless they move operations elsewhere. This requirement explains for example why the startup ABL shifted its next launch from the Sutherland spaceport — it had hoped to launch this year — to Kodiak, Alaska. Orbex will have even more problems, as it has signed a fifty year lease to launch its new Prime rocket from Sutherland, with its rocket factory close by. If it can’t test fly Prime from Sutherland the company will be very badly hampered.

Even if these companies eventually get launch licenses for their untried rockets, expect such approvals to take a very long time, based on the CAA’s past and present history. It took the CAA almost a year to approve Virgin Orbit’s launch license, essentially bankrupting the company.

Nor are my conclusions here — which I have been stating now for more than a year — simply opinions. They have now been confirmed by a new report issued only a few days ago by the UK Space Agency, which admitted the following:
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