Tag: spaceflight

Starliner at ISS: One thruster shut down, another helium leak found, and a new valve issue

9:45 am

According to an update from NASA yesterday, engineers are evaluating three different on-going technical issues with Boeing’s Starliner capsule, presently docked at ISS.

First, of the 28 attitude thrusters on the capsule’s service module, one remains what NASA calls “deselected”, which means it is presently shut down and not in the loop during operations.

Ground teams plan to fire all 28 RCS thrusters after undocking to collect additional data signatures on the service module thrusters before the hardware is expended.

Since the service module is ejected and burns up in the atmosphere, they want to test each thruster beforehand, probably one-by-one to gather as much data as possible. They have to do this after undocking because testing the thrusters while attached to ISS is too risky.

Second, it appears engineers have detected a fifth small helium leak.
» Read more

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Evidence of giant asteroid collision in debris disk surrounding the star Beta Pictoris

9:48 am

Data difference between Spitzer and Webb
Click for original figure.

Scientists comparing infrared data collected twenty years apart — first by the Spitzer Space Telescope and then by the Webb Space Telescope — think they have detected evidence of a gigantic asteroid collision in the debris disk that surrounds the very young star Beta Pictoris, located 63 light years away.

The graph to the right shows the change found between the observations. From the caption:

Scientists theorize that the massive amount of dust seen in the 2004–05 image from the Spitzer Space Telescope indicates a collision of asteroids that had largely cleared by the time the James Webb Space Telescope captured its images in 2023.

…When Spitzer collected the earlier data, scientists assumed something like small bodies grinding down would stir and replenish the dust steadily over time. But Webb’s new observations show the dust disappeared and was not replaced. The amount of dust kicked up is about 100,000 times the size of the asteroid that killed the dinosaurs, Chen said.

It is believed by scientists that the debris disk that surrounds Beta Pictoris is comparable to the early solar system when the planets first started to form. This collision could be similar to the kind of collision that is thought to have formed the Moon, when a large Mars-sized object smashed into the early Earth.

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Scientists: Water frost detected in calderas of four Martian volcanos

9:33 am

Frost found on four Martian volcanoes

Scientists using data from two European Mars orbiters think they have detected patches of transient water frost in the calderas of four Martian volcanos, all located in the dry equatorial regions of Mars where previously no near-surface ice has been seen.

According to the study, the frost is present for only a few hours after sunrise before it evaporates in sunlight. The frost is also incredibly thin — likely only one-hundredth of a millimeter thick or about the width of a human hair. Still, it’s quite vast. The researchers calculate the frost constitutes at least 150,000 tons of water that swaps between the surface and atmosphere each day during the cold seasons. That’s the equivalent of roughly 60 Olympic-size swimming pools.

You can read the research paper here. The volcanoes with frost were Olympus Mons, Arsia Mons, Ascraeus Mons, and Ceraunius Tholus, as shown by the blue dots on the overview map to the right. All are in the dry tropics of Mars.

The researchers believe the frost comes from the atmosphere, like dew forming in the morning on Earth. For it to take place at these high elevations on Mars however is astonishing. At these high elevations the atmosphere is extremely thin. Furthermore, the dry tropics have so far been found to contain no near-surface water or ice to fuel these processes.

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Starliner’s stay at ISS extended several days

9:10 am

NASA revealed yesterday that it has extended the time that Boeing’s Starliner capsule will remained docked at ISS several days, with undocking now set for June 18, 2024.

New station visitors Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, both veteran NASA astronauts, learned on Sunday they will orbit Earth until June 18 before returning home aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. The extra days in space will allow teams more time to checkout Starliner’s systems and free up the Expedition crew’s schedule for more spacewalk preparations.

I also suspect that Boeing engineers wanted more time to analyze the data on Starliner’s attitude thrusters and why several failed to work on the flight up to the station. Once the spacecraft undocks with Wilmore and Williams, it will be esssential for those thrusters to work reliably to get both home safely. The capsule can return home even with some of the spacecraft’s 28 attitude thrusters non-functioning, but if a failure occurs at an unexpected moment the results could still be bad.

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French startup gets another space station cargo contract

9:02 am

The French startup The Exploration Company has gotten its fourth contract for its proposed Nyx unmanned reusable cargo capsule, signing a deal with Vast to fly one freighter mission to its proposed second Haven station.

This startup, which has not yet flown anything, already had contracts to fly one cargo mission to ISS (a demo mission for the European Space Agency), one to Axiom’s space station, and three to Voyager Space’s Starlab station. This new contract means The Exploration Company already has a manifest of six missions.

These contracts pose a puzzle. Why is this startup getting all these deals, but not Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus or SpaceX’s Dragon capsules? Or have these two American companies signed deals without the same PR splash?

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Bill Anders, the thoughtful astronaut who liked to go fast

12:27 pm

Bill Anders suiting up for the December 1968 launch of Apollo 8
Bill Anders suiting up for the December 1968
launch of Apollo 8

The death of Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders on June 7, 2024 requires that I give the public my own personal taste of the man, whom I met and interviewed when I was writing my 1998 history of the Apollo 8 mission to the Moon, Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8.

The first time I met Bill Anders was in 1997. Anders had told me to fly into Los Angeles for our first interview. A few days before my arrival, however, his wife Valerie realized that both she and Anders would not be in Los Angeles, but in San Diego.

Rather than have me change flights, Anders agreed to drive up to LA, pick me up at the airport, and drive me to San Diego so I could interview Valerie. During the two hour drive I would be able to interview him.

Anders was waiting for me as I exited the terminal. As I have noticed routinely, he seemed much smaller than I expected, as does every astronaut at first meeting. Anders guided me to a low-slung sports car, which he slid into with ease. I — being 6′ 4″ — had to crowbar my way in.

And then Anders demonstrated instantly one reason he was chosen to fly to the Moon. He started the car, and backed out of the parking space and out of the lot at what seemed to me to be about seventy miles an hour. And he did it with total control.
» Read more

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After only seven commercial flights, Virgin Galactic retires Unity

9:33 am

The delays have never really ended: After only seven commercial flights (the most recent this past weekend), Virgin Galactic has now retired its Unity suborbital spacecraft, and will cease flights for two years while it builds a new generation suborbital craft.

Virgin Galactic flew the last commercial flight of Virgin SpaceShip (VSS) Unity yesterday. Future suborbital trips will have to wait until the new Delta-class spaceships are ready in 2026. They can carry six passengers instead of four, increasing revenue. This flight, Galactic 07, took a Turkish researcher and three private individuals across the imaginary line that separates air and space for a few minutes of weightlessness.

Founded in 2004 and largely funded by Sir Richard Branson as part of his Virgin Group, Virgin Galactic is still trying to demonstrate that commercial suborbital human spaceflight can be a profitable business. Last year Branson told the Financial Times he would stop investing in Virgin Galactic, putting pressure on CEO Michael Colglazier to cut costs and focus on getting the Delta version flying. After all these years of waiting to fly commercial passengers,VSS Unity will stop after just one year and seven commercial flights.

Branson had promised that Virgin Galactic would be flying hundreds of times per year by the mid-2000s. Didn’t happen. Virgin Galactic took deposits from hundreds (it claimed), but even now has only flown 30 people on those seven flights, many of whom have been recent customers, not the many original supporters. That’s the sum total of all of Richard Branson’s achievement with this company in two decades.

Now, with Branson out of the picture, the new management has to redo everything again, because what Branson designed was not profitable. I have serious doubts the company will fly again in 2026.

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SpaceX completes two Starlink launches hours apart

9:49 am

SpaceX last night completed two Starlink launches hours apart from opposite coasts. First its Falcon 9 rocket took 23 Starlink satellites into orbit, lifting off from Cape Canaveral. The first stage completed its 16th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

Then, a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Vandenberg carried 20 Starlink satellites into orbit, its first stage completing its 21st flight (tying the record), landing safely on a drone ship in the Pacific.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

62 SpaceX
27 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise now leads the world combined in successful launches, 72 to 41, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including other American companies, 62 to 51.

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Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders, 90, killed in plane crash

8:59 pm

Earthrise as seen from Apollo 8, December 1968

Apollo 8 astronaut Bill Anders, 90, who took the iconic Earthrise picture (to the right and oriented as he framed it when he snapped it), was killed today when the plane he was piloting went down in the waters near the San Juan Islands off the coast of the state of Washington.

A report came in around 11:40 a.m. that an older-model plane crashed into the water and sank near the north end of Jones Island, San Juan County Sheriff Eric Peter said. Greg Anders confirmed to KING-TV that his father’s body was recovered Friday afternoon.

Only the pilot was on board the Beech A45 airplane at the time, according to the Federal Aviation Association.

I will have more to write about Anders later, whom I had met and interviewed many times when I was writing Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8. Of all the astronauts, he was probably the most thoughtful about matters outside of engineering, space exploration, or aviation.

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A close-up of rocks on Mars

10:30 am

Curiosity's robot arm about to take a close look at the ground
Click for original image.

Close-up of rocks on Mars
Click for original image.

Cool image time! The picture to the right, cropped, reduced, and sharpened to post here, was taken on June 6, 2024 by Curiosity’s Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI), located at the end of the rover’s robot arm and designed to get close-up high resolution images of the ground that the arm is exploring.

The picture above, taken just after the one to the right and cropped, reduced, sharpened, and annotated to post here, shows the robot arm shortly after it has rotated upward after placing MAHLI right up against the ground. Note the tread marks. The science team apparently chose these target rocks because they were likely ground somewhat as the rover rolled over them, breaking the rocks to expose new faces.

According to the scientists, the camera was about two to three inches away from these rocks when it snapped the picture, with the scale about 16 to 25 microns per pixel. Since a micron is one millionth of a meter, this picture is showing us some very small details within a much larger rock.

I post this because I have rarely seen such colorful and crystal-like surface features from Curiosity.

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Chinese pseudo-company raises $207 million

9:53 am

The Chinese pseudo-company Space Pioneer announced yesterday that it has raised an additional $207 million from Chinese investment sources during its most recent funding round, bringing the total amount it has raised to $552 million.

Space Pioneer—full name Beijing Tianbing Technology Co., Ltd—announced the funding worth more than 1.5 billion yuan ($207 million) June 6. At least 15 investors participated in the funding, including a mix of private equity and state-linked investment vehicles.

These include state-linked Wuxi Chuangfa, CCTV Fund, CITIC Securities Investment, Hefei Ruicheng and SDIC Taikang, and private equity and investment firms Bohua Capital Management, Guoyu Gaohua, Deyue Investment and more.

The company is developing its Tianlong-3 reusable rocket, essentially a copy of SpaceX’s Falcon 9. It already has completed one launch of its Tianlong-2 expendable rocket, using government engines.

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Iran to build coastal spaceport

9:47 am

Iran's spaceports

According to Issa Zarepour, Iran’s minister of communications and information technology, Iran is now planning a new spaceport on its southern coast near the city of Chabahar.

“[The process of construction of] the first phase of the port is being completed thanks to round-the-clock endeavor,” he said. He noted that the process had so far witnessed as much as “56-percent physical progress.”

“The facility would be inaugurated by the Ten-Day Dawn ceremonies,” the minister said. He was referring to the 10-day-long annual celebrations that mark the historic run-up to the victory of the country’s Islamic Revolution in 1979. The celebrations will start in late January next year.

The spaceport is expected to host its first launch by next March, Zarepour added.

The map shows Chabahar’s location. It also shows Iran’s present spaceport in Semnan, where it has previously launched all its rockets.

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ESA signs deal with Vast to use its Haven-1 space station

2:51 pm

Vast Haven-1 station inside Falcon-9 fairing
Vast Haven-1 station inside Falcon-9 fairing

The European Space Agency (ESA) and the commercial space station startup Vast today signed an agreement that sets the initial terms for ESA to use Vast’s first space station, Haven-1, as well as any space stations to follow.

The agreement outlines the parties’ intention to foster human spaceflight, science, technology and commercialisation development and explore collaboration in low Earth orbit destinations other than the International Space Station. The collaboration will initially focus on exploring opportunities for access to space for Europe through the Vast Space Stations. These could include:

  • Access to the Vast Space Stations for ESA and its Member States, for astronaut missions and research activities as well as commercial business development.
  • Supporting European industry to supply subsystems and equipment for future Vast Space Stations.
  • Vast making use of future qualified European LEO cargo and/or crew transportation services, at market rates and commercially viable terms and conditions, also as a means for offsetting future ESA Astronaut Missions.
  • Vast and ESA jointly supporting European industry in getting certified for docking to future Vast Space Stations.

This deal is actually a very big deal, as Vast’s Haven-1 space station is the only one under construction that does not have a deal with NASA. It is being financed privately and will at first simply be a one module habitat set to launch as early as August 2025 on a Falcon 9 rocket, with the first 30-day 4-person manned mission to follow almost immediately on a Dragon capsule. Vast’s work is closely linked with SpaceX, as its station also has a deal to use Starlink for communications.

The plan is to add more modules in the coming years to build up to a full station.

This deal not only indicates that this independent station is going to give the NASA-supported stations some real competition, it indicates that Europe is committed to doing the same. Now that Europe has abandoned the government-owned and international cooperation model it has used for decades with decidedly mixed results and switched to the capitalism model, where it is merely a customer buying things from a competing private sector, it is doing so full speed ahead, without any hesitation.

The independence of this station also frees it and its customers from the heavy rules that NASA routinely imposes on anyone who deals with it. This aspect gives Vast a competitive advantage that many will clearly wish to take advantage of.

This deal is therefore a challenge that better be recognized by NASA and the other commercial stations. If they don’t react properly they could find themselves left in the dust completely.

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Boeing’s Starliner successfully docks with ISS

10:57 am

Despite several minor helium leaks and the failure of 6 of its 28 small attitude thrusters (four of which were reactivated during an improvised hot fire test during rendezvous operations), Boeing’s Starliner has successfully docked with ISS today.

Though now safely arrived at ISS, the hatch has not yet opened. The spacecraft carries NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, and will now spend about a week at the space station checking out its systems before undocking and returning to Earth.

All told, this docking is a success, though the various thruster issues are a concern that must be addressed by Boeing, especially because there were thruster issues as well during the previous unmanned demo flight.

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Webb detects carbon in early galaxy, far earlier than expected

8:43 am

The uncertainty of science: Astronomers using the Webb Space Telescope have detected evidence of carbon in a galaxy estimated to exist only 350 million years after the Big Bang, much sooner than any theory had predicted such an element could have developed.

“We were surprised to see carbon so early in the universe, since it was thought that the earliest stars produced much more oxygen than carbon,” said Maiolino. “We had thought that carbon was enriched much later, through entirely different processes, but the fact that it appears so early tells us that the very first stars may have operated very differently.”

According to some models, when the earliest stars exploded as supernovas, they may have released less energy than initially expected. In this case, carbon, which was in the stars’ outer shell and less gravitationally bound than oxygen, could have escaped more easily and spread throughout the galaxy, while a large amount of oxygen fell back and collapsed into a black hole.

The paper is available here.

The scientists are struggling to explain this result in the context of the Big Bang theory itself, and have come up with scenarios where it will work. However, the fact that Webb has found another data point suggesting the early universe was more complicated than any model predicted increases the difficulty in producing Big Bang models that will work.

All in all, there remains great uncertainty here. This particular observation required 65 hours of observation time. Pulling real data from these very distant points of light remains quite challenging.

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Lunar samples transferred to Chang’e-6 return vehicle

7:54 am

According to China’s state-run press, the ascent vehicle has docked with the Chang’e-6 orbiter and successfully transferred its lunar samples to the return spacecraft that will bring those samples back to Earth.

The ascender of China’s Chang’e-6 probe successfully rendezvoused and docked with the probe’s orbiter-returner combination in lunar orbit at 2:48 p.m. (Beijing Time) on Thursday, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced.

The container carrying the world’s first samples from the far side of the moon had been transferred from the ascender to the returner safely by 3:24 p.m., the CNSA said.

That return is scheduled for later this month. In the meantime the orbiter will adjust its position in preparation for sending the return capsule back.

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SpaceX successfully launches and lands Starship and Superheavy

7:20 am

Damaged but working flap on Starship
Damaged but working flap on Starship

SpaceX this morning successfully launched and landed both Starship and Superheavy in the ocean, with both vehicles splashing down in a vertical position as planned.

Some quick details:

  • One engine on Superheavy failed during launch, but the vehicle completed its job, successfully releasing Starship as planned.
  • Superheavy then completed a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico, landing softly and vertically. It then tipped over into the water as planned. At this moment it is unclear how successful it was in landing precisely at its planned location. One engine during the landing burn failed.
  • Unlike the previous test, Starship flew under control for its entire flight, even though the camera view showed a flap actually begin breaking up.
  • That flap, despite damage, appeared to function through landing. The screen capture to the right was taken just before landing, as the flap adjusted its position despite the significant damage near its attachment point to the ship.
  • It appeared that Starship successfully completed its flip to vertical just before landing.
  • At landing it was unclear if the landing burn occurred as planned. It did appear the spacecraft splashed down softly, and the controllers announced the burn occurred, but the indicators on the screen showed no engine burn.

Overall, this launch was an incredible success. Based on the results, the fifth test flight should be approved by the FAA relatively quickly. The FAA’s responsibility is supposed to be limited to just issues of safety. As long as SpaceX demonstrates the rocket landed where it was intended, the FAA has no cause to delay future approvals.

If so, the next launch could occur very quickly, as the next prototypes are ready and waiting. We could see another launch within two months, at the most. I predict late July, though it could be a bit later if SpaceX engineers need more time to analyze what happened to Starship during descent and then apply that knowledge to the next prototype.

UPDATE: China also had a successful launch this morning. Pseudo-company Galactic Energy’s Ceres-1 rocket placed three satellites into orbit, lifting off from the Jiuquan spaceport in the northwest of China.

Little information was released by China’s state-run press, which didn’t even bother to mention the pseudo-company’s name in its report. The solid-fueled lower stages landed somewhere inside China, but we have no idea where or how close to habitable areas.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

60 SpaceX
27 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise now leads the world combined in successful launches, 70 to 41, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including other American companies, 60 to 51.

Note that for context the U.S. total at this moment, 70 launches and achieved in less than half a year, matches the nation’s previous annual record set in 1966 and held until 2022.

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Firefly gets a major 25-launch contract from Lockheed Martin

9:02 pm

Firefly today announced that Lockheed Martin has awarded it a launch contract for 25 launches through 2029.

The contract “commits Lockheed Martin to 15 launch reservations and 10 optional launches.”

What is interesting about this agreement is who Lockheed did not give the launches to. Lockheed Martin has been a major investor in Rocket Lab, which is about to complete its 50th operational launch. It also has been a major investor in the rocket startup ABL, which in 2021 Lockheed Martin awarded its own giant launch contract for 58 launches through 2029.

ABL however has not yet had a successful launch. It tried twice in 2022, but has done nothing since. It could very well be that this new contract for Firefly is a signal that Lockheed Martin has lost faith in ABL, that there are more fundamental problems in that company. Those problems could also be related to the new regulatory burdens from the FAA that in the past two years appear to have slowed development by all American rocket startups.

That Lockheed Martin did not give this contract to Rocket Lab, which is flying, could be because Lockheed is trying to encourage the development of multiple small satellite launchers, in order to provide its main satellite-making business a variety of good options.

Either way, this deal strengthens Firefly’s position, even though its Alpha rocket has only had two launches (in 2022 and 2023), both of which put the payloads in orbit but failed to place them in the correct orbit. Moreover, the company has said it would launch four times in 2024, and as yet to launch once.

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ESA schedules first Ariane-6 launch for July 9, 2024

10:07 am

After years of delays and technical problems the European Space Agency (ESA) today announced that it has finally scheduled the first Ariane-6 launch, now to take place on July 9, 2024 from French Guiana.

The press release at the link tries to paint a glowing future for Ariane-6, as illustrated by this quote from Stéphane Israël, CEO of Arianespace.

“With 30 missions in our order book, Ariane 6 has already gained the trust of institutional and commercial customers. We are preparing to make Ariane 6’s second launch by the end of the year, followed by a steady rise to around ten launches a year once we reach cruising speed. It represents a splendid challenge for Arianespace and our partners.”

The simple fact is that Ariane-6 costs too much to launch and is not competitive with the new generation of reuseable rockets. If Amazon’s management had not decided to give it a big launch contract (in order to avoid giving that money to SpaceX), it would have very few payloads to launch. Once those launches are completed expect Ariane-6 to go the way of the dodo and the buggy whip, replaced by a new fleet of competing private European rocket companies capable of doing things faster and cheaper.

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Hubble goes to one-gyro mode, limiting the telescope’s observational capabilities; NASA rejects private repair mission

9:59 am

Story Musgrave on the shuttle robot arm during the last spacewalk of the 1993 Hubble repair mission
Story Musgrave on the shuttle robot arm during
the last spacewalk of the 1993 Hubble repair mission

After the third safe mode event in six months, all caused by issues with the same gyroscope, engineers have decided to shift the Hubble Space Telescope to what they call one-gyro mode, whereby the telescope is pointed using only one gyroscope, and the remaining working gyro is kept in reserve.

The spacecraft had six new gyros installed during the fifth and final space shuttle servicing mission in 2009. To date, three of those gyros remain operational, including the gyro currently experiencing problems, which the team will continue to monitor. Hubble uses three gyros to maximize efficiency but can continue to make science observations with only one gyro. NASA first developed this plan more than 20 years ago, as the best operational mode to prolong Hubble’s life and allow it to successfully provide consistent science with fewer than three working gyros. Hubble previously operated in two-gyro mode, which is negligibly different from one-gyro mode, from 2005-2009. One-gyro operations were demonstrated in 2008 for a short time with no impact to science observation quality.

While continuing to make science observations in one-gyro mode, there are some expected minor limitations. The observatory will need more time to slew and lock onto a science target and won’t have as much flexibility as to where it can observe at any given time. It also will not be able to track moving objects closer than Mars, though these are rare targets for Hubble.

This NASA press release is carefully spun to hide the simple fact that in one-gyro mode, the telescope will simply not be able to take sharp pictures. » Read more

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ULA’s Atlas-5 launches Boeing’s Starliner capsule on its first manned mission

9:17 am

After many delays and scrubs involving both the rocket and the capsule, ULA’s Atlas-5 rocket today successfully launched Boeing’s Starliner capsule on its first manned mission, carrying NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams.

I have embedded the live stream below, cued to just before liftoff. The spacecraft will dock with ISS tomorrow, where Wilmore and Williams will spend a week checking out the capsule’s operations before undocking and returning to Earth.

As this was only the third launch this year for ULA, the leader board for the 2024 launch race doesn’t change:

59 SpaceX
26 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise now leads the world combined in successful launches, 69 to 40, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including other American companies, 59 to 50.

» Read more

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SpaceX and Rocket Lab complete successful launches

8:45 pm

This evening both SpaceX and Rocket Lab completed launches only about an hour apart but on opposite sides of the world.

First, SpaceX this evening successfully launched another 20 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its 20th flight, landing safely on a drone ship in the Atlantic.

Next, Rocket Lab completed the second to two launches for NASA, placing the second Prefire climate satellite into orbit, following the first launch on May 25, 2024. Its Electron rocket lifted off from Rocket Lab’s launchpad in New Zealand.

The leaders in the 2024 launch race:

59 SpaceX
26 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab

American private enterprise now leads the world combined in successful launches, 68 to 40, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including other American companies, 59 to 49.

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June 4, 2024 Quick space links

5:18 pm

Courtesy of BtB’s stringer Jay. This post is also an open thread. I welcome my readers to post any comments or additional links relating to any space issues, even if unrelated to the links below.

 

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FAA issues launch license for the fourth test orbital launch of Starship/Superheavy

3:10 pm

FAA today issued [pdf] the launch license for SpaceX’s fourth test orbital launch of Starship/Superheavy, effective June 4, 2024, thus allowing the company to proceed with its planned June 6, 2024 launch date.

The two-hour launch window opens at 7 am (Central). SpaceX’s live stream will begin 30 minutes earlier. From SpaceX’s Starship website:

The fourth flight test turns our focus from achieving orbit to demonstrating the ability to return and reuse Starship and Super Heavy. The primary objectives will be executing a landing burn and soft splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico with the Super Heavy booster, and achieving a controlled entry of Starship.

To accomplish this, several software and hardware upgrades have been made to increase overall reliability and address lessons learned from Flight 3. The SpaceX team will also implement operational changes, including the jettison of the Super Heavy’s hot-stage following boostback to reduce booster mass for the final phase of flight.

Flight 4 will fly a similar trajectory as the previous flight test, with Starship targeted to splashdown in the Indian Ocean. This flight path does not require a deorbit burn for reentry, maximizing public safety while still providing the opportunity to meet our primary objective of a controlled Starship reentry.

This FAA approval is wonderful news, considering the red-tape delays the agency has previously caused to SpaceX’s efforts. It suggests that officials there are trying hard to speed up their paperwork. If so, the gap between this flight and fifth might be shorter than the three month gap seen between the third flight in March and this flight on June 6th.

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ESA requests information from European rocket startups

9:16 am

The European Space Agency (ESA) has released a request for information from European rocket startups to outline their capabilities and plans so that ESA can assess whether they qualify for future launch contracts.

Currently, ESA is working towards publishing a competitive tender in early 2025 for the award of contracts to allow European launch providers to demonstrate their ability to provide the capacity to serve institutional mission needs. To better define this competitive tender and align the challenge in the best possible way to incentivize providers, ESA has published a Request for Information call. “This Campaign will let economic operators express their views and expectations on the future of European access to space and actively participate in the definition of the European Launcher Challenge,” explains the call.

The call is limited to companies in Europe. The information the companies provide will then be used by ESA to shape the actual contract offers in 2025. The long term goal is for independent and competing European rocket companies to replace the Ariane-6, and provide a fleet of rockets of all types capable of launching European payloads faster and for much less money.

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French startup captures Russian satellite maneuvering close to another geosynchronous satellite

9:09 am

The French startup Aldoria has released a short movie taken by its ground telescopes showing a Russian “inspector” satellite maneuvering close to another geosynchronous satellite.

In a recent operation, Aldoria detected a sudden close approach by the Russian Luch Olymp K-2 (Luch-2) to a satellite positioned in geostationary orbit (GEO). This manoeuvre occurred on April 12, around 35,780 km in altitude, highlighting the increasing complexity of space activities. Luch Olymp 2, known for its unusual manoeuvres was predicted, by Aldoria, to closely approach the satellite prior to the observed manoeuvre. The original Luch-1, launched in 2014, was known for similar abnormal behaviour, creating a heightened sense of vigilance within the space community. Luch-2, like its predecessor, has a history of unusual manoeuvring near other satellites in geostationary orbit, which has also generated suspicions regarding its mission.

You can see the video here.

In the past year it appears the entire aerospace industry in Europe has come alive, no longer captured by the European Space Agency’s government-owned commercial arm, Arianespace. Instead, there are companies popping up everywhere, doing the kinds of entrepreneurial work American companies have been known to do since the founding of the country.

The competition for business and the amount of innovation in space should get very brisk in the next few years.

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SpaceX now targeting June 6, 2024 for Starship/Superheavy launch

8:58 am

Over the weekend SpaceX announced on X that it has now delayed by one day its targeted date for the fourth orbital test flight of its Starship/Superheavy rocket, from June 5th to June 6th.

No reason was given for the delay, though the company notes on its webpage for the mission that it is still awaiting regulatory approval.

Musk underlined the company’s readiness to launch however with his own tweet on June 2, stating simply that “Starship is ready to fly.”

From the FAA however we still have silence.

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Chang’e-6 ascender carrying lunar samples lifts off Moon

8:52 am

Chang'e-6's robot arm grabbing ground samples
Chang’e-6’s robot arm grabbing ground samples.
Image is a screen capture from mission control
main screen. Click for original.

Early today the ascender of China’s Chang’e-6 lunar probe lifted off the surface on the Moon’s far side, carrying the samples it had obtained both by drilling and the use of a robot arm.

The ascender took off at 7:38 a.m. (Beijing Time) from the moon’s far side. A 3,000-newton engine, after working for about six minutes, pushed the ascender to the preset lunar orbit, according to the CNSA.

The Chang’e-6 probe, comprising an orbiter, a lander, an ascender and a returner — like its predecessor Chang’e-5 — was launched on May 3. The lander-ascender combination, separated from the orbiter-returner combination on May 30, touched down at the designated landing area in the South Pole-Aitken (SPA) Basin on June 2.

The spacecraft finished its intelligent and rapid sampling work, and the samples were stowed in a container inside the ascender of the probe as planned, the CNSA said.

At some point, not yet specified, the ascender will dock with the orbiter-returner and transfer the samples to the returner, which after a period in orbit awaiting the right moment will then separate and head back to Earth.

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China releases movie taken by Chang’e-6 during its lunar descent

8:45 am

Chang'e-6 landing zone
Chang’e-6’s landing zone is indicated by the
red box, on the edge of Apollo Creater
(indicated by the wavy circle).

China’s state-run press yesterday released a short movie created from images taken by its Chang’e-6 lander during its descent to the lunar surface on the far side of the Moon this past weekend.

I have embedded that footage below. The final five frames however are very puzzling, in that they do not appear to show a smooth descent to a specific spot, but appear to jump about wildly. Moreover, the footage does not appear to show the actual landing itself, but appears to stop while the spacecraft is still above the ground.

It is possible that this footage is simply showing the spacecraft’s software searching for a good landing spot, combined with a decision in China not to release footage of the actual touchdown. It could also be that something has gone wrong, and they are stalling about saying so. This last possibility I think very unlikely, but it must be considered, based on the information available.
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NASA confirms June 5th as new launch date for Starliner

8:33 am

NASA yesterday evening confirmed that the agency, ULA, and Boeing are now targeting June 5, 2024 at 10:52 am (Eastern) for the launch of the first manned launch of Boeing’s Starliner capsule carrying two astronauts to ISS for a two week checkout mission.

Technicians and engineers with ULA (United Launch Alliance) worked overnight and on Sunday to assess the ground support equipment at the launch pad that encountered issues during the countdown and scrubbed the June 1 launch attempt. The ULA team identified an issue with a single ground power supply within one of the three redundant chassis that provides power to a subset of computer cards controlling various system functions, including the card responsible for the stable replenishment topping valves for the Centaur upper stage. All three of these chassis are required to enter the terminal phase of the launch countdown to ensure crew safety.

On Sunday, the chassis containing the faulty ground power unit was removed, visually inspected, and replaced with a spare chassis. No signs of physical damage were observed. A full failure analysis of the power unit will be performed to better understand root cause. Meanwhile, ULA has completed functional checkouts of the new chassis and the cards, and all hardware is performing normally.

These kinds of technical issues happen too often on ULA launches. Company engineers always fix them, but it never appears they fix them permanently. Too often on launches they pop up again, causing more scrubs.

The goal should be to fix them so they never pop up again, and your launches can begin to launch reliably, on time. And we know it can be done, because SpaceX has done it.

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