The X-37b that has been in orbit for the past 15 months successfully returned to Earth in a runway landing today.
Video of the landing below the fold.
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China has successfully put into orbit its first three person crew, including its first female astronaut, on its first manned space docking mission.
Despite the continuing lack of an agreement, Kazakhstan today gave Russia permission to resume launches from the Baikonur spaceport.
Their new as yet unfinished spaceport in Vostochny must appear increasingly important to the Russians.
We have a date: China’s next manned mission, with one female astronaut aboard, will launch Saturday.
Copenhagen Suborbitals: The crazy DIY spaceflight project that just might work.
The new colonial movement: China is in its final preparations for the launch of its next manned mission, expected any day now.
This is the key quote from the article:
China aims to build a space station around 2020 based on the space rendezvous and docking technology that is currently being tested. Several components will be sent into space separately before being assembled into a space station through a variety of docking procedures.
Mars Odyssey put itself into safe mode on Friday when it detected problems with one of the three reaction wheels used to orient the spacecraft.
If this space probe goes down, it will make it more difficult to rely data back from Opportunity, now on the Martian surface, and Curiosity, due to land in two months.
The X-37b in orbit for the past fifteen months is set to land this week, possibly even today.
Next up: Taking a look at the test flight planning for Orbital Sciences’ Antares rocket and Cygnus cargo capsule.
Due to cost overruns, NASA has cancelled the GEM X-ray telescope.
The shuttle prototype Enterprise was damaged on Sunday while being transported by barge to its New York City museum home.
Big news: The military has given NASA two Cold War era spy space telescopes with mirrors comparable to Hubble’s.
They have 2.4-meter (7.9 feet) mirrors, just like the Hubble. They also have an additional feature that the civilian space telescopes lack: A maneuverable secondary mirror that makes it possible to obtain more focused images. These telescopes will have 100 times the field of view of the Hubble, according to David Spergel, a Princeton astrophysicist and co-chair of the National Academies advisory panel on astronomy and astrophysics.
Since astronomers have over the past dozen years been remarkably uninterested in launching a replacement for Hubble, they now find themselves in a situation where they might have no optical capabilities at all in space. Hubble is slowing dying from age, and NASA doesn’t have the money to build a new optical space telescope, especially since with any new space telescope proposal the astronomical community has had the annoying habit of demanding more sophistication than NASA can afford.
This announcement however might just save astronomy from becoming blind. Because these spy telescopes are already half built, it will be difficult to add too many bells and whistles. Hire a launch rocket, build the cameras and spectrographs based on the instruments already on Hubble, and get the things in orbit quickly.
Kazakhstan better be worried: Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister paid a call to that country’s under-construction Vostochny spaceport today, enthusing about its possibilities.
Prediction: When Vostochny is completed in 2015, Russia will threaten to abandon its historic launch site in Baikonur. They might do it too, if Kazakhstan refuses to ease its rental terms.
Some details and photos of Sierra Nevada’s captive carry test flight last week of Dream Chaser.
A fascinating look at the space race and what the future held, written in 1959.
The article, reprinted by Forbes, is amazingly detailed, optimistic, yet also cool-headed about the future. For example, consider this quote about the future of manned spaceflight:
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The competition heats up: Using video game software, Surrey Satellite has devised a way for nanosatellites to seek each other out and then dock to form a larger satellite.
If the STRaND-2 satellites are able to dock with one another, it opens up a whole new world of space engineering. Instead of building one large spacecraft, as in conventional satellite manufacturing, or using microsatellites flying in formation as is being developed currently, dockable satellites would be modular “space building blocks” according to [Surrey]. Satellites could be made as plug-and-play components that could be sent up in segments using smaller, cheaper rockets or piggybacked with other payloads and then linked together. This would not only be a cost savings, but would allow for much greater design flexibility. It would also make it much easier to repair, maintain, refuel or upgrade satellites. Today, a satellite with a failing power system is an expensive write off. Tomorrow, it would simply a matter of sending up a new power module.
Even the fight against space junk would benefit, since a dockable micro-satellite with a booster pack could easily dock with a dead satellite and either return it to the Earth’s atmosphere or out to a space disposal area.
Radio silence: A targeted SETI observation of Gliese 581, the nearest star with exoplanets in the habitable zone, has found no evidence of alien communications.
This was a proof of concept experiment, and though they detected nothing, they also did not rule out the possibility of alien life, as their radio telescope wasn’t sensitive enough to do so. You can download the actual paper here.
What does this mean? Iran is finishing construction on a new space launch facility.
We’ve only just begun: SpaceX has tentatively but quickly scheduled its first operational cargo flight to ISS for September 24.
Intelsat has reported a delay in deploying one of the solar panels of its new communications satellite launched earlier today.
The competition heats up: Sea Launch successfully put an Intelsat communications satellite into orbit today from its floating launch platform in the Pacific.
This is the company’s second successful launch since it was reorganized after bankruptcy.
What is the current state of the six American flags planted on the Moon by Apollo astronauts? One NASA engineer takes a look.
James Fincannon has been an important contributor here at Behind the Black, sending me some interesting tips from time to time that have resulted in some good posts, such as this one about caves on the Moon.
Dragon has successfully fired its engines and released its trunk or service module. Splashdown is expected at 11:44 AM (Eastern).
Dragon has successfully undocked from ISS.
The hatch is closed and Dragon is ready for its return to Earth tomorrow morning.
The competition heats up: The FAA has granted Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic a launch permit to begin rocket-powered test flights of SpaceShipTwo.
The Air Force has announced that the X-37B spacecraft presently in orbit will be returning to Earth in the next few weeks.
From a past SpaceX critic: SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy could wipe out its launch competition.
This announcement [of SpaceX’s deal with Intelsat] is an indication that SpaceX is now threatening the dominance of Arianespace and ILS in the commercial launch arena. If a Falcon 9 Heavy can carry two or more large GEO communications satellites for half the launch price of an Ariane 5 or Proton M booking, then this could spell the end of their commercial operations as going concerns. It is not only on the commercial front that SpaceX may dominate. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 Heavy launch service promises to be less than half the cost of using equivalent Atlas and Delta rockets. So even the cosy launch provider-governmental relationships that previously benefited the likes of Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Pratt and Whitney/Rocketdyne could now be threatened.
As much of a fan of SpaceX as I am, and as much as I agree with the above statement, we must remember that Falcon Heavy is not yet built. Moreover, I suspect that the deal with Intelsat does not yet include any transfer of funds. SpaceX has a long way to go before any of this happens. Nonetheless, the company’s continued success very obviously is beginning to make its competitors nervous.
