Orbital Sciences has rolled Antares/Cygnus to the launchpad. With pictures.
Take a look. You will notice how simple this operation is, and how little infrastructure is involved, compared to the set up NASA has used for the shuttle and intends to use for SLS.
When will SpaceX launch the upgraded Falcon 9? We have competing news stories:
This is very puzzling. That the Canadian release was sent out today suggests that they have information we don’t have about the static fire test and thus knew they could announce the launch date. That Musk is more circumspect however suggests that the information the Canadians have is not correct.
Update: Stephen Clark at Spaceflight Now has more information. It appears the launch will not happen on Sunday, as SpaceX plans a second launchpad static test tomorrow to iron out the unexplained “anomalies” in yesterday’s static test.
Two Earth-based radio telescopes have detected the radio glow of the Voyager 1 spacecraft, now in interstellar space.
After a journey of 10 years, astronomers are accelerating preparations for the arrival of Europe’s Rosetta space probe at Comet 67P/Churymov-Gerasimenko.
The spacecraft will be awakened in January 2014, with rendezvous later that year.
SpaceX successfully completed a static test of the 9 first stage engines of its upgraded Falcon 9 rocket today.
SpaceX’s upgraded Falcon 9 rocket briefly fired nine Merlin 1D engines on the launch pad Thursday, but engineers will review data from the prelaunch static fire test before confirming the mission’s targeted Sunday launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, sources familiar with SpaceX’s launch preparations said.
SpaceX’s static fire test of Falcon 9R that was scrubbed yesterday is about to happen today.
NASA has announced a press conference for later today about the Voyager spacecraft.
The rumors are that all the scientists involved with this data from this spacecraft now finally agree that Voyager has left the solar system. More to come.
The rumors were true: NASA has confirmed that Voyager 1 is out of the solar system and in interstellar space, and has been since last summer.
The competition heats up: Orbital Sciences plans to roll Antares and Cygnus to the launchpad tomorrow for its Tuesday launch.
The competition heats up: Virgin Galactic held a job fair this weekend and almost 600 applicants showed up.
They want to hire a 100 new engineers to help build additional spaceships like SpaceShipTwo.
Update: This report says that more than 1300 people showed up for these 100 jobs.
The Russians have delayed the next Proton launch, scheduled for September 17, for at least a week.
They have not described the problem in any article I can find, but considering their recent failures it doesn’t surprise me if they are being extra careful now.
Wednesday’s static fire test and launch rehearsal of SpaceX’s Falcon 9R rocket was scrubbed.
I hear rumors that there was a fuel leak, but this is not confirmed. Regardless, this scrub could cause another delay of Sunday’s planned launch of the upgraded Falcon 9R with its first commercial payload, as the company wants to do this test prior to launch.
Chicken Little report: Another large satellite is about to fall to Earth.
Current estimates suggest this could occur anytime between the end of this month and the start of November. When it does, the one-tonne GOCE will plunge rapidly through the atmosphere, burning up as it descends. “Some satellites take decades to come back after finishing operations; we will re-enter in no more than three weeks,” says Esa mission manager Dr Rune Floberghagen. Modelling work indicates that perhaps up to 25% of the spacecraft may survive all the way to the surface.
The odds of this debris hitting anything significant is very small. It can happen however.
It appears that Deep Impact is lost.
SpaceX has again delayed the launch of its first Falcon 9 commercial launch.
This delay appears to be only one day, from Saturday to Sunday, September 15. The static fire test of the rocket on the launchpad appears set for today, and I suspect the one day delay was to give them more time to analyze the results of today’s test.
Also, this quote from the article shows the risks involved with this first launch of the upgraded Falcon 9:
The launch would be the first for the next-generation Falcon 9-R, designed not only to be more powerful but to have the potential for re-use — that would be the “R” in “9-R” (which Harris incidentally said is pronounced “niner” according to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk).
Space News’ Irene Klotz talked to Musk late last week and found some nervousness going into the launch. “We’re being, as usual, extremely paranoid about the launch and trying to do everything we possibly can to improve the probability of success, but this is a new version of Falcon 9,” Musk told her. [emphasis mine]
The competition heats up: Orbital Sciences has finished loading its Cygnus capsule and has closed the hatch for next Tuesday’s launch.
After 166 days in orbit, three astronauts safely returned to Earth this evening in a Soyuz capsule.
The first commercial launch of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 has been pushed back to September 14.
I must apologize to my readers. I completely missed this news item last week. However, in my defense SpaceX has been unusually tight-lipped this time with information.
The launch itself also seems dependent on a hot fire engine test that SpaceX wishes to do first, which means that the September 14 date might still be pushed back again.
NASA engineers have successfully fixed the glitch on the LADEE spacecraft.
Having completed its investigation into its scrubbed launch two weeks ago, Japan’s space agency JAXA has announced a September 14 launch date for its new Epsilon rocket.
The first and second launch of the Space Launch System are likely to be delayed due to budget issues.
“It’s very clear that we could have slips of a year or two,” said [deputy administrator Lori] Garver, referring to both the 2017 launch — which won’t have a crew — and the first planned flight of NASA astronauts aboard the SLS rocket in 2021.
Garver claims that it is insufficient funds for SLS that will cause the delays, despite getting $3 billion per year, or ten times the money the private commercial program is getting.
I’m on a hike today, but so any additional comments about this insanity will have to wait.
