SpaceX Falcon 9 lined up to launch RADARSAT Constellation | NASASpaceFlight.com
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SpaceX have announced the award of a reservation contract that lines them up as the launch service provider for three satellites that will make up the RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM). The agreement with MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) calls for the satellites to ride uphill on a Falcon 9 in 2018.
The announcement provides the first manifested mission for SpaceX’s 2018 commercial launch schedule.
The launch reservation contract with MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) will result in SpaceX supporting Canada’s largest space program to date.
See on www.nasaspaceflight.com
SpaceX Announces Contract To Launch RCM Satellites | SpaceNews.com
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WASHINGTON — Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) will launch all three satellites for Canada’s planned Radarsat Constellation Mission (RCM) in 2018 aboard a single Falcon 9 rocket, the Hawthorne, Calif., rocket maker announced July 30.
The contract award to SpaceX had been expected since January, when the Canadian Space Agency awarded MDA Corp. of Richmond, British Columbia, the 706 million Canadian dollar ($692 million) prime contract to build the RCM satellites.
Final terms of SpaceX’s “launch reservation” contact, which was awarded by MDA Corp., were not disclosed.
See on www.spacenews.com
SPACEX AWARDED LAUNCH RESERVATION CONTRACT FOR LARGEST CANADIAN SPACE PROGRAM
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Hawthorne, CA – Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) was awarded a launch reservation contract with MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) to support the largest space program to date in Canada, carrying the three satellites to orbit that will make up the RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM) on a Falcon 9 rocket in 2018.
“SpaceX appreciates MDA’s confidence in our ability to safely and reliably transport their satellites,” said Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX President and COO. “We hope this agreement is the second of many with MDA.”
See on www.spacex.com
MDA to Develop Concept to Provide Communications Capability for Commercial Shuttle Replacement | SpaceRef
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MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (“MDA” or the “Company”) (TSX: MDA), a global communications and information company, announced today that it has signed a US$1.7 million contract with Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC) to develop an engineering concept solution to provide on-board communication signal processing capabilities for its Dream Chaser crew transportation vehicle. SNC is one of only three companies funded under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program aimed at developing a reusable spacecraft to transport crew and critical cargo to the International Space Station and then return to Earth.
If successful, this work could form the basis for an operational communications solution to be incorporated into the future reusable crew transportation spacecraft.
See on www.spaceref.com
Northwest Herald | On the Record With … Andrew Gasser
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To Fox River Grove native Andrew Gasser, the final frontier should not be gunked up by government regulation and red tape. After retiring from the U.S. Air Force in 2011, Gasser decided to combine his lifelong love of space and conservatism to found Tea Party in Space, a Washington, D.C.-based group dedicated to applying free-market principles to space exploration.
Senior reporter Kevin Craver, a fellow space nut who has fried a few brains of young journalists explaining relativity and the curvature of spacetime, talked to Gasser about his group and our future in space.
See on www.nwherald.com
The Space Review: The Silicon Valley of space could be Silicon Valley
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…The aerospace industry, to be certain, has had a presence in Silicon Valley for decades.
What’s different this time around is that the space companies taking root in the region are looking less like the large, established aerospace companies—sometimes dubbed, at least somewhat pejoratively, as “OldSpace”—but more like the other entrepreneurial companies in the region.
See on www.thespacereview.com
US Lawmaker Seeks to Partner with Russia to Clean Up Space
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SAN JOSE, Calif., July 29 (RIA Novosti) – A prominent US lawmaker and advocate of the United States’ role in space told a conference on the commercialization of space that the US and Russia should team up for extraterrestrial projects — and suggested they start by cleaning up the hundreds of thousands of pieces of manmade space litter and capturing and deflecting asteroids hurtling toward Earth.
“Now that Russia is no longer a communist dictatorship and has been evolving in the right direction, we should reach out to them even more than we did in the past, along with our European allies, to have joint missions in space,” Rep. Dana Rohrabacher said by Skype to attendees at the New Space 2013 conference in San Jose, California this past weekend.
See on en.rian.ru
What Happens In Outer Space, Might Not Stay In Outer Space
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Last week the President’s plan to fund a mission to land on an asteroid was thwarted when the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology authorized a bill that will specifically prohibit the space agency from moving forward with the plan.
As arguments stall, funding for our government’s space programs in the private sector moves forward. Bellevue, Wash. is the home to one company that plans to not just land on an asteroid but to mine it for resources. Planetary Resources’ president and chief engineer is Chris Lewicki. Ross Reynolds sits down with Lewicki to discuss his plans.
See on www.kuow.org
Company Hopes Space Experiments Will Produce New Bio-fuel for Jets | Parabolic Arc
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Imagine a plant you can grow in the barren oil fields of West Texas that when you process its berries, jet fuel worth billions of dollars comes out. And that crop is there because of America’s space program.
That’s what Richard Godwin and his Florida-based company, Zero Gravity Solutions Inc. (ZGSI), are hoping to make possible. The company, which just went public, is using space-based genetic research to modify a tropical plant called jatropha curcas to grow in the cooler environment of West Texas. The plant’s berries could produce up to five to six tons of fuel per hectare.
The key to the project has been experiments conducted on a series of space shuttle flights using a technique called “directed gene expression”. When plants are exposed to a microgravity environment, they perceive a threat and go into a survival mode. In the process, they activate genes that are normally dormant in a 1 gravity environment, Godwin said last week during the NewSpace 2013 conference in San Jose, Calif.
See on www.parabolicarc.com
NewSpace 2013 – Chasing Dreams
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Presentation at the Space Frontier Foundation’s NewSpace conference by Mark Sirangelo, the Chairman of Sierra Nevada Corporation – Space Systems
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Spaceport Sweden: Lapland centre to rival Virgin Galactic’s commercial space programme
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When future waves of British astronauts lift off from Earth, they might do so not from the United States desert but from the land of the reindeer. “Our vision is to become Europe’s foremost gateway to space,” says Karin Nilsdotter, CEO of Spaceport Sweden.
See on www.independent.co.uk
There Is Another Way
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There Is Another Way – An Approach to Sustainable Exploration and Settlement of Space
Outlined in the video above is a possible path forward for space exploration and settlement. Settlement because it is a worthy goal, and settlement because it is the only way to explore on a reasonable NASA budget. The entire point of this exercise is that NASA is capable of doing something great, while what it is doing now is a waste.
Without a goal and a strategy, the talented work force of NASA and the tax payer dollars are being squandered on ‘running in place’ projects like the Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion. These systems are not sustainable, do not lead to space settlement, break faith with the flexibility and talent of the NASA workforce, and waste money competing with the commercial sector who should be their partners.
Instead of this go-nowhere-stay-nowhere ‘strategy’, NASA should be given the freedom and vision to pursue the already fruitful partnerships with the commercial space industry and return to blazing the trail and igniting the imagination of the nation and the world. There is another way.
See on www.youtube.com
Diamandis Joins 3D Systems’ Board of Directors | Parabolic Arc
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ROCK HILL, S.C., July 24, 2013 (3D Systems PR) – 3D Systems (NYSE:DDD) announced today that its Board of Directors has elected Peter H. Diamandis a director of the company.
Dr. Peter Diamandis is the Chairman and CEO of the X PRIZE Foundation, which leads the world in designing and launching large incentive prizes to drive radical breakthroughs for the benefit of humanity. Diamandis is also the co-Founder & Executive Chairman of the Singularity University, a Silicon Valley based institution teaching graduates and executives about exponentially growing technologies and their potential to address humanity’s grand challenges.
See on www.parabolicarc.com
At NewSpace 2013, NASA Preaches Commercial Partnerships | SpaceNews.com
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SAN JOSE, Calif. — NASA is seeking to encourage private companies to assist in identifying threatening asteroids, proving the utility of on-orbit refueling spacecraft and establishing new cooperative projects, space agency officials said July 25-26 at the Space Frontier Foundation’s annual NewSpace conference here.
“We are looking for new areas where there could be an intersection of NASA’s long-term interest and the innovation of the private sector,” said Dennis Stone, program integration manager for NASA’s Commercial Crew and Cargo Program at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. As an example, Stone cited a synopsis issued July 17 seeking information from U.S. companies interested in gaining access to NASA’s expertise through partnerships without any exchange of funds.
See on www.spacenews.com
Waiting on SpaceShipTwo’s next powered flight | NewSpace Journal
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The last few months have been eventful for Virgin Galactic. The suborbital spaceflight company announced last month that it had signed up its 600th customer for its suborbital spaceflights. In May, the company hired two new test pilots, including former NASA astronaut Frederick “CJ” Sturckow. Earlier this month The Spaceship Company, the former Scaled Composites-Virgin joint venture now wholly owned by Virgin, hired former Scaled executive Doug Shane as its general manager. Virgin also appointed Steve Isakowitz, hired by the company in 2011 as its chief technology officer, as president of the company; George Whitesides remains as CEO.
One thing Virgin hasn’t been doing a lot recently, though, is flying. Until yesterday, SpaceShipTwo’s last flight was its first powered flight in April. SpaceShipTwo did fly again on Thursday, although in an unpowered glide flight. “Another successful glide flight, hitting all of our goals,” the company tweeted, without stating what those goals were.
See on www.newspacejournal.com
3D-Printed Rocket Parts Excel in NASA Tests
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Key rocket parts built using 3D-printing technology have passed another round of NASA firing tests, inspiring further confidence among space agency officials in this emerging manufacturing technique.
Two rocket engine injectors made with a 3D printer performed as well as traditionally constructed parts during recent hot-fire tests, which exposed them to temperatures approaching 6,000 degrees Fahrenheit (3,316 degrees Celsius) and extreme pressures, NASA officials announced Wednesday (July 24).
The recent tests, performed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., followed closely on the heels of other successful hot-fire trials of 3D-printed engine injectors conducted at the agency’s Glenn Research Center in Ohio.
See on www.space.com
NewSpace 2013: A Day of Secrets, Mysterious Foreign Beers and the Bieb | Parabolic Arc
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“Justin Bieber’s life isn’t worth a whole lot. At least according to Howard McCurdy, that is. That was his response when I suggested that some adventurer nobody’s ever heard of dying on Mount Everest is a much less significant event publicity wise than if the Bieb blew up over New Mexico. And that his fellow celebrities might react by cancelling their reservations. McCurdy responded that I had surprised him with the question (apparently he hadn’t thought of the impact of such an event), and that he didn’t place much value on Bieber’s life anyway. Hear that, rich celebrities with more money than you can spend? If you get blowed up, and blowed up real good, there will be a portion of the space community that won’t much care. Good luck with that.”
Doug Messier. He’s one of a kind.
See on www.parabolicarc.com
XPRIZE Insights: Science Fiction is Failing | YouTube
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Jack Hidary talks about the failure of science fiction to inspire young minds and how imagination can actually be the barrier to innovation. XPRIZE Insights is a video series that highlights leading thinkers of our time.
See on www.youtube.com
Zero Point Frontiers Delivers Favorable Architecture Assessment to Golden Spike | Parabolic Arc
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Huntsville (ZPFC PR) —This week Zero Point Frontiers Corp. delivered its report analyzing the different approaches that might be used to send people from nations around the world on commercial trips to the Moon. Working with the Golden Spike Company and its various aerospace partner companies, Zero Point Frontiers used the software it developed for NASA to help NASA Johnson Space Center design space missions.
“This was a great test case for us,” said Zero Point Frontiers CEO Jason Hundley. “Golden Spike gave us an opportunity to make apples-to-apples comparisons of multiple commercial space systems. The good news was that we identified several combinations of vehicles that will support Golden Spike’s mission. They were all using several different types of scenarios, rocket stages, crew vehicles, and lunar landers, which made the work challenging.”
See on www.parabolicarc.com
New Uses For Launch Pad 39A: Threatening The Status Quo | SpaceRef Business
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While news stories focus (inaccurately) on a contrived rivalry between space billionaires Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, entrenched interests in Florida are seeking to keep new players away from using launch facilities at Kennedy Space Center. These efforts could well backfire and cause these potential employers to pick locations other than Florida to conduct their growing commercial space activities.
Reps. Frank Wolf and Robert Aderholt recently sent a letter to NASA Administrator Bolden regarding KSC pad 39A saying “we are concerned about the possibility that NASA may lease this pad for exclusive use by one company – which would effectively preclude its use as a multi-user facility for an unknown duration. Given the strategic importance of this unique, taxpayer-funded asset, as well as NASA’s questionable actions surrounding this proposed lease, we expect that no action will be taken until the concerns detailed in this letter are addressed to our satisfaction.”
In other words these legislators seem to know more about launch pads than NASA. Or at least they think that they do. No news here.
The only thing magical about launching from the Cape Canaveral or “Space Coast” area is that there are already launch pads there and people living nearby who’ve gotten to be rather good at launching rockets for a very long time. However, the weather is problematical, lots of peopel are required, and the rockets are all built somewhere else. Indeed SpaceX and Blue Origin already have testing and launch facilities elsewhere – and they are looking to expand their non-Florida operations.
See on spaceref.biz
Showdown at 39A
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The battle over who will lease NASA Pad 39A took a turn last week which was both surprising and with the injection of yet another Alabama congressman, disturbing.
After SpaceNews originally reported that SpaceX was apparently the only bidder for the historic pad, it was subsequently revealed that Blue Origin is interested as well. If anyone thought Blue Origin’s brief foray into the light meant that the company was prepared to unveil its orbital launch system, they were mistaken. While the secretive rocket company founded by Jeff Bezos would ultimately like to use the facility, the substance of their bid, as indicated in some of the unattributed NASA response to questions, is to manage it as a multi-use pad which could be subleased to other, concurrent users which could include SpaceX, if that company still maintains an interest in 39A after being rebuffed in their own bid.
To add a bit of gravitas to their proposal, Blue Origin apparently included a letter from United Launch Alliance expressing a potential interest in using the facility, as well as another letter from an unnamed provider.
See on innerspace.net
NASA Releases Draft Proposal for Final Phase of Commercial Crew
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On Friday, July 19th, NASA released a draft Request for Proposal for the next phase of the Commercial Crew competition, and with it came some new acronyms. Following Commercial Crew Integrated Capacity (CCiCap), the fourth and final phase will be called Commercial Crew Transportation Capability (CCtCap) and is intended to ” develop a U.S. commercial crew space transportation capability to achieve safe, reliable and cost-effective access to and from the International Space Station (ISS) with a goal of no later than 2017.”
CCtCap will be divided into two phases; Design, Development, Test and Evaluation (DDTE) to procure the crew systems and conduct test flights, followed by Post Certification Missions (PCM) to conduct the operational flights.
See on innerspace.net
Skycorp Introduces Spacecraft Life Extension System to Extend Operational Lives of Geostationary Satellites | SpaceRef Business
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July 23 — Today at the 2013 New Space conference Skycorp Incorporated (Skycorp) will introduce the Spacecraft Life Extension System (SLES). The purpose of the SLES is to extend the useful lifetime of Geostationary (GEO) satellites.
The SLES accomplishes this by docking and mating with a GEO satellite and then takes over the task of attitude control and station keeping. This is a simple mechanical interface, similar to a tug guiding a larger ship at sea. There is no fuel transferred or electrical connection to the GEO satellite.
Skycorp founder and CEO Dennis Wingo states; “It is the goal of the SLES to provide up to ten additional years of operating life to a geostationary asset for about one third the replacement cost. This provides a clear financial benefit to the satellite operator”.
See on spaceref.biz
The Business and Future of Space Exploration | To the Point on KCRW
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From personal satellites to tourism, space travel is going private. With NASA no longer sending shuttles up, what does that mean for exploration and scientific research? Can private companies lead the way to this final frontier?
See on www.kcrw.com
The Newspace Daily 