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Człowiek i Astronautyka => Media => Wątek zaczęty przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:24

Tytuł: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:24
The Space Review jest tygodnikiem kosmicznym założonym przez Jeffa Fousta po katastrofie Columbii. Od tamtego czasu ukazało się już 3957 artykułów i recenzji. Co tydzień publikowanych jest 5 tekstów. Założyciel internetowego tygodnika swoje credo przedstawił we wstępnym artykule.
Crew Dragon jest jedną z odpowiedzi na utratę załogi 17 lat temu i pierwszy jego lot załogowy zbiega się z zainicjowaniem cyklicznego zaistnienia TSR na Forum.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Space_Review

https://www.thespacereview.com/archive.html
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:24
Time to ask the big questions
Is Columbia the most tragic example of the failure of the space exploration paradigm?
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, February 11, 2003

Anyone with more than a passing knowledge of the history of space has a few dates etched into their brains: October 4, 1957; April 12, 1961; July 20, 1969. Also there, sadly, are January 27, 1967; January 28, 1986, and now, February 1, 2003. The Space Age has given us its share of triumphs and tragedies, and while the tragedies are relatively modest when put into a global perspective — 21 deaths in just under 42 years of human spaceflight — it makes them no less painful.

Despite these tragedies, the US space program has forged ahead. After Apollo 1 NASA quickly worked to determine the cause of the accident, fix that and other problems with the Apollo spacecraft, and was flying again in time land on the Moon before 1970, as President Kennedy had asked. The interregnum after Challenger was longer — there was no space race with the Soviets then — but in time a revamped shuttle fleet was flying again. In both cases there was broad public support for maintaining a slightly modified status quo.

Today, there has been a desire expressed by many people inside and outside of NASA to quickly determine what happened to Columbia, fix the problem, and start flying again. Even if there wasn’t pressure to get the shuttle flying again so that it can support the International Space Station, this desire is an understandable one, even a noble one: a refusal to give up in the face of adversity, just as in the case with past tragedies. As the saying goes, if you get thrown off a horse, you need to get right back on it — presumably, after figuring out why you got thrown off in the first place.

The danger in this approach is that this gives NASA, or the space community in general, little time to reflect on the current state of space exploration and development. The situation in 2003 is different than 1967, when the space program’s goals were clear cut, or even 1986. Even before the Columbia tragedy, it was clear that the space activities in general worldwide — commercial, civil government, and military — were dysfunctional, if not downright broken. Space access, both manned and unmanned, is still too expensive to support more than a few applications. The reliability of space transportation is also a problem, from numerous launch delays to catastrophic failures, such as the recent failures of a Proton/Block DM and an Ariane 5 ECA. There are too many launch vehicles chasing too few payloads, with, paradoxically, even more expendable vehicles under development. Human space flight relies today on only two vehicles: the Space Shuttle, an expensive vehicle that has now suffered two catastrophic failures in 113 flights; and Russia’s Soyuz, which is chronically underfunded. This puts at risk the tens of billions of dollars invested to date in the International Space Station, a project years behind schedule that has yet to live up to even basic expectations.

Space transportation is not the only focus of problems. The commercial space industry is suffering from an overall glut of supply: from launch vehicles to satellite manufacturers to on-orbit communications capacity. The remote sensing business has failed to materialize, and many of the existing companies are now heavily reliant on government business for their survival. The failures of several satellite communications ventures garnered enough publicity that “Iridium” became synonymous in the business world for any hugely expensive failure.

Government space programs are no better than their commercial brethren. While much has been said about NASA’s continual battles for more funding, it is in far better shape than other programs around the world, which must either beg for a tiny fraction of NASA’s budget or, particularly in ESA’s case, endure internecine battles among its member nations regarding even modest programs. While these agencies are pursuing a number of excellent projects, none of them have the goals or the vision to capture the interest and enthusiasm of the general public. Those proposals that seem to have the best prospects of resonating with the general public — notably, human exploration of Mars — are considered either too expensive or too far in the future to be officially adopted by these agencies.

All of these issues are symptoms of fundamental problems with how we approach space today. Many of these problems are rooted in decisions made years, if not decades, ago. Exploring these decisions can be useful, if only to best understand the process that led to those decisions. However, we are forced to cope with the consequences of those past decisions today. If this is the best we can do to explore and develop the final frontier, we may be stuck on Earth for the foreseeable future.

As stated above, there is a temptation to quickly patch the problem that caused the loss of Columbia and press on. Yet it’s clear that the way we approach space today is filled with problems and pitfalls; Columbia is not the only evidence of this, merely the most visible and the most unfortunate. Rather than get right back on that horse, perhaps its time to ask some more fundamental questions. How fast should we be riding? Where should we be going? And should we even be riding a horse?

That is what The Space Review is about: exploring the fundamental issues and the fundamental problems related to the exploration and development of space. The Space Review is not another news publication — there are already plenty of those available online — but instead an online magazine devoted to the past, present, and future of space exploration. In particular, there will be an emphasis on where we should go from here: the goals organizations should set in space, the destinations we should explore, the technologies we need to make it happen, the policies that help or hinder us, and so on.

What should you do, gentle reader? First of all, please come by every week and check out our latest articles: we plan to publish from one to three articles a week, ranging from in-depth studies of specific topics to short essays and book reviews. Give us feedback, about both the articles and the site: everything here is currently “in beta”, to borrow the jargon of the software industry, so your suggestions can be easily incorporated into the site in the coming weeks. If you have an article or essay you’d like to contribute to the site, please send an email to jeff@thespacereview.com. Oh, yes: be sure to tell your friends and colleagues about us too.

It is my hope that The Space Review can become an effective forum for discussing and debating our future in space. Recent events have made it as clear as ever that if we are truly interested in exploring and developing space, we need to reexamine why and how to best do it. We owe that to the crew of the Columbia and the others who have paid the ultimate price in the exploration of the final frontier.

https://www.thespacereview.com/article/1/1
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/1/2
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:28
Review: Alien Oceans
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 4, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3933a.jpg)

Alien Oceans: The Search for Life in the Depths of Space
by Kevin Peter Hand
Princeton Univ. Press, 2020
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-691-17951-3
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691179514/spaceviews

Last week, the Government Accountability Office published its annual assessment of cost and schedule major NASA programs. Much of the interest in the report focused on NASA’s exploration programs, which are years behind schedule and billions over budget, but the GAO also cited an issue of a different kind with a planetary science mission, Europa Clipper. That mission is facing a $250 million cost increase because the spacecraft may be ready too soon: because of a congressional mandate to launch the mission on the Space Launch System, Europa Clipper isn’t expected to launch until 2025, even though the spacecraft itself will be ready in 2023. The additional money will be needed to cover spacecraft storage, workforce costs, and other impacts to the mission while it waits for an SLS rocket. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3933/1

SPICA: an infrared telescope to look back into the early universe
by Arwen Rimmer Monday, May 4, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3934a.jpg)
The SPICA mission would fly a telescope operating in the far infrared to perform studies supporting everything from solar system science to cosmology. (credit: JAXA/SPICA team)

The ESA’s fifth call for medium-class missions (M5) is in its full study phase. Three finalists, EnVision, SPICA (https://spica-mission.org/), and THESEUS, remain from more than two dozen proposals. A selection will be made in the summer of 2021, with a launch date tentatively set for 2032. In February, the author attended the EnVision conference in Paris, and reported on the progress of that consortium. The THESEUS meeting is meant to be in Malaga, Spain, in May, and the SPICA collaboration was scheduled for March 9–11 in Leiden, The Netherlands. Unfortunately, the COVID-19 pandemic intervened and the physical meeting was cancelled. Instead, the group met via Zoom teleconference. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3934/1

In the recession, space firms should focus on Earth imagery
by Nicholas Borroz Monday, May 4, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3935a.jpg)
Analysis of satellite imagery can play a major role in the response to the pandemic, such as tracking the number of airliners placed in storage at a California airport. (credit: Planet)

The COVID-19 pandemic will disrupt the space sector. The world is about to enter the worst recession since the Great Depression. More than 30 million Americans have filed for unemployment. China reports its economy contracted by 6.8% in the first three months of 2020. The International Monetary Fund predicts that global growth in 2020 will fall by 3% (https://blogs.imf.org/2020/04/14/the-great-lockdown-worst-economic-downturn-since-the-great-depression/).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3935/1

Commercial crew safety, in space and on the ground
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 4, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3936a.jpg)
NASA astronauts Bob Behnken (background) and Doug Hurley training for their Demo-2 commercial crew mission, now scheduled for launch May 27. (credit: SpaceX)

The last time NASA launched astronauts from the Kennedy Space Center, hundreds of thousands of people showed up to watch the final flight of the space shuttle in July 2011. The expectation, by NASA and others, was that similar crowds would show up when commercial crew flights finally began. The large crowds that showed up for launches like the first Falcon Heavy mission in 2018 or even relatively routine cargo launches appeared to confirm that belief, and NASA was planning for big crowds, not just of the public outside the gates of KSC but also official guests and working media inside, for a historic mission. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3936/1

Working in the shadow space program
A General Electric engineer’s work on MOL and other space programs
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 4, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3937a.jpg)
Richard Passman, right, during a demonstration of a new spacewalking tether developed by General Electric in the 1960s. (credit: Bill Passman)

Richard Passman, an engineer for General Electric, spent over a decade working on many missile and space programs, including as a senior manager of the Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) program. Passman passed away April 1 at the age of 94 (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/16/obituaries/richard-passman-dead-coronavirus.html?referringSource=articleShare) due to complications from the coronavirus. This article is based on an interview conducted with him by the author in January. We had planned to do a follow-up interview, but did not get the chance. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3937/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:28
Toward a brighter future: Continuity of the Artemis program
by Jamil Castillo Monday, May 11, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3938a.jpg)
The Orion spacecraft built for the Artemis 1 mission after the completion of environmental testing at NASA’s Plum Brook Station in Ohio in March. (credit: NASA/Marvin Smith)

As we navigate through the COVID-19 pandemic, overcoming the immediate crisis is the top priority. Recovery will require thoughtful planning, investment, and patience. At the same time, it is important that we look beyond the crisis toward grand efforts that push boundaries and fuel humanity’s aspirations. That is why we continue to work on Artemis, our nation’s program to send humans forward to the Moon and on to Mars. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3938/1

Reinvigorating NASA’s lunar exploration plans after the pandemic
by Ajay P. Kothari Monday, May 11, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3599a.jpg)
A revamped exploration program might preserve NASA’s plans to return to the Moon despite the economic impact of the pandemic, but it will have to forego development of the lunar Gateway. (credit: NASA)

In a recent Washington Post op-ed (https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/04/08/coronavirus-crisis-is-turning-americans-both-parties-against-china/), Josh Rogin argued for the need for a strong American response to China’s perceived mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic: “Americans in both parties increasingly agree that the United States needs a tougher, more realistic China strategy that depends less on the honesty and goodwill of the Chinese government.” Such a strategy should include space, too. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3939/1

The launch showdown
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 11, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3940a.jpg)
Blue Origin CEO Bob Smith speaks at a ceremony marking the completion of the company’s rocket engine factory in Huntsville, Alabama, February 17. The factory will build engines for both the company’s own New Glenn rocket, a model of which is on the right, but also ULA’s Vulcan (left). (credit: J. Foust)

On President’s Day back in February—less than three months ago, but feeling like a previous era—a couple hundred people gathered at a new Blue Origin building in Huntsville, Alabama. The attendees, ranging from local business leaders to members of Congress, were there for the formal dedication of the 32,500-square-meter factory, which the company will use to produce rocket engines. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3940/1

Astronauts, guns, and butter: Charles Schultze and paying for Apollo in a time of turmoil
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 11, 2020
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=4125.msg145663#msg145663

“Maybe you were put here to be the answer”
Religious overtones in the new Space Force recruitment video
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, May 11, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3942a.jpg)
The end of the first US Space Force ad, whose imagery and messages had religious overtones. (credit: US Space Force)

The American space program has had remarkable religious components from its very beginnings. In its first few decades, the American space program was seen as a challenge to Soviet supremacy in outer space. The Soviet Union was known for its communism and officially atheistic stance, which made the American space program more explicitly religious by default. NASA, for instance, collected the religious affiliations of its astronauts, probably in order to know a person’s preferences in the case of a serious or fatal accident. The crew of Apollo 8 famously read from the book of Genesis while looking back at the Earth from lunar orbit and, in an act not publicized at the time, Buzz Aldrin took communion while he waited to exit the lunar module on July 20, 1969. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3942/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:29
Review: The Cosmic Revolutionary’s Handbook
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 18, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3943a.jpg)
The Cosmic Revolutionary’s Handbook: (Or: How to Beat the Big Bang)
by Luke A. Barnes and Geraint F. Lewis
Cambridge Univ. Press, 2020
hardcover, 286 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-108-48670-5
US$22.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1108486703/spaceviews

Every astronomer has received a missive like this, not to mention those working in adjacent fields as well as science journalists. The email arrives from an unfamiliar account, and is often written in a… creative choice of fonts, and with various attachments. The gist of the message is along the lines of “The Big Bang is wrong!” (or, often, “THE BIG BANG IS WRONG!” in the belief that the emphasis that capitalization offers will somehow make it more convincing.) The author then provides his or her own alternative cosmology and a plea to review or publish that alternative approach. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3943/1

Explaining China’s space ambitions and goals through the lens of strategic culture
by Namrata Goswami Monday, May 18, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3944c.jpg)
A Long March 5B successfully lifts off May 5 on its first flight, clearing the way for future launches of Chinese space station modules. (credit: Xinhua)

We all need conceptual tools for analysis. Strategic culture is one of them. I define strategic culture as a sum of a nation’s assumptions about its reality (threats, opportunities) based on which certain policy choices are preferred over others. These policy choices are informed by the state’s political culture reflecting both continuity and change over time. Political culture is defined as “a short-hand expression for a ‘mindset’ which has the effect of limiting attention to less than the full range of alternative behaviors, problems (https://support.jstor.org/hc/en-us/articles/360000313328-Need-Help-Logging-in-to-JSTOR) [emphasis added], and solutions which are logically possible.” Strategic culture flows from political culture, and is mostly applicable to the political and military leaders, whose assumptions, preferences, and choices inform their proclivity to adopt a particular military strategy over others: offense/defense, compellence/deterrence. History, myths and metaphor, and state capacity play a critical role in informing these assumptions. Colin Gray captures strategic culture well in his definition, “the persisting (though not eternal) socially transmitted ideas, attitudes, traditions, habits of mind, and preferred methods of operation that are more or less specific to a particularly geographically based security community (https://www.jstor.org/stable/20097575?seq=1) that has had a necessarily unique historical experience. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3944/1

When Washington went to the Moon: An interview with Glen Wilson
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 18, 2020
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=4125.msg145664#msg145664

Can NASA land humans on the Moon by 2024?
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 18, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3946a.jpg)
The lunar lander concept by the “national team” led by Blue Origin. (credit: Blue Origin)

Nearly 14 months ago, Vice President Mike Pence spoke at a meeting of the National Space Council in Huntsville, Alabama, and changed the trajectory of NASA’s human spaceflight program. Pence directed NASA to accelerate its schedule for returning humans to the Moon, which at the time called for a landing by 2028. The new goal: land American astronauts on the Moon “within the next five years,” a goal subsequently interpreted to mean by the end of 2024 (see “Lunar whiplash (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3687/1)”, The Space Review, April 1, 2019.) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3946/1

Worms and wings, meatballs and swooshes: NASA insignias in popular culture
by Glen E. Swanson Monday, May 18, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3947a.jpg)
NASA insignias in popular culture. Kids and adults are shown sporting NASA apparel. The late comedian Bob Hope is pictured ready to kick off his 1983–84 season of NBC specials wearing the NASA worm during a gala salute to NASA in honor of their 25th anniversary. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 launch vehicle, adorning the NASA worm, is shown ready on the pad at KSC for its upcoming launch that will carry two astronauts to the ISS, the first crewed launch from US soil since the last flight of the space shuttle Atlantis in 2011. (credit: G. Swanson/NBC-TV/NASA/SpaceX)

If all goes well, SpaceX will launch a Dragon spacecraft atop one of its Falcon 9 launch vehicles next week. The spacecraft will carry two humans, the first to be launched from the US since the last shuttle lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in 2011. Emblazoned on the side of the rocket will appear a NASA insignia that was all but retired from the agency nearly 30 years ago. Dubbed the “NASA worm,” the retro, then-ultramodern interpretation of the agency’s logo was first created in 1975 as part of the Federal Graphic Improvement Program of the National Endowment for the Arts. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3947/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:29
Review: The View from Space
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, May 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3948a.jpg)
The View from Space: NASA’s Evolving Struggle to Understand Our Home Planet
by Richard B. Leshner and Thor Hogan
University Press of Kansas, 2019
paperback, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-0-7006-2832-2
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0700628320/spaceviews

Human spaceflight has always attracted an overwhelming share of interest in NASA programs. The attention this week to the Demo-2 commercial crew test flight has been understandable, but what NASA does, or proposes to do, with humans in space captures headlines and public imagination, from last year’s announcement of returning to the Moon by 2024 to the first all-woman NASA spacewalk last October. Space science missions also garner attention, from the latest Hubble Space Telescope images to current and future Mars rover missions. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3948/1

A new use for InSight’s robotic arm
by Philip Horzempa Tuesday, May 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3949a.jpg)
The robotic arm, known as the Instrument Deployment Arm, on the Mars InSight lander as seen during the lander’s development. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Lockheed Martin)

The InSight Mars Lander comes equipped with a very capable robot arm and scoop. After a year of being used to assist the “mole” of the lander’s Heat flow and Physical Properties Package (HP3) instrument burrow into the surface, this hardware could be used to produce additional science data. Specifically, the InSight team should consider a program to dig a deep trench to allow direct examination of the subsurface layers near the lander. This excavation may also provide clues regarding why the mole has had problems getting below the surface. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3949/1

Cyber security and space security
What are the challenges at the junction of cybersecurity and space security?
by Nayef Al-Rodhan Tuesday, May 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2923a.jpg)
Communications links between ground stations and satellites are in some cases vulnerable to cyberattacks, linking cybersecurity with space security. (credit: Wikimapia)

In 2014, the network of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) was hacked by China (https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/chinese-hack-us-weather-systems-satellite-network/2014/11/12/bef1206a-68e9-11e4-b053-65cea7903f2e_story.html). This event disrupted weather information and impacted stakeholders worldwide. Satellites are often highly vulnerable to cybersecurity breaches (https://uk.pcmag.com/news/119996/want-to-hack-a-satellite-it-might-be-easier-than-you-think) as some telemetry links are not even encrypted. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3950/1

Space resources: the broader aspect
by Kamil Muzyka Tuesday, May 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2795a.jpg)
Space resources are not just a potential source of profit for space companies, but essential to survival for settlements beyond Earth. (credit: Anna Nesterova/Alliance for Space Development)

Space mining is back on the table. Yes, mining. Putting bucket-wheel excavators on the Moon and bringing back ores with rocket-propelled haulers and thousands of space-suited truckers, miners, and other people living and working in space. Some of them would be possibly brewing “Earthshine.” And the Americans are going to strip mine the whole Moon, hollow it out, and then move to someplace else. Americans will be ruining the Moon for their own profit, like they ruined the Earth. We have to stop them! Or if we can’t block their launch or landing sites, we must force them to share the benefits of space mining, and comply with regulations that would be beneficial for the whole world. We cannot allow their greed to ruin other celestial bodies, right? (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3951/1

Commercial crew’s day finally arrives
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, May 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3952a.jpg)
Doug Hurley (left) and Bob Behnken pose in front of the Tesla May 23 that will transport them to Launch Complex 39A for a final dress rehearsal before the Demo-2 launch scheduled for May 27. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The commercial crew program has forced NASA to adapt to new ways of doing things as it partners with SpaceX. Ride to the launch pad in a Tesla? Sure, no problem. Adorn that Tesla, along with the Falcon 9 rocket, with both the NASA “worm” and “meatball” logos, contrary to past policy? The more the better. (See “Worms and wings, meatballs and swooshes: NASA insignias in popular culture (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3947/1)”, The Space Review, May 18, 2020). Ditch the old orange pressure suit shuttle astronauts wore in favor a new, sleek, primarily white suit? Okay, as long as it meets NASA safety standards. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3952/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 06, 2020, 07:29
Astrobiotechnology: molecular steps towards the boundaries of space exploration
by Andrea Camera, Ana Sofia Mota, and Christos Tsagkaris Monday, June 1, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3953a.jpg)
The International Space Station’s Columbus module supports astrobiotech research, particularly for European scientists. (credit: ESA)

The Apollo 11 landing was reported as a small step by a man and a great step for mankind. Since then, there have been many steps in space research and exploration, or SRE. Astrobiotechnology, a relatively new branch of biotechnology developed in the frame and for the sake of SRE, is a field where molecular steps mark new endeavours and pave the way to new paths. (NASA, 2018; NASA, 2019) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3953/1

Is open sourcing the next frontier in space exploration?
by Dylan Taylor Monday, June 1, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3954a.jpg)
Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) flew a supercomputer on the ISS to test how terrestrial computing systems could operate in the space environment. (credit: HPE)

Humans are naturally curious. For centuries, we have used that curiosity to collaborate to achieve great things. You only have to look at ancient wonders like the Great Pyramids as well as modern-day engineering marvels like launch vehicles. Such traits help us advance technologically and learn more about the world around and above us. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3954/1

The genre-defining astronaut/ex-astronaut autobiographies
by Emily Carney Monday, June 1, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3955a.jpg)
Brian O’Leary wrote about his short tenure as a NASA astronaut 50 years ago.

Books still matter. Throughout the last sixty-plus years of spaceflight, literature chronicling spaceflight history and heritage, which runs the gamut from detailing hardware and rocketry to describing the features of the Moon and various solar system objects, have dazzled and awed readers, often introducing audiences to the subject. However, frequently the books that draw the most interest from readers are about the people: the astronauts, the flight controllers, and the workers. First-person accounts of a particular period can function as a “time machine,” pulling the reader closer into a project’s or program’s orbit (pardon the pun.)

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3955b.jpg)(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3955c.jpg)(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3955d.jpg)
(...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3955/1

NASA will not save 2020
by A.J. Mackenzie Monday, June 1, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3956a.jpg)
While the Demo-2 launch was a major milestone for NASA, it’s not going to “save” 2020 any more than Apollo 8 saved 1968. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

There is a bit a mythology popular among space aficionados about how NASA “saved” 1968. That year was, arguably, one of the worst for the United States in the 20th century. The Vietnam War raged on with no end in sight, civil rights protests turned violent, and leaders like Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy were assassinated. But, around Christmastime that year, NASA launched Apollo 8, the first human mission to orbit the Moon. The success of that daring, unprecedented mission salvaged 1968, just in the nick of time—or, at least, that’s what many space enthusiasts believe. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3956/1

A shaky ride to a smooth launch
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 1, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3957a.jpg)
The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, named Endeavour by the two astronauts on board, approaches the ISS May 31. (credit: NASA)

Ordinarily, planning a mid-afternoon launch from Florida during the summer would be inadvisable, especially if there’s no margin for error. The heat and humidity can make for “dynamic” weather conditions (to use a word that came up frequently in forecasts last week) that make it difficult to predict if a launch can proceed. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3957/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 09, 2020, 00:26
Review: After LM
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3958a.jpg)
After LM: NASA Lunar Lander Concepts Beyond Apollo
by John Connolly
NASA, 2020
ebook, 277 pp.
ISBN 978-0-578-62272-9
Free
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20190031985

When NASA announced the winners of Human Landing System (HLS) awards at the end of April (see “Can NASA land humans on the Moon by 2024? (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3946/1)”, The Space Review, May 18, 2020), one thing that was immediately obvious was the diversity of designs. SpaceX proposed a version of its Starship reusable launch vehicle, offering a lander far larger than its counterparts, and one so tall that astronauts would descend to the lunar surface not using a ladder but instead on an elevator. Dynetics, by contrast, proposed a lander with a low-slung crew cabin ringed by drop tanks. Only the “national team” led by Blue Origin offered a lander that looked like a descendent of the Apollo program’s Lunar Module, with an ascent stage mounted on top of a descent stage. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3958/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 09, 2020, 00:26
Space alternate history before For All Mankind: Stephen Baxter’s NASA trilogy
by Simon Bradshaw Monday, June 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3959a.jpg)
Stephen Baxter’s “NASA trilogy” novels offered different looks at alternative histories, or futures, for NASA. (credit: NASA)

For All Mankind, one of the flagship shows of Apple’s original-content Apple TV+ service (see “Wasn’t the future wonderful? (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3895/1)”, The Space Review, March 9, 2020), is far from being the first alternate history to reach our screens. Amazon’s adaptation of Philip K. Dick’s The Man in the High Castle is the leading recent example, although the premise has been explored before in series such as Sliders (1995–2000). It is the first such production to specifically take and focus on as its premise an alternate history of human space exploration, overtly diverging from ours in June 1969 when Alexei Leonov becomes the first man on the Moon.[1] (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3959/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 09, 2020, 00:26
Be careful what you wish for
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3960a.jpg)
President Donald Trump speaks at the Kennedy Space Center Vehicle Assembly Building after the successful Demo-2 commercial crew launch May 30. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

For decades, space advocates have sought presidential leadership in space: a commitment by a president and broader administration to make space a priority and take actions accordingly. That belief was rooted in President John F. Kennedy’s public advocacy for NASA and the goal he set of landing humans on the Moon by the end of the 1960s. NASA’s success in achieving that goal cemented that belief, even if, as historical records revealed decades later, that Kennedy personally was not that interested in space. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3960/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 09, 2020, 00:27
How has traffic been managed in the sky, on waterways, and on the road? Comparisons for space situational awareness (part 1)
by Stephen Garber and Marissa Herron Monday, June 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2663a.jpg)
The growth of both debris in Earth orbit from collisions and explosions as well as active satellites is raising awareness about the need for revised approaches to space traffic management. (credit: ESA)

Disclaimer: the views expressed in this article are solely those of the authors, not of NASA or of the Federal Government.

Most casual observers likely would agree that as the complex space operating environment becomes more crowded with more operating satellites and debris, the topics of space situational awareness (SSA) and space traffic management (STM) deserve more concerted attention. While we’ve had over 60 years of satellites in the large expanse of near-Earth space with only a handful of collisions, this likely will change as space becomes more crowded. To understand what kind of overall STM framework might be both useful and practical, we will examine some of the complexities of current SSA operations. For historical points of comparison, we then will look at literal and figurative “rules of the road” paradigms for traveling on land, sea, and in the air. Curiously, norms and procedures for managing the flights of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), aka “drones”, are evolving faster than those for STM, even though modern drones have flown effectively for fewer years than spacecraft. Some aeronautics researchers have looked at UAS traffic management (UTM) as a possible model for STM.[1] By assessing similarities and differences among how traffic is managed on roads, waterways, and in the air for diverse groups of drivers/pilots, we hope to stimulate careful thought on how inherently global space operations might best be managed in this rapidly evolving era of international capabilities in space, technological change, and commercialization. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3961/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 09, 2020, 00:27
Imagining safety zones: Implications and open questions
by Jessy Kate Schingler Monday, June 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3962a.jpg)
The scarcity of lunar resources like volatiles illustrates the need to deconflict activities on the Moon in a way that is acceptable by all participants. (credit: NASA)

In May, NASA announced its intent to “establish a common set of principles to govern the civil exploration and use of outer space” referred to as the Artemis Accords.[1,2] The Accords were released initially as draft principles, to be developed and implemented through a series of bilateral agreements with international partners. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3962/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 16, 2020, 09:13
Review: Chasing the Dream
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 15, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3963a.jpg)

Chasing the Dream
by Dana Andrews
Classic Day Publishing, 2020
paperback, 350 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-59849-281-1
US$28.95
https://www.retiredrocketdoc.com/shop

The history of spaceflight is littered with concepts that never, literally or figuratively, got off the ground. The recent NASA book After LM described dozens of designs for lunar landers proposed after the Apollo program, up through the cancellation of the Constellation program a decade ago, none of which got even to the hardware production phase of development (see “Review: After LM (https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3958/1)”, The Space Review, June 8, 2020). The same is true, of course, for many other proposed launch vehicles and spacecraft. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3963/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 16, 2020, 09:13
How has traffic been managed in the sky, on waterways, and on the road? Comparisons for space situational awareness (part 2)
by Stephen Garber and Marissa Herron Monday, June 15, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2663a.jpg)
The growth of both debris in Earth orbit from collisions and explosions as well as active satellites is raising awareness about the need for revised approaches to space traffic management. (credit: ESA)

Disclaimer: the views expressed in this article are solely those of the authors, not of NASA or of the Federal Government.

Other traditional “rules of the road”

Taking a step back from the complexities of STM and looking at how traffic historically has been managed in other domains may provide some useful insights. One issue that cuts across land, air, and sea is vehicle worthiness. That is, cars, planes, and boats all need to be registered to ensure their safety, and this may be analogous to the satellite licensing process. Cars go through safety inspections to ensure road worthiness and minimum pollution standards, as well as to ensure we have functioning headlights to see and be seen at night, avoiding collisions. Just as cars, planes, and boats should be visible unless bad weather precludes this, so too should satellites be trackable. The technology for each domain is different, but the goal for all these vehicles is to be identifiable to foster communication and coordination of intended maneuvers. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3964/1
Part 1 https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3961/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 16, 2020, 09:13
Hugging Hubble longer
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 15, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3965a.jpg)
The Hubble Space Telescope seen by the last servicing mission, STS-125 in 2009. (credit: NASA)

The future of space-based astronomy is delayed. Again.

Last week, Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA associate administrator, confirmed the inevitable: the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) won’t launch next March, as had been the schedule for the last two years. This time, a slowdown in work on the telescope that started this past March because of the pandemic will delay a launch, something that appeared increasingly obvious given the limited work that could be done and the available schedule reserves. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3965/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 16, 2020, 09:13
The Eagle, the Bear, and the (other) Dragon: US-Russian relations in the SpaceX Era
by Gregory D. Miller Monday, June 15, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3966a.jpg)
A sucecssful SpaceX Crew Dragon mission will allow NASA to end its dependence on Russia for accessing the International Space Station, which brings with it geopolitical implications. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The May 30 launch of two US astronauts aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft, the first human launch into orbit from US soil in nearly nine years, raises several questions about the future of US-Russian cooperation in space (Snyder and Kramer; O’Callaghan), but also about US-Russian relations more generally. US astronauts have been launching aboard Russian spacecraft since 1995 (Uri), but with NASA’s retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011, the US human spaceflight program became reliant on Russian launch capabilities. Now that SpaceX showed its ability to perform this task, and plans more launches in the future, one must ask whether this development will help or hinder relations between the U. and Russia. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3966/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 16, 2020, 09:14
Peresvet: a Russian mobile laser system to dazzle enemy satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, June 15, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3967a.jpg)
The trailer-mounted Peresvet laser system as seen in a Russian Ministry of Defense video.

On March 1, 2018 Russian President Vladimir Putin delivered a saber-rattling State of the Union speech that harkened back to the darkest days of the Cold War. He used the occasion to put on a display of new armaments such as nuclear-powered cruise missiles and hypersonic glide vehicles capable of penetrating US missile defenses, underlining they had been developed as a result of the US pulling out of the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty in 2002. Putin also boasted that Russia was “one step ahead” in what he called “weapons with new physical properties”, adding:

“We have achieved significant progress in laser weapons. It is not just a concept or a plan anymore. It is not even in the early production stages. Since last year, our troops have been armed with laser weapons. I do not want to reveal more details. It is not the time yet. But experts will understand that with such weaponry, Russia’s defense capacity has multiplied.” (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3967/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 23, 2020, 01:15
Review: Cosmic Clouds 3-D
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 22, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3968a.jpg)
Cosmic Clouds 3-D: Where Stars Are Born
by David J. Eicher and Brian May
MIT Press, 2020
hardcover, 192 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-262-04402-8
US$40.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262044021/spaceviews

Earlier this month, the New Horizons mission released the results of a unique experiment. The spacecraft, about seven billion kilometers from Earth, took pictures of two nearby stars, Proxima Centauri and Wolf 359. Project scientists compared them to images of the stars as seen from Earth. The result was a simple but powerful demonstration of parallax: the positions of the two stars were clearly shifted in the spacecraft images compared to the Earth. (Parallax is routinely used to measure distances to nearby stars, by using the Earth’s orbit as the baseline, but the shifts are never as prominent as in these images.) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3968/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 23, 2020, 01:15
Distributors should unplug the Earth imagery bottleneck
by Nicholas Borroz Monday, June 22, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3969a.jpg)
An image of Lower Manhattan take by Maxar’s WorldView-3 satellite in April. While there is plenty of satellite imagery and related data, getting the right data into the hands of analytics firms remains an obstacle. (credit: ©2020 Maxar Technologies)

In the midst of the pandemic-induced recession, the Earth imagery industry is a bright point in the space sector. Unlike other areas of the space sector, such as those dealing with satellite constellations or new launch vehicles, there is the potential to make relatively quick profits. This is significant because the recession will likely dampen investment in infrastructure projects that require large investments of time and capital to make returns. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3969/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 23, 2020, 01:15
Spaceflight after the pandemic
by Eric R. Hedman Monday, June 22, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3728a.jpg)
The pandemic has created crowing demand for broadband that could be an opportunity for constellations like SpaceX’s Starlink, if they can afford to build and launch their satellites. (credit: SpaceX)

A crisis as big as the coronavirus pandemic can’t help but change the world. The space industry will change. We have already seen changes, like OneWeb filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in March. There will be many more changes as this crisis plays out and long afterwards. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3970/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 23, 2020, 01:15
Orbital use fees won’t solve the space debris problem
by Ruth Stilwell Monday, June 22, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3926a.jpg)
Orbital use fees are paid by operators of new satellites, but the collision risk largely comes from debris and inactive satellites. (credit: ESA)

When it comes to space debris, the numbers are repeated often: more than 21,000 objects ten centimeters across or larger, approximately half a million objects between one and ten centimeters in diameter. Across the space community, there is general agreement that space debris is an existing, and worsening, problem. Many point to the free and open access to space, while others argue that proposed “megaconstellations” will take low Earth orbit to the breaking point. In response, some argue that economic disincentives, like orbit fees or taxes, could be used to reduce demand by increasing the cost of a satellite in orbit. Some argue that additional satellites create additional debris risk solely based on the increase in the satellite population. But is this the problem we are trying to solve? (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3971/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 23, 2020, 01:15
Stability and certainty for NASA’s exploration efforts
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 22, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3972a.jpg)
Kathy Lueders, NASA commercial crew program manager, monitors the approach of the Crew Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station May 31. NASA named Lueders as associate administrator for human exploration and operations June 12. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

For most of the last decade, NASA’s human spaceflight program had stable leadership. Since the establishment of the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate (HEOMD) in 2011, when NASA merged its space operations and exploration directorates, that part of NASA had been led by Bill Gerstenmaier, a veteran of NASA’s shuttle and space station programs. Over the next eight years, Gerstenmaier gained almost universal admiration and respect in the industry for his leadership and expertise during an often-tumultuous time for human spaceflight at the agency. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3972/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 30, 2020, 02:15
Review: The Search for Life on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 29, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3973a.jpg)
The Search for Life on Mars: The Greatest Scientific Detective Story of All Time
by Elizabeth Howell and Nicholas Booth
Arcade Publishing, 2020
hardcover, 424 pp.
ISBN 978-1-950691-39-5
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/195069139X/spaceviews

Over the next month the newest flotilla of Mars missions will set sail. Around the middle of July, a Japanese rocket will launch Hope, an orbiter that is the first Mars mission developed by the United Arab Emirates. Sometime in July, or perhaps early August, China will launch Tianwen-1, an ambitious mission that includes an orbiter, lander, and rover, but about which the Chinese space program has said little. Most of the attention, though, will go towards NASA’s Mars 2020 mission, carrying a rover called Perseverance and currently scheduled for launch on July 22. Perseverance will land on March next February and soon start caching samples of Martian rocks, part of an overarching Mars Sample Return effort that will take at least a decade to complete. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3973/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 30, 2020, 02:15
Enhancing space deterrence thought for nuclear threshold threats (part 1)
by Christopher M. Stone Monday, June 29, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3686a.jpg)
Military planners need to consider threats not just from conventional anti-satellite weapons but also alternatives once dismissed as “unthinkable.” (credit: DRDO)

Most governments when asked to choose between war and peace are likely to choose peace because it looks safer. These same governments if asked to choose between getting the first or second strike will very likely choose the first strike…once they feel war is inevitable, or even very probable.
- Herman Kahn, On Thermonuclear War (1960)

Space fighting is not far off. National security has already exceeded territory and territorial waters and airspace and territorial space should also be added. The modes of defense will no longer be to fight on our own territory and fight for marine rights and interests. We must also engage in space defense as well as air defense.
- Teng Jinqun, People’s Liberation Army Analyst (2001) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3974/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 30, 2020, 02:15
The Artemis Accords: repeating the mistakes of the Age of Exploration
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, June 29, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3975a.jpg)
NASA’s approach to international cooperation, the Artemis Accords, rejects alternatives like the Moon Treaty, and an implementing agreement for it, that could be more viable in the long term. (credit: NASA)

“Space is a warfighting domain… It is not enough to have an American presence in space; we must have American dominance in space.”
- US Vice President Mike Pence, 2018[1]

In the spring of 1493, the King and Queen of Spain sent an envoy to the Pope in Rome. Along with Portugal, Spain had just used its advanced sailing and navigation technology to reach “new worlds,” areas of the Earth that had not been previously discovered by Europeans. But they had a problem: they wanted to establish sovereign property rights in the lands they had discovered, but they weren’t sure they could do so under their own authority. So, they turned to the only international authority in Europe at that time, the Catholic Church, which held sway over governments from Portugal to Poland, from the Arctic to the Mediterranean. If the Church would establish a legal framework that granted them sovereignty, then those nations would be bound to recognize it.[2] (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3975/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 30, 2020, 02:16
THESEUS: a high-energy proposal for a medium-sized mission
by Arwen Rimmer Monday, June 29, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3976a.jpg)
An illustration of THESEUS, a proposed medium-class ESA missions to detect and precisely locate gamma-ray bursts. (credit: ESA)

THESEUS (https://arxiv.org/pdf/1710.04638.pdf) (Transient High-Energy Sky and Early and Universe Surveyor) is a space mission project aimed at detecting and characterizing gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) so as to investigate the early universe and advance multi-messenger and time-domain astrophysics. It is one of three finalists in the ESA’s latest call for medium-sized missions, along with EnVision and SPICA (see “EnVision and the Cosmic Vision decision”, The Space Review, March 2, 2020; and “SPICA: an infrared telescope to look back into the early universe”, The Space Review, May 4, 2020). (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3976/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 30, 2020, 02:16
Sausage making in space: the quest to reform commercial space regulations
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 29, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3977a.jpg)
The new commercial remote sensing regulations should make it easier for synthetic aperture radar satellite companies like Capella Space get licenses for their systems. (credit: Capella Space)

There’s long been a tension between government and industry involving regulations. Companies traditionally want to minimize regulations in order to reduce the cost and other burdens they place on them. Governments, on the other hand, seek regulations in order to support broader priorities, like national security, workplace safety, and the environment. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3977/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2020, 00:44
Review: The Little Book of Cosmology
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 6, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3978a.jpg)

The Little Book of Cosmology
by Lyman Page
Princeton Univ. Press, 2020
hardcover, 152 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-691-19578-0
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691195781/spaceviews

Physics and associated subjects, like cosmology, have plenty of canonical, and massive, books. Many physics students are acquainted with Gravitation, a classic textbook about general relativity whose authors include Nobel laurate Kip Thorne. Weighing in at more than 1,000 pages, the book seems massive enough to warp spacetime on its own. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3978/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2020, 00:44
Enhancing space deterrence thought for nuclear threshold threats (part 2)
Assessing North Korean nuclear spacepower
by Christopher M. Stone Monday, July 6, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2262a.jpg)
A North Korean rocket launch in December 2012. The rocket successfully placed a satellite into orbit, but that satellite appeared to be dead on arrival.

Strategic cultures are not like strategic plans. They are the result of political and cultural history and tend to be relatively stable over time. The study of these cultures would be inexpensive and could reduce our uncertainties about how these countries could use their new power.
   - Stephen Rosen: Winning the Next War
(...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3979/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2020, 00:44
“Artemis 8” using Dragon
by Robert Zubrin Monday, July 6, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3957a.jpg)
A SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, like the one approaching the ISS in May on the Demo-2 mission, could be sent around the Moon using a combination of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets. (credit: NASA)

The following memo was sent by the author to NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine and Scott Pace, executive secretary of the National Space Council, on June 30, 2020.

A mission equivalent to Apollo 8—call it “Artemis 8”—could be done, potentially as soon as this year, using Dragon, Falcon Heavy, and Falcon 9. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3980/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2020, 00:44
It’s (small) rocket science, after all
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 6, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3981a.jpg)
A Rocket Lab Electron rocket lifts off Saturday on its ill-fated launch. (credit: Rocket Lab webcast)

Maybe companies should think twice about launching on US holidays.

To be fair, it was the morning of Sunday, July 5, in New Zealand when an Electron rocket lifted off from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex 1 there. However, back in the United States, where Rocket Lab is headquartered, it was still the afternoon of July 4 when the Electron lifted off on a launch licensed by the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3981/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2020, 00:44
National spaceports: the past
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, July 6, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3982a.jpg)
An Atlas V launch in August 2019, seen from the author’s home.

The US Air Force, long the operator of the nation’s primary space launch bases, is giving some thought to what “National Spaceports” should be. This analysis should be aided by certain facts.

The launch bases at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station (AFS) and Vandenberg Air Force Base (AFB) originally were conceived as test facilities for Air Force Systems Command programs. Systems Command’s main focus was its product centers, the procurement organizations for new Air Force systems. They conducted development and acquisition of new military hardware. Under Systems Command’s highly programmatic focus, the launch centers and all other test ranges were entirely driven by the various procurement program requirements. Program offices almost always greatly dislike even the idea that they could be impacted by the requirements and actions of other programs, and as a result this produced a huge proliferation of range systems and facilities designed to meet specific program requirements, largely without regards to overall efficiency. Tracking systems, communications systems, utilities, and brick-and-mortar support facilities required by programs were installed at the launch bases largely without regard to long-term costs or efficiency. This had the effect of increasing test center capacity: dozens or even hundreds of test support operations were common every day, and even multiple rocket launches in one day were common. On the other hand, no doubt many opportunities were lost that could have reduced costs, or at least been better for future activities. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3982/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 14, 2020, 11:31
Review: The Sirens of Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 13, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3983a.jpg)

The Sirens of Mars: Searching for Life on Another World
by Sarah Stewart Johnson
Crown, 2020
hardcover, 264 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-101-90481-7
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/110190481X/spaceviews

Move over, Shark Week: it’s Mars Month. From now through (hopefully) the end of the month, three missions are set to launch to go to Mars. The United Arab Emirates’ first Mars mission, an orbiter called Hope, is set to launch Wednesday morning (Tuesday afternoon US time) on an H-2A rocket in Japan. Next week is the likely launch date for Tainwen-1, China’s first full-scale Mars mission that includes an orbiter, lander, and rover. NASA’s Mars 2020 mission, carrying the rover Perseverance, is now scheduled for launch July 30 after some launch vehicle and spacecraft processing issues delayed the launch from July 17. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3983/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 14, 2020, 11:31
Enhancing space deterrence thought for nuclear threshold threats (part 3)
A future defense space strategy for the Second Nuclear Age
by Christopher M. Stone Monday, July 13, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3095d.jpg)
The defense space strategy of the future must acknowledge the connection of space as a “forward region” of homeland defense similar to that of the emergent Asian nuclear-space powers in the second nuclear age environment.

Deterrence theory favors status quo powers, not powers unhappy with the limitations put on them by the existing distribution of power and superior weapons in the hands of others.
— Therese Delpech: Nuclear Deterrence in the 21st Century
(...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3984/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 14, 2020, 11:32
Not so dark skies
by Al Globus Monday, July 13, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3985a.jpg)

In the book Dark Skies (https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0190903341/spaceviews), Daniel Deudney examines space settlement[1] in detail and comes to the conclusion that it is so likely to exterminate humanity or have other serious consequences that it should not be undertaken at all, or at least not for several centuries, giving time to improve homo sapiens’ habits. Deudney comes to his surprising conclusion by applying geopolitics, a part of political science that studies “the practice of states controlling and competing for territory,”[2] among other things, to space settlement, which Deudney describes as “habitat expansionism.” Deudney uses a version of geopolitical theory to generate 12 propositions and then applies them to predict the future, coming to the conclusion that space settlement is an existential threat to humanity and should be viewed in the same category as nuclear war. Dark Skies is a difficult read but it is also a detailed and extensive critique of space settlement that deserves a thoughtful response. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3985/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 14, 2020, 11:32
CSI: Rocket Science
by Jeffrey L. Smith Monday, July 13, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3986a.jpg)
The Castor 600 rocket motor’s nozzle disintegrated during its inaugural test in May 2019, setting off an intense investigation. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

In the failure review process, engineers and technicians work together to perform two separate but equally important tasks: the Investigation to determine the accident’s Root Cause, and the Recovery to implement the Corrective Action.

These are their stories.
(...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3986/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 14, 2020, 11:32
What’s in a name when it comes to an “accord”?
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 13, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3599a.jpg)
While development of the lunar Gateway (above) will be done through an extension of the intergovernmental agreement for the International Space Station, NASA envisions a new approach for further international cooperation in the Artemis program. (credit: NASA)

The cooperation among the nations involved in the International Space Station is governed by what’s known as the Intergovernmental Agreement (IGA), a legal framework that handles the rights and responsibilities of the United States, Russia, Japan, Canada, and various European nations involved in the station. That framework will be extended to cover the lunar Gateway, the facility NASA is developing in lunar orbit as part of the Artemis program with future contributions by Canada, Europe, Japan, and perhaps Russia. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3987/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 21, 2020, 05:47
Review: Once Upon a Time I Lived on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 20, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3988a.jpg)

Once Upon a Time I Lived on Mars: Space, Exploration, and Life on Earth
by Kate Greene
St. Martin’s Press, 2020
hardcover, 240 pp.
ISBN 978-1-250-15947-2
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1250159474/spaceviews

While the robotic missions launching to Mars this year have a wide range of science goals, they are widely seen as precursors for eventual human missions to the Red Planet. NASA’s Mars 2020 mission includes an experiment called MOXIE that will demonstrate a way to produce oxygen from the carbon dioxide in the Martian atmosphere, a capability that will be essential for future human expeditions. NASA’s fiscal year 2021 budget proposal included a request to start work on a Mars Ice Mapper mission, an orbiter that would search for subsurface ice deposits that could be resources for future human expeditions. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3988/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 21, 2020, 05:47
Tracking off-the-books satellites with low perigees
by Charles Phillips Monday, July 20, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3989a.jpg)
A printout of a computer prediction of the reentry of Skylab in 1979, illustrating the hazards of low-perigee objects.

One fascinating study is objects that reenter the atmosphere: watching to see how low an orbit various objects can have and still survive, and where they reenter. My first professional job was in the US Air Force as an orbital analyst and one of the first things I worked on was the reentry of Skylab. It was a lot of fun for a young person. The image above is a plot from our 427M computer that showed predicted reentry time and location; there are probably not many surviving prints from that system. Skylab was an example that large objects that fall from the sky can cause damage and alarm to people below them. I was glad that the US Air Force had taken upon itself the responsibility of alerting the world. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3989/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 21, 2020, 05:47
The pandemic’s effect on NASA science
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 20, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3990a.jpg)
The coronavirus pandemic is partly to blame for the latest James Webb Space Telescope launch slip, a seven-month delay to October 31, 2021. (credit: NASA/Chris Gunn)

When the coronavirus pandemic started affecting NASA operations in March, forcing the agency to close centers (see “Space in uncertain times”, The Space Review March 23, 2020), NASA leadership prioritized some activities, like operation of the International Space Station and other spacecraft missions. NASA also elevated the priority of the SpaceX Demo-2 commercial crew test flight and the launch of the Mars 2020 mission. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3990/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 21, 2020, 05:47
Handshakes and histories: The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, 45 years later
by Asif Siddiqi and Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 20, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3991a.jpg)
The Apollo-Soyuz mission was in many ways intended to be the most visible symbol of a new era of détente between the United States and the Soviet Union. (credit: NASA)

On July 15, 1975, two rockets lifted off their launch pads on other sides of the world. One was a Soyuz spacecraft launching out of the Baikonur Cosmodrome, carrying cosmonauts Alexei Leonov and Valeri Kubasov. The other was an Apollo spacecraft atop the last of the Saturn IB rockets, carrying Thomas Stafford, Vance Brand, and Deke Slayton. Two days later the spacecraft linked up, their space travelers opened their hatches, and they engaged in a symbolic handshake in orbit that was intended to symbolize a thawing of Cold War tensions between two superpowers equipped to annihilate each other in nuclear war. Now, 45 years later, the Russian space agency Roscosmos has released a large trove of declassified documents about the Soviet side of this event which at the time seemed incredibly historic, but in retrospect now looks like a minor footnote in a long and continuing rivalry. Hindsight, it turns out, can be blurrier than we think. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3991/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 28, 2020, 05:21
Review: Promise Denied
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 27, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3992a.jpg)

Promise Denied: NASA’s X-34 and the Quest for Cheap, Reusable Access to Space
by Bruce I. Larrimer
NASA, 2020
ebook, 410 pp., illus.
ISBN 9781626830516
free
https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/promise_denied.html

If, in 1995, you told people in the space industry that in a quarter-century there would be partially reusable launch vehicles in operation commercially, the news might have been a little bit of a disappointment. The mid-1990s were the heyday for reusable launch vehicle concepts, particularly single stage to orbit (SSTO). The DC-X Delta Clipper, developed by the Pentagon and later transferred to NASA and renamed the DC-XA Clipper Graham, was making test flights in New Mexico, demonstrating vertical takeoff and landing. NASA had ambitions for an even more capable RLV demonstrator, the X-33, that Lockheed Martin won the contract to develop with plans to turn it into a commercial SSTO vehicle, VentureStar. Certainly by 2020 RLVs would be commonplace, flying daily! (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3992/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 28, 2020, 05:22
What you should learn from Comet NEOWISE
by Hariharan Karthikeyan Monday, July 27, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3993a.jpg)
Comet NEOWISE as photographed by the author recently. (credit: Hariharan Karthikeyan)

This was nothing short of a hasty search for the highest point in the city. As the sky dimmed, we drove in separate cars for miles and miles unsuccessfully, finally settling for a rugged trail that branched off of Beatty Drive in El Dorado Hills, California. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3993/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 28, 2020, 05:22
Highway to the Danger Zone: The National Reconnaissance Office and a downed F-14 Tomcat in Iraq
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 27, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3994a.jpg)
An F-14 Tomcat from fighter squadron VF-154 “the Black Knights” like the one lost over Iraq in April 2003. (credit: seaforces.org)

It was April 1, 2003, in the opening days of the American invasion of Iraq, known as Operation Iraqi Freedom, when it still seemed like the United States and its coalition partners were going to liberate the country from a brutal dictator, and before the occupation turned into a long, brutal, messy conflict. Lieutenant Chad Vincelette and Lieutenant Commander Scotty “Gordo” McDonald were assigned to squadron VF-154, “the Black Knights,” flying the squadron’s last deployment of the F-14A Tomcat. Their call-sign was “JUNKER 14.” The squadron had been split in two, with most aircraft staying on the USS Kitty Hawk, while five were based ashore, at Al Udeid Air Base, in Qatar. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3994/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 28, 2020, 05:22
National spaceports: the future
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, July 27, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3995a.jpg)
The Space Force offers an opportunity to stop repeating the mistakes of the past when it comes to operating launch sites. (credit: US Navy)

“National spaceports: the past” explained how different organizational inclinations, as well as both Command and Air Force priorities and specific experiences, impacted the way different Air Force commands regarded and managed the Air Force test ranges that have become national spaceports. These attitudes and priorities had significant impacts on the way the spaceports were operated and planned. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3995/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 28, 2020, 05:23
Irregular disorder and the NASA budget
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 27, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3946a.jpg)
The lunar lander concept by the “national team” led by Blue Origin, one of three that NASA is currently supporting through the Human Landing System program. The House version of a fiscal year 2021 spending bill provides NASA with only a fraction of the funding the agency requested for that program. (credit: Blue Origin)

It’s been a long time since there’s been anything like “regular order” in the congressional appropriations process: individual bills passed by the House and Senate, their differences resolved in conference to produce a final version that’s signed into law before the beginning of the fiscal year October 1. Instead, there are usually stopgap funding bills, called continuing resolutions, that extend for weeks or months before a massive omnibus bill, combining up to a dozen different bills, is eventually passed. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3996/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 04, 2020, 02:15
Sending Washington to the Moon: an interview with Richard Paul
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 3, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3997a.jpg)
A celebration of the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 last year in Washington. A radio show two decades earlier examined the political issues behind the program. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Recently, the BBC World Service podcast “13 Minutes to the Moon” finished its second season, focusing on the Apollo 13 mission during seven episodes. It has been an outstanding series so far. But this was not the first time that radio has addressed the Apollo program in an interesting and substantive way. Two decades ago there was a two-part radio broadcast that also told a complicated space story involving multiple actors. In 1999, in honor of the 30th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing, radio station WAMU in Washington, DC, aired a program about the role of Washington politics in the lunar landing. “Washington Goes to the Moon” (WGTTM) was written and produced by Richard Paul and featured interviews with a number of key figures in the story, from historians to NASA and congressional officials to famed newsman Walter Cronkite. After the radio program aired Paul, the author of We Could Not Fail: The First African Americans in the Space Program, turned transcripts of the interviews over to NASA as historical documents. These transcripts included unaired portions of the interviews. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3997/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 04, 2020, 02:15
Mars race rhetoric
by Ajey Lele Monday, August 3, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3900b.jpg)
NASA launched the Mars 2020 mission, featuring the Perseverance rover, last week, bound for a landing on Mars next February. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Science gets viewed as the search for truth. It helps to remove bias and bring in objectivity. But the intimacy of science and politics is also well-known. Depending upon the purpose, science could have societal, political, economic, and strategic backdrops. Science requires political patronage, mainly for funding. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3998/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 04, 2020, 02:15
Propelling Perseverance: The legacy of Viking is helping NASA get to Mars
by Joe Cassady Monday, August 3, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3999a.jpg)
The same thruster design used for the Viking landers was resurrected for the Curiosity landing (above) and will be used on the Perseverance landing next year. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Much has been written in the past few weeks about the NASA Mars 2020 mission that will carry the rover Perseverance and the helicopter Ingenuity to Mars. But did you know that the transportation system that will deliver these phenomenal machines to the surface of the Red Planet actually owes much to the original Viking landers back in the 1970s? It’s true. This is a tale of tried and true engines and a little bit of perseverance to accomplish the task that the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) liked to proclaim as “Dare Mighty Things!” (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/3999/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 04, 2020, 02:15
How the “Department of Exploration” supports Mars 2020 and more
by Paul Dabbar Monday, August 3, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4000a.jpg)
An Atlas V rocket carrying the Mars 2020 Perseverance rover lifts off July 30 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

Rovers can’t rove without persistent sources of power. That’s especially true when it comes to space exploration. And when NASA’s Perseverance rover begins exploring the Red Planet next February after its launch last Thursday, it will do so thanks to power supplied by the Department of Energy (DOE), which may be better dubbed the “Department of Exploration.” (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4000/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 04, 2020, 02:15
Captured flag
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 3, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4001a.jpg)
The Crew Dragon spacecraft Endeavour moments before splashdown August 2 that ended the Demo-2 mission. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

During a ceremony on the final space shuttle mission, STS-135 in July 2011, astronauts on the International Space Station spoke with then-President Barack Obama. During the call, the astronauts showed off a small American flag, 10 by 15 centimeters, that has also flown on the first shuttle mission three decades earlier. That flag, they said, would remain on the station until the next crewed American spacecraft arrived at the station. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4001/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 11, 2020, 08:27
Review: War in Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 10, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4002a.jpg)
War in Space: Strategy, Spacepower, Geopolitics
by Bleddyn E. Bowen
Edinburgh University Press, 2020
hardcover, 288 pp.
ISBN 978-1-4744-5048-5
US$110.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1474450482/spaceviews

The latest salvo, if you will, in the debate about a space arms race came last month. US Space Command announced that Russia conducted what it considered an anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons test in orbit when the Kosmos 2543 satellite deployed an object in the vicinity of another Russian satellite. The speed of the deployed object led the US government to conclude this was a test of a kinetic projectile. “This is further evidence of Russia’s continuing efforts to develop and test space-based systems, and consistent with the Kremlin’s published military doctrine to employ weapons that hold US and allied space assets at risk,” said Gen. Jay Raymond, head of both Space Command and the US Space Force, in a statement. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4002/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 11, 2020, 08:27
Orbital space tourism set for rebirth in 2021
by Tony Quine Monday, August 10, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4003a.jpg)
Both Axiom Space and Space Adventures have announced contracts for Crew Dragon missions, either to the International Space Station or a free-flyer mission to a higher orbit. (credit: SpaceX)

Orbital space tourism has been in a holding pattern since 2009, a decade-long hiatus caused, indirectly, by the end of the space shuttle in 2011. However, orbital space tourism is finally due to return in 2021, perhaps on a scale unimaginable back in 2009.

According to media releases from the two main protagonists in the sector, Space Adventures and Axiom Space, up to nine seats to orbit will be available for purchase, by either individuals or organizations, during the final quarter of 2021. These will be spread across three spaceflights, using both the tried and tested Russian Soyuz, and SpaceX’s Dragon, two of which will dock at the International Space Station. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4003/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 11, 2020, 08:27
Virgin Galactic, still awaiting liftoff, spreads its wings
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 10, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4004a.jpg)
The interior of SpaceShipTwo features reclining seats, lots of cameras, and a mirror in the back. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

For the last 15 years, Virgin Galactic has been very clear about its plans: develop a suborbital vehicle, SpaceShipTwo, that will fly customers and payloads to the edge of space on a regular basis. It’s kept a focus on that goal despite extensive delays, testing setbacks, and a fatal test flight accident nearly six years ago. When the company did develop a side business, a small launch vehicle called LauncherOne, it spun that out into Virgin Orbit, a separate business that now shares little with Virgin Galactic other than founder Richard Branson and the “Virgin” in their names. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4004/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 11, 2020, 08:27
After the fire: a long-lost transcript from the Apollo 1 fire investigation
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 10, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4005a.jpg)
The crew of Apollo 1 crosses the gantry to the spacecraft on the day of the fire, January 27, 1967. (credit: NASA)

As long as there has been spaceflight, there have been conspiracy theories. There were conspiracy theories about Sputnik in the late 1950s (“their Germans are better than our Germans”) and dead cosmonauts in the early 1960s. Even before some people claimed—on the very day that it happened—that the Moon landing was faked, Apollo had its own conspiracy theories. In those days it was difficult for them to propagate and reach a wide audience, unlike today, when they can spread around the world at the speed of light. One of those Apollo conspiracy theories was about a whistleblower named Thomas Baron, who later died under mysterious circumstances. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4005/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 11, 2020, 08:27
Upgrading Russia’s fleet of optical reconnaissance satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, August 10, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4006a.jpg)
Early concept for a 2.4 m primary mirror scheduled to fly on Russia’s next-generation Razdan reconnaissance satellites. (credit: Kontenant magazine)

Russia currently has only two operational optical reconnaissance satellites in orbit, both of which may already have exceeded their design lifetime. They are to be replaced by more capable satellites carrying a primary mirror about the same size as of those believed to be flown aboard American reconnaissance satellites, but it is unclear when these will be ready to fly. An experimental satellite launched in 2018 likely is the precursor of a constellation of much smaller spy satellites that will augment the imagery provided by the big satellites. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4006/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 25, 2020, 03:44
Review: Shuttle, Houston
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 24, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4007a.jpg)

Shuttle, Houston: My Life in the Center Seat of Mission Control
by Paul Dye
Hachette Books, 2020
Hardcover, 320 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-316-45457-5
US$28.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0316454575/spaceviews

The recent SpaceX commercial crew mission offered a look at the future of mission control, or at least the concept of mission control. There was the traditional NASA Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, overseeing the operations of the International Space Station. There was also, though, SpaceX’s own mission control center at its Hawthorne, California, headquarters, which handled the Crew Dragon itself. During their trip to the station in May, and back home in August, the NASA astronauts on the spacecraft communicated directly with the SpaceX mission control rather than with JSC. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4007/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 25, 2020, 03:44
Reaching for the stars: structural reform in the private space sector in India
by Anirudh Rastogi and Varun Baliga Monday, August 24, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4008a.jpg)
New privatization initiatives by the Indian government may help space startups in the country, like small launch vehicle developer Skyroot Aerospace. (credit: Skyroot Aerospace)

India has taken steps in quick succession to liberalize its private space industry. In May, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the opening up of the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO’s) facilities to the country’s private sector as part of its COVID-19 special economic stimulus. More recently, the Indian Cabinet approved the setting up of the Indian National Space Promotion and Authorisation Centre (IN-SPACe) to facilitate private sector participation “through encouraging policies and a friendly regulatory environment.” These are early but laudable steps. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4008/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 25, 2020, 03:44
NASA’s Artemis Accords: the path to a united space law or a divided one?
by Guoyu Wang Monday, August 24, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3975a.jpg)
The Artemis Accords are intended to ensure partners in NASA’s Artemis program agree to a set of principles, but some of those principles may raise international space law issues. (credit: NASA)

On May 15, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine presented the critical points of The Artemis Accords Principles for a Safe, Peaceful, and Prosperous Future (the Artemis Accords) publicly (see “What’s in a name when it comes to an ‘accord’?”, The Space Review, July 13, 2020). The Artemis Accords attempt to clarify basic principles and rule frameworks in international law for the sake of lunar activities which are led by the US, and then to influence and promote the international community to reach a consensus on the legality of space resources activities. It shows that the US carries on the rationale of the Space Resource Exploration and Utilization Act of 2015, along with the Presidential Decree No.13914, and continues to promote the construction of legal and political certainties on space resource activities. In this way, more countries will be attracted to participate in not just the Artemis program, but also future space resources activities on other celestial bodies, such as extracting and utilizing resources on Mars or asteroids. This will have a certain impact not just on the nature of space activities and the relations between spacefaring countries, but also on the discussion of relevant international rules. The main question to be discussed here is whether it will bring to a united space law or a divided one. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4009/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 25, 2020, 03:44
The National Aeronautics and Space and Arms Control Administration (NASACA)?
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 24, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4010a.jpg)
A missile during a May Day Parade in Red Square. In 1969, NASA sought a role in arms control negotiations between the US and USSR.

Nineteen sixty-nine was a key turning point for NASA. In July, the agency landed Apollo 11 on the Moon, a stunning achievement that culminated more than eight years of frantic effort. But by that time the agency’s future was already in question. The Nixon administration had begun questioning the agency’s budget and looking for ways to cut it. Advisers had indicated that there were major policy issues to address about what would happen after Apollo landed on the Moon, and soon some in the administration would question if NASA was even necessary. It was in the midst of this uncertain environment that NASA Administrator Thomas Paine made a surprising suggestion that has been classified for 50 years: NASA could become the key US government agency for monitoring arms control agreements. Newly declassified documents are now shedding some light on this previously unknown proposal, but they raise many questions requiring further study. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4010/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 25, 2020, 03:45
Losers and (sore) winners
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 24, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3940b.jpg)
While SpaceX won the Air Force launch competition using its existing Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, it will have to build a mobile servicing tower (right) at LC-39A to allow for vertical processing of payloads, as well as a stretched payload fairing for the Falcon Heavy. (credit: SpaceX)

In April 2014, Elon Musk declared war on the US Air Force. At a press conference in Washington, he announced that he was filing suit against the service, arguing that it had locked SpaceX out of future military launch contracts with a block buy of launches from rival United Launch Alliance. “Essentially, what we feel is that this is not right,” he said at that event. “National security launches should be put up for competition, and they should not be awarded on a sole-source, uncompeted basis.” (See “SpaceX escalates the EELV debate”, The Space Review, April 28, 2014.) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4011/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 01, 2020, 17:40
Review: The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 31, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4012a.jpg)

The End of Everything (Astrophysically Speaking)
by Katie Mack
Scribner, 2020
hardcover, 240 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-9821-0354-5
US$26.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/198210354X/spaceviews

The end of the universe is probably one of the last things on everyone’s minds these days, given all the problems that make you wonder how we’ll get through just this year. It’s something that is (presumably) very far in the future, and also something we have absolutely no control over. But, perhaps, you are a little curious about how it will all come to an end—whether or not you want to accelerate the process. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4012/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 01, 2020, 17:41
From SSA to space recon: Setting the conditions to prevail in astrodynamic combat
by Maj. James Kirby, US Army Monday, August 31, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4013a.jpg)
The growing concerns about threats to military space assets requires a new mindset, adapted from terrestrial military reconnaissance, to help identify those threats in a timely fashion. (credit: DOD)

Traditional orbital analysis in support of the concept of Space Situational Awareness (SSA) has been historically focused upon the concepts of executing orbit determinations, state vector updates, and close approach analysis to support safety of flight. While these functions will remain foundational, the mindset and culture that has developed these procedures must change in the face of existential threats to our space capabilities. No longer may we be content with a solely a passive awareness of the domain, focused on collision avoidance and safety of flight; rather we must transform our perspective to merge the physics of Newton, Kepler, Lambert, Clohessy, Wiltshire, and Hill, and the reconnaissance principals and culture of Tzu, Buford, and Wellesley into concepts that shape maneuver warfare in this emerging warfighting Area Of Responsibility (AOR). (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4013/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 01, 2020, 17:41
Collaboration is the cornerstone of space exploration
by Dylan Taylor Monday, August 31, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3900b.jpg)
NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover, launched in late July, carried instruments from several companies and is just one example of the importance of international collaboration in space exploration. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

When Neil Armstrong proclaimed that landing on the Moon was “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” the resonance of its message not only alluded to the incredible undertaking that a moon landing entailed, but it also ignited the human imagination and the spirit of invention for what could now be possible. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4014/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 01, 2020, 17:41
Outer space needs private law
by Alexander William Salter Monday, August 31, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3946b.jpg)
NASA’s Artremis program and its proposed Artemis Accords has triggered debate about space governance. (credit: Dynetics)

The Cold War is back, and it’s headed into orbit. American tensions with China and Russia are escalating, especially since Russia’s suspected anti-satellite weapons test. The stakes are nothing less than a peaceful future in space. Operations in orbit and beyond require extraordinary precision and certainty. Any conflict can seriously hinder operational efficiency for both governments and businesses. Fortunately, there’s a solution that can benefit all parties: Giving private law a major role in ordering the cosmos. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4015/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 01, 2020, 17:41
Pick an agency, any agency
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 31, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3926a.jpg)
A report commissioned by Congress affirmed the administration’s choice of the Office of Space Commerce within the Department of Commerce as the lead agency for civil space traffic management. (credit: ESA)

When President Trump appeared at a meeting of the National Space Council at the White House in June 2018, the highlight was his announcement that the administration would seek to establish a Space Force as a separate military branch. It overshadowed his signing of Space Policy Directive (SPD) 3, which focused on space traffic management and assigned responsibilities to the Commerce Department (see “Managing space traffic expectations”, The Space Review, June 25, 2018). (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4016/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 09, 2020, 02:36
Review: The Smallest Lights in the Universe
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4017a.jpg)

The Smallest Lights in the Universe: A Memoir
by Sara Seager
Crown, 2020
hardcover, 320 pp.
ISBN 978-0-525-57625-9
US$28.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0525576258/spaceviews

Science is done by scientists. That may seem like an obvious statement, but it’s something often forgotten in the announcements of discoveries, including in astronomy and related space sciences. Discoveries are often attributed—particularly in news headlines—to the spacecraft or observatories used to make them. But those discoveries are made not by spacecraft and instruments, but by people who operate them and analyze the data they produce. Those researchers, like the rest of us, are people with their own motivations to do such work, and struggles to overcome to achieve those discoveries. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4017/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 09, 2020, 02:36
Walking through the doors of history: unlocking a space tradition
by Kirby Kahler Tuesday, September 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4018a.jpg)
The shuttle mission stickers above the double doors at the O&C. (credit: K. Kahler)
In July 2019, I had the unique opportunity to revisit the astronaut walkout doors at the Neil Armstrong Operations & Checkout Building (O&C) at the Kennedy Space Center for the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11. Fifty years ago, I was one of more than 3,500 journalists trying to get the “money shot” of the Apollo 11 astronaut walkout. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4018/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 09, 2020, 02:36
The Artemis Accords: a shared framework for space exploration
by Paul Stimers and Abby Dinegar Tuesday, September 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4019a.jpg)
NASA plans to seek international partners for the Artemis lunar exploration program, making an agreement like the Artemis Accords critical. (credit: NASA)

President Trump has made quite a mark on US space policy by announcing the Artemis program to send the first woman and the next man to the Moon in 2024 and creating the Space Force. The recent developments continue the role America has always played in space: a leader and partner in peaceful, cooperative international efforts. This is the spirit that has led to 20 years of continuous human presence in space aboard the International Space Station (ISS) and that sent American astronauts to the Moon a half century ago, not to claim territory, but “in peace for all mankind.” President Trump’s initiatives build carefully and squarely atop a foundation of policy that stretches across decades of bipartisan leadership. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4019/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 09, 2020, 02:36
Making the transition from the ISS
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3888a.jpg)
Axiom Space won a NASA award early this year to add commercial modules to the International Space Station, but NASA has put on hold a similar competition to support a free-flyer commercial station. (credit: Axiom Space)

In less than two months, the International Space Station will reach a milestone. On November 2, 2000, the Soyuz TM-31 spacecraft carrying Russian cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev, and American astronaut Bill Shepherd, docked with the Zvezda module of the International Space Station. Since that day the station has been continuously occupied, meaning that, barring a calamity of some kind in the coming weeks, the station will soon surpass 20 years with people on board. That is a major accomplishment for a program that struggled for years to get off the drawing boards and into orbit. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4020/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 09, 2020, 02:36
The future on hold: America’s need to redefine its space paradigm
by Stephen Kostes Tuesday, September 8, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3200a.jpg)
Constructing a cislunar infrastructure will drive renewed investment in education and training, and it will re-direct investment back into the historical drivers of job creation and economic growth.

A powerful school of economic thought today, led by economists such as Robert Gordon, suggests that, during the 1970s, the focus of technological innovation changed and, as a result, economic growth started to decline and wealth inequality began to rise. While there are many factors involved, it is interesting to note that this coincides with the end of the Apollo era. Along with severe budget cuts, this limited scope of innovation certainly took its toll on the space program. However, it also seems to have short-circuited our economy as well. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4021/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 15, 2020, 02:44
Review: Space Dogs
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4022a.jpg)

Space Dogs
Directed by Elsa Kremser and Levin Peter
Icarus Films, 2019
91 mins.
https://www.raumzeitfilm.com/spacedogs-kino

Most readers are familiar with the tale of Laika, the first animal in space. A stray picked up off the streets of Moscow, Laika was flown on the second Sputnik satellite in November 1957, claiming yet another first for the Soviet space program. The flight was a one-way mission from the beginning, since Sputnik 2 has no capability to survive reentry. Laika, as later historical research revealed, likely died from overheating just a few hours after launch. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4022/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 15, 2020, 02:44
The West needs bold, sustainable, and inclusive space programs and visions, or else
by Giulio Prisco Monday, September 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4023a.jpg)
A Chinese concept for a lunar base. China’s long-term vision for space exploration and utilization poses a challenge to the US and its partners. (credit: CAST)

China is planning an International Lunar Research Station (ILRS) (https://spacenews.com/china-is-aiming-to-attract-partners-for-an-international-lunar-research-station/) in the lunar south pole region, and recently revealed that it is seeking international partners.

I hope there’ll be international ILRS partners, but I guess they’ll play only a token role. Since I’m not too optimistic on the US Artemis lunar program (I’ll come to that), going to the Moon as guests of the Chinese may become the only plausible option for aspiring astronauts in the rest of the world. But of course, foreigners will be kept far from the really important things that China wants. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4023/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 15, 2020, 02:44
Star children: can humans be fruitful and multiply off-planet?
by Fred Nadis Monday, September 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4024a.jpg)
A Dutch startup, SpaceLife Origin, proposed a series of missions leading up to a baby being born in orbit, before backing off last year. (credit: SpaceLife Origin)

From his home in Cape Canaveral, Air Force pilot Alex Layendecker explained how he had been drawn to the study of sex and reproduction in space. “I had been immersed in the space environment in the Air Force, assigned to launch duty, and was simultaneously pursuing an M.A. in public health, and then at the Institute for Advanced Study of Human Sexuality, and I was looking for a dissertation topic,” he recalled. “I decided that sex and reproduction in space had not received the attention they deserved—if we’re serious about discussions of colonization, having babies in microgravity—on Mars or other outposts of the Earth, then more needs to be learned.” His general recommendation was that because of the squeamishness of NASA to study sex in space, a private nonprofit organization, or Astrosexological Research Institute, should be founded for this research critical to human settlement of outer space. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4024/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 15, 2020, 02:44
Launch failures: fill ’er up?
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, September 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4025a.jpg)
A Proton launch in 2010 failed not because it ran out of propellant but instead because it had too much on board. (credit: Roscosmos)

One of the most common causes of airplane accidents is a pilot sitting there and letting the thing run out of gas. This type of mishap is much less common with space launches, but early propulsion system shutdowns due to the vehicle running out of propellant have occurred in some noteworthy cases.

The majority of liquid propellant space boosters ever launched have lacked a system with even as little sophistication as a bewildered pilot staring at a dropping fuel gauge. The engines were tested, the performance noted, and the required amounts of fuel and oxidizer calculated using simple formulas. For vehicles using liquid oxygen (LOX) as the oxidizer, that tank was topped off: a necessity since it kept boiling off until mere seconds before liftoff, when the vent valve was closed. The fuel was loaded based on the calculations, with a bit extra added to provide some margin. Thor, Titan, and Delta all used this approach, as did most foreign vehicles. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4025/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 15, 2020, 02:44
Moon and Mars advocates find peace
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4026a.jpg)
NASA’s lunar Gateway, part of the agency’s Artemis program, could also be used to support Mars exploration through long-duration crewed missions there. (credit: NASA)

For decades, it seems, space exploration advocates have done battle over the long-term goals of human spaceflight, even as humans remained stuck in low Earth orbit. Some have argued for a return to the Moon, both for its own sake as well as a proving ground for missions beyond. Others, though, have pushed for going to Mars, often as soon as possible, fearing that a lunar return could be a costly, lengthy detour. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4026/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 22, 2020, 11:36
Review: The Last Stargazers
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4027a.jpg)

The Last Stargazers: The Enduring Story of Astronomy’s Vanishing Explorers
by Emily Levesque
Sourcebooks, 2020
hardcover, 336 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-4926-8107-6
US$25.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1492681075/spaceviews

Two historic observatories were in the news recently, not because of any new discoveries they made but instead due to threats to their existence. Last month, a wildfire in the early days of California’s horrific fire season approached Lick Observatory, on a mountaintop near San Jose. Last week, another fire encroached on Mount Wilson Observatory near Los Angeles, at one point coming within a couple hundred meters of its major telescopes. Fortunately, in both cases firefighters were able to halt the fires, with only minor damage at each observatory. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4027/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 22, 2020, 11:36
Review: Orphans in Space
by Glen E. Swanson Monday, September 21, 2020

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Orphans in Space is a two-DVD set with an eclectic collection of little-known space-related films.

Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier
DVD
2012, The Orphans Film Project

In early April, while doing research for an article (see “‘Space, the final frontier’: Star Trek and the national space rhetoric of Eisenhower, Kennedy and NASA”, The Space Review, April 20, 2020), I interviewed Megan Prelinger. During that interview, she mentioned that both she and her husband Rick helped assemble a collection of space-themed films that appeared in a DVD set called Orphans in Space: Forgotten Films from the Final Frontier. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4028/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 22, 2020, 11:36
Venus: science and politics
by Ajey Lele Monday, September 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4029a.jpg)
An image of the surface of Venus taken by the Soviet Union’s Venera 13 mission.

For many years, the major focus for space exploration has been Mars and the Moon. Of course, the scientific community has been involved in missions elsewhere in the solar system, but the agendas for major space agencies have been dominated by the missions to the Moon and Mars. Now, there exists a possibility that another world could push its way into those agendas.

The discovery

Venus is known as the hottest planet in the solar system, with surface temperatures as high as 470°C. In fact, Venus is even hotter than Mercury because Venus thick atmosphere filled with carbon dioxide, generating a runaway greenhouse effect. Venus is sometimes called the sister planet of the Earth, since it is very similar to the Earth in terms of size and mass. However, the problem is that the temperature and atmosphere of Venus makes it entirely different than the Earth. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4029/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 22, 2020, 11:36
Why the detection of phosphine in the clouds of Venus is a big deal
by Paul K. Byrne Monday, September 21, 2020

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The discovery of phosphine in the atmosphere of Venus could be a sign of life, as well as a sign of new life for exploration of thew planet. (credit: European Space Organization/M. Kornmesser & NASA/JPL/Caltech)

[This article was originally published by The Conversation, and is reprinted under a Creative Commons license.]

On September 14, a new planet was added to the list of potentially habitable worlds in the Solar System: Venus.

Phosphine, a toxic gas made up of one phosphorus and three hydrogen atoms (PH3), commonly produced by organic life forms but otherwise difficult to make on rocky planets, was discovered in the middle layer of the atmosphere of Venus. This raises the tantalizing possibility that something is alive on our planetary neighbor. With this discovery, Venus joins the exalted ranks of Mars and the icy moons Enceladus and Europa among planetary bodies where life may once have existed, or perhaps might even still does today. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4030/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 22, 2020, 11:37
Where will Artemis 3 land? And when?
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4031a.jpg)
Comments last week suggested the Artemis 3 lunar landing might not take place near the lunar south pole, but NASA has since reiterated it still plans to go to the south pole. (credit: NASA)

NASA’s Artemis program faces many challenges to overcome to achieve its goal of landing humans on the Moon in 2024. There are the myriad technical problems that have already occurred, and will likely continue to crop up in the coming years as NASA completes development of the Space Launch System, Orion, one or more human lunar landers, and the lunar Gateway. Funding remains a challenge, as evidenced by a House bill that provides NASA with less than a fifth the funding it sought for the Human Landing System (HLS) program (see “Irregular disorder and the NASA budget”, The Space Review, July 27, 2020). And, there’s the possibility that a change of administrations next year will lead to a slowdown, or even abandonment, of the entire program. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4031/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 30, 2020, 00:43
Review: China in Space
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, September 28, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4032a.jpg)

China in Space: The Great Leap Forward, 2nd ed.
by Brian Harvey
Springer; 2nd ed. 2019
paperback, 564 pages
ISBN-13: 978-3-030-19587-8
US$37.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/3030195872/spaceviews

Brian Harvey has long written about China’s space program as well as the space programs of India and Japan. This is a second edition of his book on China’s expanding space program, successor to the edition published in 2013. It provides a good overview of the breadth of Chinese space activities, as well as what has led up to China’s current projects and their future ambitions. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4032/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 30, 2020, 00:44
Photons and phosphine
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 28, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4033a.jpg)
Rocket Lab’s Photon satellite bus will be used to support the launch of NASA’s CAPSTONE mission to the Moon next year. (credit: NASA)

On August 31, a Rocket Lab Electron rocket lifted off from the company’s launch pad in New Zealand, placing a radar imaging satellite for startup Capella Space into orbit. The launch represented the return to flight of the Electron, which failed in its previous launch less than two months earlier (see “It’s (small) rocket science, after all”, The Space Review, July 6, 2020). An investigation tracked down the cause of the failure to an “anomalous electrical connection” in the rocket’s second stage that had evaded the company’s acceptance testing processes prior to launch. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4033/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 30, 2020, 00:44
Battle of the Titans (part 1)
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, September 28, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4034a.jpg)
What would become the Titan IV faced challenges both before and after the Air Force selected the design for development. (credit: Lockheed Martin)

As has been described in various articles in The Space Review (see “When ‘about time’ equals ‘too late’”, October 11, 2005; “The engine problem”, August 3, 2015; “About those scrapped Atlas ICBMs”, July 6, 2010), the Space Shuttle was developed to be the sole US launch vehicle that would be supported by the US Government. All US government payloads eventually would fly on nothing but the shuttle and that meant American commercial payloads would also. All rocket engine development except that related to the shuttle was stopped in the 1970s and most rocket engine production ended as well. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4034/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 30, 2020, 00:44
Reality bites
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, September 28, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4035a.jpg)
The website for the planned “Space Hero” reality TV show has a countdown clock but little else about the show that would send the winner to the ISS. (credit: spacehero.me)

Two weeks ago, the Hollywood publication Deadline reported an exclusive that sounded a lot like déjà vu all over again:

“Space Hero Inc., a U.S.-based production company founded by Thomas Reemer and Deborah Sass and led by former News Corp Europe chief Marty Pompadur, has secured a seat on a 2023 mission to the International Space Station. It will go to a contestant chosen through an unscripted show titled Space Hero. Produced by Ben Silverman and Howard Owens’ Propagate, the series will launch a global search for everyday people from any background who share a deep love for space exploration. They will be vying for the biggest prize ever awarded on TV.” (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4035/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 30, 2020, 00:44
India’s Mars orbiter completes six years at the red planet, but where is the science?
by Jatan Mehta Monday, September 28, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4036a.jpg)
India’s Mangalyaan spacecraft arrived at Mars six years ago, but the scientific output of the mission has been a disappointment. (credit: ISRO)

September 24 marked six years since ISRO’s Mars Orbiter Mission, or Mangalyaan, spacecraft entered Mars orbit, making India the first Asian country to do so. What is even more impressive is that Mangalyaan was the country’s first interplanetary mission. Combined with the cost effectiveness for which it is lauded, Mangalyaan is often hailed as India’s most successful space mission. But is it? (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4036/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 08, 2020, 07:46
Review: Space Is Open for Business
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 5, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4037a.jpg)
Space Is Open for Business: The Industry That Can Transform Humanity
by Robert C. Jacobson
Robert Jacobson, 2020
paperback, 418 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-7342051-0-7
US$32.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1734205105/spaceviews

Despite the economic upheavals in the last year caused by the coronavirus pandemic, interest in space continues largely unabated (see “Commercial space, and space commercialization, weather the pandemic”, The Space Review, this issue). CNBC reported over the weekend on a recent analysis by Bank of America, which projected the global space economy would more than triple over the next decade, to $1.4 trillion in 2030. While the analysis was simplistic—Bank of America simply assumed the average annual growth rate of the last two years, more than 10%, would continue for the next ten—it exemplifies the bullishness the investment community has shown in space in recent years. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4037/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 08, 2020, 07:46
Why addressing the environmental crisis should be the space industry’s top priority
by Loïs Miraux Monday, October 5, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4038a.jpg)
Hurricane Florence as seen from the International Space Station. (credit: NASA)

How can we give meaning to space missions in the context of a global environmental crisis? World Space Week 2020 (October 4–10) and its theme “Satellites Improve Life” will remind us of the numerous benefits that space-based assets bring on Earth. However, as climate change has been largely recognized as an existential threat in the 21st century, some space activities, such as space exploration or space tourism, raise important questions. Some projects continue to promise technological solutions to environmental issues in outer space. They won’t help. The environment should be space industry’s top priority. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4038/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 08, 2020, 07:46
Commercial space, and space commercialization, weather the pandemic
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 5, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4039a.jpg)
A Northrop Grumman Antares rocket lifts off October 2 carrying a Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station. Included in the Cygnus was a commercial payload for Estée Lauder. (credit: NASA Wallops/Patrick Black)

The Northrop Grumman Cygnus spacecraft that launched Friday night from Wallops Island, Virginia, bound for the International Space Station, carried a diverse array of cargo. There were science and technology demonstration payloads, ranging from testing cancer treatments to growing radishes in microgravity (yes, scientists said at a pre-launch briefing, the astronauts will be able to eat the radishes.) There were also some nitrogen gas bottles for the station’s air supply as the crew worked to trace the source of a small air leak, now thought to be in the Zvezda module. And there was the Universal Waste Management System, a next-generation space toilet that will be tested on the ISS before it’s used on the Orion spacecraft. (“When the astronauts have to go, we want to allow them to boldly go,” said one member of the team that developed it.) (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4039/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 08, 2020, 07:46
Battle of the Titans (part 2)
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, October 5, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4040a.jpg)
A converted Titan II ICBM launches the Quickscat mission for NASA. (credit: NASA)

It was a matter of national policy that the Space Shuttle would be the only new US launch system, but not everyone in the US Air Force agreed with that philosophy. The Complementary Expendable Launch Vehicle (CELV) procurement that began in 1984 and became the Titan IV program addressed back up launches for three very important Air Force payloads, all to be launched from Cape Canaveral (see “Battle of the Titans (part 1)”, The Space Review, September 28, 2020). Soon after CELV got underway in 1984, some Air Force officers began thinking about the problem of alternative launch capabilities for payloads using polar orbits launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4040/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 08, 2020, 07:46
Mars ain’t the kind of place to take your kid: Netflix’s “Away”
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 5, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4041a.jpg)
Netflix’s “Away” is about a crew on a journey to Mars, but much of the story takes place on Earth and feels no different than a typical suburban melodrama on basic cable.

How do we measure what is in the popular culture, what occupies the zeitgeist? Certainly some things are obvious. But what about the subjects that do not overwhelm popular discussion, but nevertheless occasionally rise up above the din? Subjects like Mars. Where is Mars in our popular culture today? (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4041/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 13, 2020, 17:59
Review: Neutron Stars
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 12, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4042a.jpg)

Neutron Stars: The Quest to Understand the Zombies of the Cosmos
by Katia Moskvitch
Harvard Univ. Press, 2020
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-674-91935-8
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674919351/spaceviews

There’s too much gold in the universe. That’s the conclusion of a recent study that compared the abundances of gold measured in our solar system with the known mechanisms for producing gold. The primary way to create it, astronomers believe, is when two neutron stars collide (supernovae don’t help, since any star massive enough to produce gold through fusion will end up as a black hole, trapping the gold within it.) But, the study’s authors noted, neutron star collisions don’t appear to be frequent enough to produce the gold we do see. Either another process creates gold, or neutron star collisions create more gold than astronomers expect. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4042/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 13, 2020, 17:59
Space entrepreneurs need to look to the stars but keep their feet on the ground
by Nicholas Borroz Monday, October 12, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4043a.jpg)
Many get into the space industry seeking to pursue interesting technologies, like reusable rockets; a sustainable business plan is only a secondary concern. (credit: SpaceX)

The space sector is one where technological marvels are widely celebrated. As private firms become more influential in the sector, there has been a veritable explosion of exciting plans for employing next-generation technologies. This creativity is inspiring, but it also has drawbacks. Entrepreneurs should continue pursuing their visions, but they should also make sure to ground their enterprises in reality. They should clearly understand how their activities benefit others. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4043/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 13, 2020, 17:59
In the paler moonlight: the future’s past in “For All Mankind”
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 12, 2020

Note: This article contains spoilers for the first and second seasons of For All Mankind.

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“For All Mankind’s” first season ended with an American base on the Moon. In season 2, set in the 1980s, the base has expanded, and become the focus of the Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union.

The second season of Apple TV+’s “For All Mankind” was filming when reality intervened, halting production after eight episodes had been shot, although production resumed late in the summer. For a show about world events to be derailed by a world event is perhaps overly ironic, but despite the delay, the producers did release a trailer for season two, and it indicates that things are heating up on the Moon. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4044/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 13, 2020, 17:59
The three administrators
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 12, 2020

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Former NASA administrator Charlie Bolden, seen here at a 2019 conference, joined two of his predecessors in the Aviation Week webinar last week. (credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

NASA administrators get plenty of advice, solicited and unsolicited, while on the job. Politicians, executives, scientists, and others are more than willing to weigh in on what the agency’s leader should do. The best advice, though, might come from the people who previously held the job—if they’re willing to give it. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4045/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 13, 2020, 18:00
Semantics in lexicon: Moving away from the term “salvage” in outer space
by Michael J. Listner Monday, October 12, 2020

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As more efforts get started to repair and revive derelict satellites, the space industry needs to reconsider its use of “salvage” when describing such operations. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

The idea of salvage in outer space is one that evokes fervent discussions about space debris and recovering defunct satellites for possession. The idea of salvage in outer space is misunderstood and mischaracterized by private space enthusiasts, and is one I’ve discussed here before (see “Taking salvage in outer space from fiction to fact”, The Space Review, March 20, 2017). Moreover, I suggested that a form of salvage, akin to contract salvage in the maritime domain, might be an appropriate model for outer space and that a precedent has already laid the groundwork with the recovery of the Palpa B and Weststar VI satellites by NASA and the Space Shuttle.[1] The successful rendezvous and servicing operation performed on Intelsat 901 by the SpaceLogistics Mission Extension Vehicle 1 (MEV-1) earlier this year and a follow-on mission by MEV-2 with the Intelsat 10-02 next year lays the groundwork for opportunities for more of these activities in outer space. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4046/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 20, 2020, 15:53
Review: Canadarm and Collaboration
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 19, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4047a.jpg)

Canadarm and Collaboration: How Canada’s Astronauts and Space Robots Explore New Worlds
by Elizabeth Howell
ECW Press, 2020
paperback, 240 pp.
ISBN 978-1-77041-442-6
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1770414428/spaceviews

For most people in the space field, the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about Canada’s space program is its series of robotic arms (with the possible recent exception of former astronaut/social media personality Chris Hadfield.) Over the last four decades, Canada has become synonymous with those systems, first with the Canadarm on the shuttle and then Canadarm2 and the Dextre manipulator on the space station. The back of the Canadian five-dollar bill includes an illustration of Canadarm2, while a model of a robotic manipulator was visible in the office of new Canadian Space Agency president Lisa Campbell last week when she participated in a virtual signing ceremony for the NASA-led Artemis Accords. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4047/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 20, 2020, 15:54
Is the New Zealand commercial space success story a model for other countries?
by Marçal Sanmartí Monday, October 19, 2020

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New Zealand’s Cook Strait viewed from the International Space Station. (credit: NASA)

These remotely located group of islands in the South Pacific with a population of just five million people has a tradition of punching above its weight. New Zealand is a primary industries powerhouse; probably hosts the best known and successful rugby team on Earth, the All Blacks; and is seen internationally as a champion in the fight against COVID-19. The space sector is emerging as another such area—ironic, considering that locals refer themselves as kiwis, the name of a local flightless bird! (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4048/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 20, 2020, 15:54
Rock-solid (Blue) Cube: Galileo and the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, October 19, 2020

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The US Air Force Satellite Control Facility circa 1984, located near Sunnyvale, California.

Thirty-one years ago, the United States space program placed a mark in the “win” column amidst a terrible terrestrial tragedy. On October 18, 1989, the shuttle Atlantis lifted off from Cape Canaveral’s Launch Complex 39B, carrying the Jupiter-bound Galileo space probe atop its Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) booster. While the Galileo saga included many epic twists and turns over the decades since its conception, one of the most inspiring stories came from the unlikeliest of places: a non-descript blue building in Sunnyvale, California less than 24 hours before the launch. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4049/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 20, 2020, 15:54
TAG, Bennu, you’re it
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 19, 2020

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An illustration of OSIRIS-REx, its sample gathering arm extended, approaching the surface of the asteroid Bennu. (credit: NASA/Goddard/University of Arizona)

Some call it a fist bump. Others, a “boop.” But the formal name is “touch and go,” or TAG, which clearly illustrates what NASA will attempt to do Tuesday.

The Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification, Security-Regolith Explorer (OSIRIS-REx) spacecraft—one of the more convoluted acronyms in NASA’s history—has been orbiting the asteroid Bennu since late 2018, studying the asteroid while scouting for a landing site. On Tuesday, the spacecraft will descend towards the selected site, dubbed Nightingale, extending a robotic arm with a sampling mechanism, called TAGSAM, on the end. If all goes well, that mechanism will touch down on the surface, collect at least 60 grams, and perhaps up to two kilograms, of material, in just five to ten seconds, before the spacecraft pulls away: touch and go. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4050/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 20, 2020, 15:54
Applied witchcraft: American communications intelligence satellites during the 1960s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 19, 2020

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A TOPHAT communications intelligence satellite launched in 1970. This satellite was about the size of a small refrigerator and gathered up Soviet communications from low Earth orbit. (credit: NRO)

During the Battle of Midway in June 1942, Admiral Chester Nimitz, Commander in Chief of the US Pacific Fleet, monitored the battle from his command center in Pearl Harbor, picking up snippets of radio traffic from both American and Japanese forces. After hearing that American planes had spotted the Japanese carriers and started their attack, Nimitz and his officers heard nothing more from the Japanese carriers for a long period, but then intercepted a message from the Japanese force seeking the location of the American fleet. After another long silence, the Americans intercepted a coded Japanese message. The call sign on the message was Vice Admiral Chuichi Nagumo, whose flagship was the carrier Akagi. But one of the American naval officers present had become an expert at identifying the styles of the Japanese operators who tapped out coded messages. This message was not tapped out by the Akagi’s heavy-handed warrant officer, but instead by the chief radioman in the cruiser Nagara. The Americans concluded from this small bit of evidence that the Akagi had been damaged too heavily to serve as flagship, and Nagumo had shifted his command to the cruiser. In fact, Akagi was in flames, Nagumo had barely escaped alive by climbing down a rope from the ship’s bridge, and the carrier, which had participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor, would sink within the day. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4051/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 27, 2020, 14:48
If we are going forward to the Moon, don’t go back to Apollo
by Christopher Cokinos Monday, October 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4052a.jpg)
Aristarchus crater might be a better alternative landing site for the first Artemis missions than an Apollo site, if the south pole of the Moon is ruled out. (credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University)

NASA Administrator James Bridenstine recently surprised the space community by suggesting that the first crewed Artemis surface mission to the Moon, slated for 2024, might not land at the south pole as previously discussed but instead could revisit one of the Apollo landing sites in the easier-to-reach lunar equatorial regions. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4052/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 27, 2020, 14:48
From the Truman Proclamation to the Artemis Accords: steps toward establishing a bottom-up framework for governance in space
by Alfred B. Anzaldúa and Cristin Finnigan Monday, October 26, 2020

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Should lunar governance for future exploration and other activities be done in a bottom-up or top-down way? (credit: NASA)

Humanity stands at the doorway of an astounding societal transformation. While many people worldwide pass time attending to urgent personal matters or frivolous entertainments, nation states and private parties harbor serious plans to launch missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond to establish permanent outposts and communities. Such extraterrestrial activity offers vast potential to unleash “infinite opportunity, boundless freedom, and unfettered creativity.”[1] (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4053/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 27, 2020, 14:49
The Artemis Accords take shape
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 26, 2020

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Representatives of the US and seven other nations signed the Artemis Accords in a virtual ceremony October 13. (credit: NASA)

It was a signing ceremony for the Zoom era. On the screens of attendees of the virtual International Astronautical Congress October 13, as well as anyone who tuned in to NASA TV, was a three-by-three array of screens, a fancy version of video chats that have become commonplace. In each window, a government official put pen to paper; some matter-of-factly, others proudly showing off the document they signed. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4054/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 27, 2020, 14:49
Swords into plowshares: the top secret PERCHERON project
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 26, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4055a.jpg)
One of the last KH-7 GAMBIT-1 reconnaissance satellites was launched in early 1967. General Electric proposed using the successful spacecraft for NASA missions, but ran headlong into secrecy issues, angering officials at the National Reconnaissance Office, which procured and operated GAMBIT. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection)

In the 1960s, NASA had the coolest stuff. They had Mars probes and lunar landers, Gemini spacecraft and spacesuits and the coolest of the cool, the Saturn V rocket. But NASA didn’t have everything. The top secret National Reconnaissance Office, with a budget that was probably only 15% as big as NASA’s, had some powerful camera systems, large high-quality optical mirrors inside spacecraft that the NRO routinely launched into low Earth orbit. NASA had fledgling astrophysics and Earth observation programs that could benefit from the NRO’s technology, but there were policy and secrecy requirements that prevented NASA from acquiring them. Nevertheless, companies that built this equipment for the NRO looked at NASA as another potential customer and sought out ways to sell it to them. And sometimes those efforts went badly. PERCHERON is one of those stories. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4055/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 27, 2020, 14:49
Russia gears up for electronic warfare in space (part 1)
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, October 26, 2020

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The Krasukha-4 electronic warfare system is used among other things to interfere with observations of radar reconnaissance satellites (source).

Russia is building up an impressive capability to conduct electronic warfare against foreign satellites. At the center of this effort is the development of a variety of mobile ground-based systems to interfere with the operations of both communications and radar reconnaissance satellites. There is also evidence for plans to perform electronic warfare from space using nuclear-powered satellites. Aside from that, work is underway at various locations in Russia to construct ground-based infrastructure to obtain signals intelligence on foreign satellites and apparently also to protect Russia’s own fleet of satellites against electronic attack from outside. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4056/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 03, 2020, 03:29
Review: Star Crossed
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 2, 2020

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Star Crossed: The Story of Astronaut Lisa Nowak
by Kimberly C. Moore
University Press of Florida, 2020
hardcover, 296 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-8130-6654-7
US$28.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0813066549/spaceviews

We’ve come a long way from the earliest days of the US space program, where the Mercury 7 astronauts were placed on a pedestal as clean-cut, All-American men. They, and the astronauts who followed, were far from perfect, as we have since learned: some carousing and unfaithful to their spouses, others suffering from alcoholism and depression. Marriages were shattered and careers derailed because these best-of-the-best had human weakness and frailties, like the rest of us. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4057/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 03, 2020, 03:29
The Green New Deal for space
by S. Mike Pavelec Monday, November 2, 2020

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Innovations in spaceflight and space markets can help achieve the goals of a Green New Deal. (credit: SpaceX)

As we approach yet another election in the US, a number of incredibly important issues will be decided. One is the future of American space power, the role of the government, military, and civilian sectors, and ongoing and increasing concern for the future health of the planet. There is an argument for why climate activists, political representatives, and anyone who supports radical change to mitigate global climate change needs to embrace US efforts in space now and into the near future. This argument is based on both the Green New Deal platform as well as current and near-future space capabilities. Environmentalists, politicians, and the population in general should support space exploration and access for the future of the planet and humanity. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4058/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 03, 2020, 03:29
US space missions require bipartisan support for optimal long-term success
by Namrata Goswami Monday, November 2, 2020

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If elected, a Biden Administration should press forward with many space initiatives, like a return to the Moon, to keep pace with China’s space ambitions. (credit: NASA)

Missions to explore and develop outer space necessitate long-term resource commitment and policy focus. This kind of long-term strategy formulation and identification of “decades out” space policy goals (2020–2049) and resource commitment is evident in China’s space program. Soon after China landed on the far side of the Moon in January 2019, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced plans to establish a permanent lunar research base by 2036. In February, China’s Tianwen-1 Mars mission, launched July 23 of this year, will attempt to enter into Martian orbit, and later land on the Martian surface and release a rover to carry out a survey of Mars’ surface to include its soil composition. According to Chinese media, the scientific goals of China’s Mars mission are:

Mapping the morphology and geological structure, investigating surface soil characteristics and water-ice distribution, analyzing the surface material composition, measuring the ionosphere and the characteristics of the Martian climate and environment at the surface, and perceiving the physical fields and internal structure of Mars. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4059/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 03, 2020, 03:29
Russia gears up for electronic warfare in space (part 2)
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, November 2, 2020 [Part 1 was published last week]

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A signals intelligence site (code-named 1511/2) under construction near Pionerskiy is intended to intercept signals from foreign satellites (Google Earth image taken on May 22, 2020).

Space-based electronic warfare

Russia may also be working on a capability to perform electronic warfare (EW) from space. Interest in this arose back in the 1980s as part of a large-scale effort to develop countermeasures against America’s Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), which was aimed at forming a space-based shield against incoming Soviet missiles. One of many projects proposed at the time was a space-based EW system called OREST-02 (an unknown acronym), which is seen in a list of space-based systems intended to attack targets on land, in the oceans and in the air.[1] There are no indications that OREST-02 ever went beyond the proposal stage and the plans were likely shelved after the collapse of the Soviet Union. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4060/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 03, 2020, 03:29
A dynamic ISS prepares for its future, and its end
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 2, 2020

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The International Space Station will gain a set of commercial modules later this decade, a precursor for both commercial space stations and the end of the ISS itself. (credit: Axiom Space)

Twenty years ago today, the crew of Expedition 1—Bill Shepherd, Yuri Gidzenko, and Sergei Krikalev—arrived at the International Space Station, kicking off occupation of the station that has continued uninterrupted to this day. NASA and its partners have been celebrating this impending milestone for months, regularly remining the public that there is now a whole generation of people who have no memories of a time when there were not people in orbit. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4061/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 10, 2020, 21:09
Review: Luna Cognita
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, November 9, 2020

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Luna Cognita: A Comprehensive Observer’s Handbook of the Known Moon 1st ed. 2020 Edition
by Robert A. Garfinkle
Springer Nature, 2020
hardcover, 1680 pp., illus. (three volume set)
ISBN 978-1-4939-1663-4
US$89.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1493916637/spaceviews

As the closest celestial object in our skies, the Moon has an amazing body of literature surrounding it. Primitive humans looked up into the sky and saw the mysterious orb appear and disappear in a timely (and predictable) manner. As civilization developed, the Moon became a natural target of attention. For the romantics among us, it invokes poetry and mythological lore about supernatural effects on both human and beasts. For scientists, the Moon is a literal playground for chemical and geologic processes that hold clues to our own Earth’s origins. Over the past few centuries, especially since the human exploration missions, the Moon has had a lot written about it. One might wonder, “Is another book about the Moon really needed?” (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4062/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 10, 2020, 21:10
Russia looks for actress to steal Tom Cruise space movie thunder
by Tony Quine Monday, November 9, 2020

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An illustration for the movie Vyzov, which will include scenes filmed on the ISS involving an actress selected as part of a competition. (credit: Roscosmos)

Russia’s not-too-subtle effort to upstage Tom Cruise’s plans to film the first ever feature film in Earth orbit have taken a major step forward, with more details announced jointly by the Russian space agency Roscosmos and Channel One TV, from Moscow.

Vague details released in September have now been fleshed out, with the headline grabbing news being the decision to base the Russian movie plot around a woman, meaning that the filmmakers will need to find an actress willing to fly on a Soyuz rocket in October next year. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4063/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 10, 2020, 21:10
How ISRO handled the pandemic
by Ajey Lele Monday, November 9, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4064a.jpg)
An Indian PSLV lifts off November 7 on the first launch by ISRO since last December. (credit: ISRO)

On November 7, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully undertook a ten-satellite launch. ISRO’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, in its 51st flight (PSLV-C49), successfully launched EOS-01 along with nine international customer satellites. This was the first launch for ISRO this year. EOS-01 is an Earth observation satellite, intended for applications in agriculture, forestry and disaster management support, and should become operational in the coming days. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4064/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 10, 2020, 21:10
Closing the business case
by Robert G. Oler Monday, November 9, 2020

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President-elect Joe Biden faces tough questions about what NASA’s future direction in human spaceflight should be. (credit: Adam Schultz/Biden for President)

The American people have spoken. At noon on January 20, 2021, the Biden-Harris Administration will end four years of chaos passing for governance. The new administration’s underlying goal must be making government work again.

Key to that goal is to regain social trust with both the citizenry of the United States and other governments of the world. Social trust forms when people and organizations accomplish the things that are proposed. In government it means organizations succeeding in making the lives of the people who pay the bills measurably better. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4065/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 10, 2020, 21:11
Moon 2020-something
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 9, 2020

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A 2024 human lunar landing, a goal many in the industry treated skeptically even before the election, may now be out of reach. (credit: NASA)

It can be hard to believe, in this era where the pandemic has warped our sense of time, that the centerpiece of NASA’s human space exploration plans isn’t that new. It was only in March 2019, a little more than 18 months ago, that Vice President Mike Pence announced that he was calling on NASA to return humans to the Moon by 2024. Prior to his speech, NASA was working towards a human landing in 2028, after first assembling the lunar Gateway. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4066/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 18, 2020, 10:08
George Low made the hard choices on Apollo: a review of “The Ultimate Engineer”
by Emily Carney and Dwayne A. Day Monday, November 16, 2020

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The Ultimate Engineer: The Remarkable Life of NASA’s Visionary Leader George M. Low
by Richard Jurek
University of Nebraska Press, 2019
hardcover: 344 pages, illus.
ISBN 978-0-8032-9955-9
US$32.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0803299559/spaceviews

The Apollo program was an immensely complicated project that some estimates indicate involved nearly 400,000 people working on different aspects of it, spread all across the country. Despite the hundreds of books written about Apollo in the past half century, surprisingly, a number of key officials and aspects of the program have been, if not entirely overlooked, certainly not given the attention they are due. One of these people is George Low, a senior NASA official who made numerous key decisions in the program while based in Houston but frequently traveling to NASA headquarters in Washington, DC. Low has often been relegated to the background in Apollo histories that focus on astronauts and rockets, despite playing a major role in keeping Apollo focused on its goal of beating the Russians to the Moon. Low, for instance, was the main driver of the gutsy decision to send Apollo 8 around the Moon in December 1968. Now, Richard Jurek has written a book focused on Low that gives him his due. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4067/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 18, 2020, 10:08
The need for US leadership in remediating space debris
by Jessica Duronio Monday, November 16, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3847a.jpg)
The US can take the lead in establishing rules for orbital debris remediation, setting a standard for other countries to follow. (credit: ESA)

Some 150 million pieces of debris litter Earth orbit, and outer space is getting more crowded. Discarded rocket bodies, defunct satellites, lost instruments, even chips of paint circle the Earth at up to 25,000 kilometers per hour. They are capable of causing incredible damage.

So far, the international community has failed to address the problem of space junk. There are no rules for the remediation, or removal, of orbital debris, thereby leaving vital US space assets vulnerable to potential accident. The US should promote and uphold the safety and sustainability of outer space by establishing regulatory rules for the remediation of space debris. Those rules should be modeled after the United States Government Orbital Debris Mitigation Standard Practices. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4068/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 18, 2020, 10:08
Lunar commerce: a question of semantics?
by Derek Webber Monday, November 16, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4069a.jpg)
Can some lunar development activities, such as resource extraction, ever be considered a true commercial venture? And if so, when? (credit: Caterpillar)

Many planning professionals are working all over the globe on aspects of returning to the Moon, with an expressed focus this time on sustainability and commercial developments. Most are carrying out the design and development work for the necessary science and engineering technologies. Others are investing considerable thought to the issues of governance and international regulatory protocols. I want to consider here the commercial element, move toward some way of characterizing it, and thereby seek to provide a firm and stable basis for attempting to quantify the elements. We need to reach an understanding of the likely combination, scale, and timing of commercial contributions in developing the Moon. Such an understanding is important in coming to decisions about design, sizing, and costs of various infrastructure elements. There is a direct link between demand forecasts, design architectures, and overall costs. So, even though at present it is difficult to quantify, we must attempt to provide at least a basis for forecasting and budgeting. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4069/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 18, 2020, 10:08
Spooks and satellites: the role of intelligence in Cold War American space policy
by Aaron Bateman Monday, November 16, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3927a.jpg)
A 1985 test of an anti-satellite missile released from an F-15 fighter. Intelligence on Soviet ASAT activities played a role in policy decisions in the 1970s and 1980s that led to the development of this ASAT weapon as well as support for SDI. (credit: USAF)

In 1978, Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) Admiral Stansfield Turner declared that the “Russians can kill us in space.” Shortly thereafter, President Carter approved the Pentagon’s request to test an anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon to place greater pressure on the USSR over ASAT arms control. Reagan Administration officials regularly invoked intelligence on Soviet space activities to justify both the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) and the Miniature Homing Vehicle (MHV) ASAT program. The declassified intelligence record reveals that the US Intelligence Community was less alarmist in its assessments of Soviet military space capabilities than some public statements suggested. Intelligence did, nevertheless, play a direct role in the decisions to develop US ASATs, and later to justify space-based missile defense. Perhaps most interestingly, the Reagan administration systematically released sanitized intelligence on Soviet military capabilities in the publication Soviet Military Power to garner greater support for SDI. Now, with the declassification of relevant national security documents on Soviet space activity, it is possible to better understand the role of intelligence in shaping American space policy during the Cold War. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4070/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 18, 2020, 10:09
From development to operations, at long last
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 16, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4071a.jpg)
A Falcon 9 carrying a Crew Dragon spacecraft with four astronauts on board lifts off November 15 from the Kennedy Space Center. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

Launches are the aspect of space activities that often attract the most attention, and understandably so: they are dramatic spectacles, controlled explosions that on occasion become uncontrolled. But while important, their glare can blind us to more important issues. The launch industry, for example, is just a small fraction of the overall space industry, with communications and other services provided by satellites generating far more revenue. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4071/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 24, 2020, 03:36
Review: Spacepower Ascendant
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 23, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4072a.jpg)

Spacepower Ascendant: Space Development Theory and a New Space Strategy
By Joshua P. Carlson
independently published, 2020
paperback, 257 pp., illus.
ISBN 979-8655659230
US$19.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B08BWGPR8V/spaceviews

This week’s launch of China’s Chang’e-5 lunar sample return mission will doubtless reinvigorate claims of a space race between the US and China, including those who believe the US is falling behind China in such a competition. The Chinese effort will likely be depicted as part of a grand strategy by China to harness the resources of the Moon (water, rare earth elements, helium-3, etc.), if not seize the Moon itself, to become the dominant power in space and therefore on Earth. If America does not respond, they argue, it risks ultimately being subservient to China.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4072/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 24, 2020, 03:37
In the new spectrum of space law, will Biden favor the Moon Treaty?
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, November 23, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4065a.jpg)
President-elect Joe Biden has said little about space, but his views on the Convention on the Law of the Seas from his time in the Senate could shape plans for the Artemis Accords and space resources. (credit: Adam Schultz/Biden for President)

The full spectrum of space law, from nationalist to internationalist, was on display at the Moon Village Association’s annual symposium earlier this month. But the question on everyone’s mind was, what will be the effect of Joe Biden’s election as the next President of the United States? He has already declared his intent to rejoin the Paris Climate Accords and the World Health Organization. A look at his Senate record gives us a hint concerning his space policy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4073/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 24, 2020, 03:37
The space resources debate pivots from asteroids to the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 23, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4074a.jpg)
Over the last five years, the issue of using space resources has shifted from asteroid mining to lunar exploration. (credit: ESA)

Five years ago this week, President Obama signed into law the Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act (CSLCA) of 2015. The bill, as its name suggests, primarily dealt with commercial launch issues, such as extending the indemnification regime for commercial launch liability and establishing a class of spaceflight participants known as “government astronauts” who would be treated differently than their commercial counterparts.

The CSLCA, though, is best known for a section that was once a standalone bill, the Space Resource Exploration and Utilization Act of 2015. That section stated that any US company that extracted resources from asteroids or other celestial bodies beyond Earth would be entitled to them, “including to possess, own, transport, use, and sell the asteroid resource or space resource obtained in accordance with applicable law.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4074/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 24, 2020, 03:37
An iconic observatory faces its demise
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 23, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4075a.jpg)
A satellite image of Arecibo taken November 17, showing the damage to the giant dish caused by two broken cables that support the platform suspended over it. (credit: Satellite image ©2020 Maxar Technologies)

A few astronomical observatories are iconic, in the sense they are distinctive enough to be recognized in the broader culture. The Arecibo Observatory certainly qualifies, with its 305-meter main dish nestled in the terrain of Puerto Rico and a platform hosting receivers suspended above it, connected by cables to three towers. Few people might know much about the astronomy done at Arecibo (beyond, perhaps, its supporting role in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence), but it became famous in movies like Contact and GoldenEye.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4075/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 24, 2020, 03:37
We were heroes once: National Geographic’s “The Right Stuff” and the deflation of the astronaut
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, November 23, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4076a.jpg)
Actor Sam Shepard as Chuck Yeager in the 1983 movie The Right Stuff, an exploration of themes of American masculinity and heroism.

Several years ago, National Geographic ventured out beyond documentaries to start producing scripted dramas. So far none of them have hit a high mark—nothing on the order of “Mad Men,” “Breaking Bad,” “Fargo,” or other prestige television. Most recently they produced “The Right Stuff,” based on Tom Wolfe’s famous book and currently streaming on Disney+. But whereas Wolfe’s book was an exploration of the qualities required of men in a new and highly dangerous job, exploring space, the series is focused on depicting the Mercury astronauts as a bunch of back-biting, egotistical, insecure, argumentative jerks. The differences may be explained by the needs of a multi-episode series, and our changing cultural views of heroism, but the result is unfortunately mediocre.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4076/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 02, 2020, 00:42
Review: Black Hole Survival Guide
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 30, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4077a.jpg)

Black Hole Survival Guide
by Janna Levin
Knopf, 2020
hardcover, 160 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-525-65822-1
US$20.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/052565822X/spaceviews

So, how did you survive Black Hole Friday? That’s right, Black Hole Friday. A few years ago, NASA tried to coopt the post-Thanksgiving shopping “holiday” of Black Friday into an educational event online about black holes, complete with a hashtag: #BlackHoleFriday. It did so again this year, with various social media posts offering facts about black holes. It’s not clear many people paid attention, though, as they negotiated the Black Friday sales online or feasted on Thanksgiving leftovers.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4077/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 02, 2020, 00:42
Chesley Bonestell and his vision of the future
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 30, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4078a.jpg)

Chesley Bonestell: A Brush with the Future
directed by Douglass M. Stewart Jr.
2018, 96 minutes
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7343526/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_2

Most people with even a fleeting familiarity of the early Space Age are familiar with the work of artist Chesley Bonestell, even if they don’t recognize the name. Long before the launch of Sputnik and Explorer 1, let alone the flights of Yuri Gagarin and John Glenn or the footsteps of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, Bonestell painted dramatic landscapes of the Moon and other worlds in our solar system, as well as the rockets and spacecraft that would take people to them. His artwork, along with the words of Willy Ley and the visions of Wernher von Braun, televised by Walt Disney, would shape American perceptions of space at the dawn of the Space Age.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4078/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 02, 2020, 00:42
A 4G network on the Moon is bad news for radio astronomy
by Emma Alexander Monday, November 30, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4079a.jpg)
Radio telescopes like the Lovell Telescope at Jodrell Bank Observatory face threats of radiofrequency interference on Earth, and now from space. (credit: Jodrell Bank Obs./Anthony Holloway)

As you drive down the road leading to Jodrell Bank Observatory, a sign asks visitors to turn off their mobile phones, stating that the Lovell telescope is so powerful it could detect a phone signal on Mars.

Radio telescopes are designed to be incredibly sensitive. To quote the legendary astronomer Carl Sagan, “The total amount of energy from outside the solar system ever received by all the radio telescopes on the planet Earth is less than the energy of a single snowflake striking the ground.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4079/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 02, 2020, 00:42
The case for Apophis
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 30, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4080a.jpg)
NASA’s OSIRIS-REx spacecraft, depicted here at the asteroid Bennu, could have an extended mission visiting another near Earth asteroid, Apophis, when it flies by Earth in 2029. (credit: NASA/GSFC)

On April 13, 2029—a Friday the 13th—the asteroid Apophis will pass remarkably close to the Earth, coming within 31,000 kilometers of the Earth’s surface, or closer than satellites in geostationary orbit. In late 2004, shortly after its discovery, astronomers projected at one point a 1-in-37 chance of a collision in 2029, but additional observations soon ruled out any impact. A small risk of an impact in April 2036 lingered for a few years, particularly if the asteroid passed through a narrow “keyhole” of space near Earth during its 2029 flyby (see “Sounding an alarm, cautiously”, The Space Review, May 31, 2005), but that, too, has since been ruled out.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4080/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 02, 2020, 00:42
Rolling the dice on Apollo: Prospects for US-Soviet cooperation in the Moon program
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, November 30, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4081a.jpg)
President John F. Kennedy viewing the Saturn I launch pad in 1963. NASA Administrator James Webb is at center. (credit: Cecil Stoughton, White House photographer)

On September 20, 1963, President John F. Kennedy gave a speech in front of the United Nations in New York City where he proposed a joint mission to the Moon with the Soviet Union. One year after the two countries had been to the brink of nuclear war, Kennedy wanted to cooperate with the Soviet Union on a major space project. The proposal was a surprise to many, seeming to come out of nowhere, and prompted backlash among Kennedy’s supporters in Congress, who worried that Apollo’s goals were being undermined.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4081/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 08, 2020, 07:20
Review: Operation Moonglow
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 7, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4082a.jpg)

Operation Moonglow: A Political History of Project Apollo
by Teasel Muir-Harmony
Basic Books, 2020
hardcover, 384 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5416-9987-8
US$32
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1541699874/spaceviews

In July 1962, huge crowds converged on a Tokyo department store for a special event. Over the course of four days, more than 500,000 people stood in long lines—going up nine flights of stairs, zigzagging across the store’s roof, and then going back down nine flights of stairs. What attracted so many people? Not a sale, or a celebrity, but a spacecraft: Friendship 7, the Mercury capsule that John Glenn flew in the first American orbital spaceflight five months earlier, and now on a round-the-world tour.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4082/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 08, 2020, 07:20
Review: The Art of NASA
by Christopher Cokinos Monday, December 7, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4083a.jpg)

The Art of NASA: The Illustrations that Sold the Missions
by Piers Bizony
Motorbooks, 2020
hardcover, 192 pages, illus.
ISBN 978-0-7603-6807-7
US$50
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0760368074/spaceviews

Piers Bizony’s The Art of NASA: The Illustrations that Sold the Missions is an eye-popping, sumptuous coffee table book of full-color art—mostly vintage government and corporate work—that spans the early days of the American crewed space program all the way to present conceptions of orbital and planetary futures. The Art of NASA is a gorgeous, well-designed ode to visions of space flight, focusing on graphic illustrative art that appeared in brochures, newspapers, magazines, and, of late, on the web.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4083/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 08, 2020, 07:21
Learning from Chandrayaan 2 for India
by Ajay P. Kothari Monday, December 7, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3837a.jpg)
An illustration of India’s Vikram lander making its descent to the lunar surface. The spacecraft crashed attempting a landing in September 2019. (credit: ISRO)

Given the recent astounding success (so far) of Chang’e-5, as well as other missions by China and Japan, it might seem harsh to compare them to India’s Chandryaan 2 lunar mission launched last year. But this is not meant as a criticism, only a constructive conjecture. Yes, many aspects of Chandrayaan 2 were successful, for which India and its space agency, ISRO, should be proud. However, it is also apt to learn from what did not work, admit it and improve.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4084/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 08, 2020, 07:21
The cloth of doom: The weird, doomed ride of Ariane Flight 36
by Francis Castanos Monday, December 7, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4085a.jpg)
A version of the Ariane 4 rocket similar to the one lost in a 1990 launch failure caused by a “cloth of doom”. (credit: ESA)

This is a companion piece of sorts to Wayne Eleazer’s excellent series on rocket launch failures, and why they happened. It is a story involving rockets, satellites, an earthquake, and a couple of kitchen accessories. And a lot of bad luck. It all started with a natural disaster, which led to two further disasters, man-made this time.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4085/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 08, 2020, 07:21
The future of Mars exploration, from sample return to human missions
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 7, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4086a.jpg)
An illustration of a Mars Ascent Vehicle, containing samples collected by the Mars 2020 mission, launching into Martian orbit for later return to Earth. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

When an Atlas V lifted off from Cape Canaveral July 30, NASA heralded it as the beginning of a new era of Mars exploration. The rocket was launching NASA’s Mars 2020 mission, which will land the rover Perseverance on the surface of Mars in February. That rover will collect samples for later return to Earth, a long-running goal of scientists.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4086/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 15, 2020, 19:37
Review: How to Astronaut
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4087a.jpg)

How to Astronaut: An Insider’s Guide to Leaving Planet Earth
by Terry Virts
Workman Publishing Co., 2020
hardcover, 320 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5235-0961-4
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1523509619/spaceviews

Most astronaut memoirs describe an unconventional career in a conventional way. They often follow a chronological approach—sometimes flashing back or forward—to describe the career path that person took to becoming an astronaut, the experience of training for and flying missions, and finally how the experience changed them. A few diverge from that path, like Chris Hadfield’s An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth, which used his experience to offer lessons on, as he put it, “how to live better and more happily here on Earth.” (See “Review: An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth”, November 18, 2013.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4087/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 15, 2020, 19:37
More space on the ground: trendy analogues vs. an unpleasant reality
by Ilaria Cinelli Monday, December 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4088a.jpg)
Analogue missions are intended to prepare for future human missions to places like the Moon and Mars, but depending on how they are designed may not be that useful.

The astronaut job is probably the only one that is at the same time both the most wanted job in the space sector and one of the silliest expectations someone may have as a career goal. Still, it is a job! There are high hopes for upcoming human spaceflights, and the commercial astronaut job is slowly opening the door to new types of astronauts. However, such a “silly expectation” drives people to find new opportunities to become astronauts no matter what. Thus, the boom of analogue astronauts has started!
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4088/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 15, 2020, 19:37
Beyond Apollo: guiding the next Moon landing
by Alan Campbell Monday, December 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4089a.jpg)
The lunar lander under development by the Blue Origin-led “National Team” that includes Draper, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman. (credit: Blue Origin)

The Apollo Moon landing is familiar to many. Neil Armstrong looks out the window of the lunar module, adjusts his descent to avoid craters and boulders while keeping an eye on his dwindling fuel supply, and maneuvers to the surface for the first time. While the scene is destined to be repeated, experts agree the next Moon landing will be far different affair.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4089/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 15, 2020, 19:37
Starship contradictions
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4090a.jpg)
SpaceX’s Starship SN8 vehicle lifts off from the company’s South Texas test site December 9. (credit: SpaceX)

Can a launch that ends in a spectacular explosion be considered a success? Can a company be hailed for being open when it is also far from transparent about its work? Can a development program be described as proceeding at breakneck speed while also being well behind schedule?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4090/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 15, 2020, 19:37
Big bird, little bird: chasing Soviet anti-ballistic missile radars in the 1960s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, December 14, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4091a.jpg)
Declassified image of the MABELI signals intelligence satellite launched in January 1972 to search for and characterize Soviet anti-ballistic missile radars. MABELI was the latest in a sequence of satellites and special payloads used by the United States to try to determine the extent of the Soviet ABM program. (credit: NRO)

The second bus-sized HEXAGON photo-reconnaissance satellite roared off its California launch pad in January 1972. Inside of its payload shroud atop the Titan III rocket, the HEXAGON looked somewhat like a train locomotive, and tucked along one of its slab sides was a small rectangular box about the size of a suitcase. After the HEXAGON reached its proper orbit and stabilized itself, circling the Earth over its poles, the box detached, pushed off by springs. It started spinning, and then fired a small rocket motor that boosted its orbit a bit higher than the big bird that had delivered it into space. The small satellite began unfolding like an origami crane spreading out, deploying solar panels and numerous antennas, most of them pointed down at the Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4091/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 23, 2020, 00:47
Review: Cosmic Odyssey by Jeff Foust
Monday, December 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4092a.jpg)

Cosmic Odyssey: How Intrepid Astronomers at Palomar Observatory Changed our View of the Universe
by Linda Schweizer
MIT Press, 2020
hardcover, 312 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-262-04429-5
US$39.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262044293/spaceviews

Asked today what is the most influential astronomical observatory, many might say the Hubble Space Telescope, or perhaps the Keck Observatory in Hawaii or the Very Large Telescope in Chile. For most of the latter half of the 20th century, though, the likely response would have been the Palomar Observatory, home to the 200-inch (five-meter) telescope that for decades was the largest in the world. It allowed astronomers to peer deeper into the universe than ever before.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4092/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 23, 2020, 00:47
Creating an inspector “mascot” satellite for JWST
by Philip Horzempa Monday, December 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4093a.jpg)
The James Webb Space Telescope recently completed the last deployment test of its sunshield before its October 2021 launch. (credit: NASA/Chris Gunn)

The James Webb Space Telescope has a heritage that stretches back at least half a century. It is a very complex spacecraft that will require numerous deployments to achieve its operational configuration. These will be monitored by instrumentation on the spacecraft, but given that each operation must proceed without error, it would be prudent to send a “Mascot” to monitor them. This would take the form of a cubesat that would ride with JWST after being launched as a secondary payload on the Ariane 5 that launches JWST. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4093/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 23, 2020, 00:47
Candy CORN: analyzing the CORONA concrete crosses myth
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, December 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4094a.jpg)
Present-day Concrete Cross. Courtesy of Google Maps.

A few years ago, NPR Morning Edition released a story about spy satellites that caught my attention during a morning commute to work. Reporter Danny Hajek covered a story about mysterious 60-foot-long (18-meter-long) concrete crosses found in the Arizona desert titled, “Decades-Old Mystery Put to Rest: Why Are There X’s in the Desert?” The NPR story details how two adventurers, Chuck Penson and Pez Owen, spotted mysterious crosses while flying cross-country in Owen’s Cessna. The crosses spotted by Penson and Owen were just a handful of targets laid out over a 16-by-16-mile (26-by-26-kilometer) grid across the desert near Casa Grande, Arizona. Wondering what the crosses were for, the pair reached out to the US Army Corps of Engineers, since one of the bronze positioning markers at the center of one crosses stated “Army Map Service” with a date of 1966. According to the story, the US Army Corps of Engineers response made the connection between the concrete crosses and the CORONA program. [1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4094/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 23, 2020, 00:47
Twilight for Trump space policy
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4095a.jpg)
Vice President Mike Pence speaking at the December 9 National Space Council meeting. (credit: White House)

On December 9, the National Space Council met for the eighth and last time in the Trump Administration at the Kennedy Space Center. The event, held in the Apollo/Saturn V Center there, with that rocket above attendees’ heads, was something of a season finale for the council. Cabinet secretaries and other officials spent about an hour recounting the work they had done in space policy in the last four years, from the establishment of the Space Force to commercial space regulatory reforms.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4095/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 23, 2020, 00:47
From TACSAT to JUMPSEAT: Hughes and the top secret Gyrostat satellite gamble
by Dwayne A. Day and Nicholas W. Watkins Monday, December 21, 2020

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4096a.jpg)
Photo of Hughes’ HS-308 TACSAT (left) in May 1968 next to their proposal for Intelsat IV based on the HS 312 bus. These are mockups. Intelsat IV had a different antenna farm at top. This basic design led to the JUMPSEAT and Satellite Data System satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office. (credit: Hughes)

Starting in August 1968, the secretive National Reconnaissance Office began launching new intelligence satellites into much higher orbits to accomplish their missions. The first was the CANYON series of communications intelligence satellites, followed in 1970 by the first of the RHYOLITE telemetry interception satellites. In spring 1971, the NRO launched a new and enigmatic satellite named JUMPSEAT, which has remained perhaps the most mysterious of these high-orbit satellites. Each of these satellites pushed the state of the art in terms of payloads, antennas, and satellite design. But JUMPSEAT represented a concerted effort by a civil and commercial satellite designer to break into the top-secret world of satellite intelligence by leveraging a new technology and a military contract to demonstrate that it could perform the mission of both detecting signals from the ground, and spotting missile launches with an infrared telescope.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4096/1

(Editor’s Note: The Space Review will not publish the week of December 28. Our next issue will be January 4, 2021. Happy holidays!)
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 07, 2021, 03:51
Review: Stephen Hawking: A Memoir of Friendship and Physics
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 4, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4097a.jpg)

Stephen Hawking: A Memoir of Friendship and Physics
by Leonard Mlodinow
Pantheon, 2020
hardcover, 240 pp.
ISBN 978-1-5247-4868-5
US$25.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1524748684/spaceviews

It’s been nearly three years since Stephen Hawking passed away. At the time of his death in 2018, Hawking had been for decades one of the most famous scientists in the world, even though few people understood his research in topics such as black holes and cosmology. He was, in many respects, a cultural figure, revered for his intelligence and his achievements in spite of the physical limitations imposed by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4097/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 07, 2021, 03:51
Why I’m flying to space to do research aboard Virgin Galactic
by Alan Stern Monday, January 4, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3626a.jpg)
SpaceShipTwo ascends to the edge of space during a December 2018 test flight. (credit: MarsScientific.com and Trumbull Studios)

[Editor’s Note: A version of this essay was first published last month by The Hill, and is republished here with permission.]

Unlike researchers in virtually every other field of science, space researchers have long been limited to operating their experiments by remote control. Why? Because for many decades it was simply not possible or not practical to send themselves into space to do their work. This forced us to routinely have to incorporate expensive and often failure-prone automation into our experiments to replace the human operator.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4098/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 07, 2021, 03:52
Catalonia’s space ambitions
by Marçal Sanmartí Monday, January 4, 2021

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A few weeks after announcing the plans to launch satellites and create a space agency, Jordi Puigneró, Catalan minister of digital policies, announced the creation of a spaceport in Lleida-Alguaire Airport.

In October, the British newspaper The Guardian published an article titled “Catalonia to invest in ‘Catalan NASA’ space agency and satellites.” Many people were surprised as Catalonia is an autonomous nationality inside the kingdom of Spain, not an independent state. And it’s quite small. It measures around 32,000 square kilometres, approximately the size of the state of Maine in the US or slightly bigger than Wales in the UK. If we visit the Catalan government website and check the information provided there, we might conclude that the term “Catalan NASA” is a big exaggeration.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4099/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 07, 2021, 03:52
Can space bridge a widening partisan divide?
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 4, 2021

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Congress has been able to work on space issues in a bipartisan manner in the past, but will that be possible this year? (credit: J. Foust)

Sunday marked the start of the 117th Congress, with the swearing in of members, a vote for the Speaker of the House (won, as expected, by Nancy Pelosi), and other introductory matters. A new Congress represents a clean slate, clearing out all the legislation that didn’t become law in the previous Congress.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4100/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 12, 2021, 18:13
Review: Extraterrestrial
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 11, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4101a.jpg)

Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth
by Avi Loeb
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021
hardcover, 240 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-358-27814-6
US$27.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0358278147/spaceviews

Last month, the British newspaper The Guardian reported that astronomers involved in the Breakthrough Listen SETI project had detected a signal emanating from the direction of Proxima Centauri, the star closest to our Sun. Initial analysis failed to turn up an obvious source of terrestrial or satellite interference. Yet, even those involved with Breakthrough Listen, like former NASA Ames director Pete Worden, warned that the signals “are likely interference that we cannot fully explain.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4101/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 12, 2021, 18:13
Arecibo telescope’s fall is indicative of global divide around funding science infrastructure
by Raquel Velho Monday, January 11, 2021

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A satellite image of Arecibo Observatory taken days after the observing platform crashed into the dish below December 1. (credit: satellite image ©2020 Maxar Technologies)

A mere two weeks after the National Science Foundation declared it would close the Arecibo single-dish radio telescope—once the largest in the world—the observatory took a dramatic dying breath and collapsed on December 1, 2020.

While drone footage captured the moment in excruciating detail, in truth, the disintegration of the telescope in Arecibo, Puerto Rico began far before this cinematic end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssHkMWcGat4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ssHkMWcGat4&feature=emb_title
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4102/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 12, 2021, 18:13
What will space security look like in 2021?
by Nayef Al-Rodhan Monday, January 11, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4103a.jpg)
Secretary of the Air Force Barbara Barrett and Chief of Space Operations Gen. John Raymond participate in a ceremony last month to formally transfer NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins, currently on the ISS, from the Air Force to the Space Force. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

The US Space Force has only been in operation for little more than a year, and it is already heading into a bold and unpredictable horizon. As the new administration takes over in January, how will the terrestrial and space landscape be viewed and what priorities will be undertaken?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4103/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 12, 2021, 18:13
European space in a time of transition
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 11, 2021

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Europe’s next-generation launch vehicles, the Ariane 6 (left) and Vega C, will enter service this year and next, even as launch operator Arianespace calls in European governments to provide more support to match what the US government offers rivals like SpaceX. (credit: ESA)

After ten months of conferences and meetings that have moved online because of the pandemic, it’s understandable that some want to try to do things a little differently. However, being a little too different can have its problems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4104/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 19, 2021, 03:15
A possible Biden space agenda
by Roger Handberg Monday, January 18, 2021

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One issue facing the new administration is the future of the International Space Station and its possible replacement by one or more commercial stations. (credit: NASA)

President Joseph Biden enters office this week with a minimalist position regarding future US space policy. His campaign made no explicit space policy declarations. The Democratic Party platform was generally supportive, but articulated no specific new items regarding space policy. Here, several proposals are put forth as priorities for the new administration. After recent events in Washington, space policy is likely not a priority unless something weird or disastrous happens in that realm; other priorities, such as the pandemic, economy, and security threats, will dominate discussion and focus.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4105/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 19, 2021, 03:15
A review of space strategy worldviews (part 1): 2011 National Security Space Strategy
by Christopher M. Stone Monday, January 18, 2021

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A policy intended to deter hostile acts in space, like antisatellite weapons tests, may not have had the desired effect. (credit: ESA)

In 2011, the National Security Space Strategy (NSSS) was released. Its objective, in response to the destructive testing of kinetic energy anti-satellite interceptors by China in 2007, was to “deter the development, testing, and employment of counterspace” weapons by any potential adversary seeking to degrade or destroy American freedom of access and use of space.[1] This document, like other strategies developed by US policymakers since the 1990s, was grounded in a perception of the international political environment. This perception is found within a combined international relations theory of a liberal, constructivist, utopian worldview. This specific worldview believes that rule-making, norm-building, and international institutions are what shapes, preserves, and propagates security and peace within the international system. While this document has been superseded by the 2020 Defense Space Strategy, the undercurrents of the original ideas and worldviews are still active and influential in national security space debates. This paper argues that the NSSS’s view of the international environment, with China as the case study, does not fully explain the international politics surrounding Chinese spacepower development and ultimately meant the NSSS failed to deter China and others from development, testing, and employment of counterspace systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4106/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 19, 2021, 03:15
Comparing the 2010 and 2020 National Space Policies
by Laura Brady and Charles Ellsey Monday, January 18, 2021

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Vice President Mike Pence at the December 9 meeting of the National Space Council, where the new national space policy was announced. (credit: White House)

The US National Space Policy, issued by the White House, is an enunciation of the principles and goals by which the US will engage in space activities. On December 9, the Trump White House issued a National Space Policy (the 2020 policy) to replace the National Space Policy issued by the Obama White House in 2010 (the 2010 policy). A careful analysis of the two policies reveals that the 2020 policy builds upon and expands many of the 2010 policy’s objectives in a natural evolutionary arc, demonstrating that the exploration and utilization of space is truly nonpartisan.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4107/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 19, 2021, 03:15
Green Run, yellow light
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 18, 2021

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The four RS-25 engines of the SLS core stage fire up at the start of the Green Run static-fire test January 16 at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi. (credit: J. Foust)

For a decade, one of the tentpoles of NASA’s human space exploration program has been the Space Launch System, even as what was inside the tent changed: supporting the Asteroid Redirect Mission, returning humans to the Moon in the late 2020s, and now a human return to the Moon as early as 2024. But also for that decade, the SLS has yet to fly, its first launch slipping by several years. (Orion, the other tentpole of that program, is even older, dating back to the Constellation program of the latter half of the ’00s, but at least it has flown once, on a brief orbital test flight in late 2014.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4108/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 26, 2021, 02:00
Review: Envisioning Exoplanets
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 25, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4109a.jpg)

Envisioning Exoplanets: Searching for Life in the Galaxy
by Michael Carroll
Smithsonian Books, 2020
hardcover, 224 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-58834-691-9
US$34.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1588346919/spaceviews

More than a quarter of a century after the modern era of exoplanet discovery began, scientists can still only guess what those worlds look like. The tremendous distances and differences in brightness mean that most exoplanets are discovered by indirect means, such as the periodic Doppler shifts in spectral lines of stars caused by the gravitational tug of orbiting planets, or the miniscule drops in brightness of those stars as planets pass in front of them. Those and other techniques have allowed astronomers to measure the sizes and orbits of these planets, and spectroscopy has helped identify the composition of some. But they can only hypothesize what those planets look like.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4109/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 26, 2021, 02:00
In memoriam: Kellam de Forest, who gave us Stardates and the Gorn
by Glen E. Swanson Monday, January 25, 2021

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Kellam de Forest is shown in his library at CBS with two of his assistants, Rona Kornblum (right) and Charlotte Worth. Photo was taken during the 1963–1964 timeframe. (Photo courtesy the author and CBS Films.)

One of the unsung heroes of the original Star Trek television series passed away. Kellam de Forest (1926–2021) died from complications due to COVID-19 on Tuesday, January 19. He was 94.

In December 2019, I had the good fortune to meet with de Forest and interview him about his work with Star Trek while researching a feature article for the Smithsonian. De Forest was one of two technical advisors that Gene Roddenberry employed during the production of the original Star Trek television series. The other was Harvey Lynn, a physicist that worked for the Research And Development (RAND) Corporation, a privately held think tank based in Santa Monica, California.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4110/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 26, 2021, 02:00
Terrain analysis for space warfare
by D. Grant Greffey Monday, January 25, 2021

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What lessons can doctrines developed for land warfare offer for space operations? (Michigan National Guard photo by Sgt. 1st Class Jim Downen Jr.)

After reading a recent essay at The Space Review on space reconnaissance (see “From SSA to space recon: Setting the conditions to prevail in astrodynamic combat”, The Space Review, August 31, 2010), I found myself inspired to think about the challenges of intelligence preparation of the battlespace for space warfare. As a young cadet and then Infantry officer, I was taught the mnemonic OCOKA, which apparently was changed in Army field manuals some years ago to OAKOC. OAKOC stands for Observation and Fields of Fire, Avenues of Approach, Key and Decisive Terrain, Obstacles, and Cover and Concealment. Additionally, Weather is also a consideration for assessing the battlespace. This essay will attempt to apply the “OAKOC plus Weather” methodology in the space warfare domain, particularly for combat operations in Earth orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4111/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 26, 2021, 02:01
Soyuz plans unclear as the 60th anniversary of Gagarin’s flight approaches
by Tony Quine Monday, January 25, 2021

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The presence of NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei (right) alongside Russian cosmonauts training for the next Soyuz mission to the ISS raised questions if NASA might find a way to include Vande Hei on the crew.

This April will mark 60 years since Yuri Gagarin took humankind’s first tentative step into space on board Vostok. This presents a golden opportunity for Russia to celebrate this occasion by not only reflecting on past achievements and influence in human spaceflight, but also to showcase new milestones and to reignite public interest, and enthusiasm, for cosmonautics.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4112/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 26, 2021, 02:01
Smallsat launch: big versus small
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 25, 2021

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Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne ignites its engine on its successful orbital launch attempt January 17. (credit: Virgin Orbit)

Two competing visions for the future of launching smallsats played out on consecutive Sundays this month.

On January 17, Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne took to the skies on its second test flight, appropriately called Launch Demo 2. The company’s first launch, in May 2019, failed seconds after the company’s LauncherOne rocket released from its Boeing 747 carrier aircraft and ignited its NewtonThree engine. A liquid oxygen propellant line ruptured, depriving the engine of propellant and causing it to shut down (see “It’s (small) rocket science, after all”, The Space Review, July 6, 2020)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4113/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2021, 03:40
What to do with that olde space station
by Eric Choi Monday, February 1, 2021

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The International Space Station may continue to evolve over the next decade, such as with the addition of commercial modules by Axiom Space, but eventually the station will reach the end of its life and need to be retied in some way. (credit: Axiom Space)

In the final episode of the 1990s TV series Babylon 5, the titular space station is decommissioned by deliberately overloading its fusion reactors and blowing the place to smithereens. “We can’t just leave it here, it would be a menace to navigation,” an Earthforce commander tells former president John Sheridan, saying the station had “become sort of redundant” and citing recent budget cutbacks. This is a peculiar action because one would think a massive cloud of debris in the Epsilon Eridani system would be an even greater menace to navigation. A more logical decommissioning would have been to crash the station onto Epsilon 3, the planet about which it had orbited, although I suppose Draal and the Great Machine might have taken offense.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4114/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2021, 03:40
A long journey but a short stay on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 1, 2021

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Under a plan for the first human Mars mission that NASA is currently studying, astronauts would spend only 30 days on the Red Planet, with the overall mission lasting two years. (credit: NASA)

On one hand, it seems premature for NASA to start planning for the first human mission to Mars. After all, its much nearer-term plans to return humans to the Moon are facing delays, as the 2024 goal of a human landing fades because of a shortfall of funding and a change of presidential administrations. On the other hand, NASA has for decades developed all kinds of architectures for human Mars missions, although for missions that themselves were decades in the future.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4115/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2021, 03:40
The secret history of Britain’s involvement in the Strategic Defense Initiative
by Aaron Bateman Monday, February 1, 2021

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Long before Ronald Reagan offered Margaret Thatcher hundreds of millions of R&D funding associated with SDI, she supported the program, often over the objections of others in the British government. (credit: Reagan Library)

In March 1983, President Ronald Reagan surprised the world when he called upon American scientists to use their talents to render ballistic missiles “impotent and obsolete.” His speech would lead to the establishment of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), derisively called “Star Wars.” It grew into a $30 billion effort to explore the technologies required for a multi-layered missile defense system with land, sea, air, and space-based interceptors. While SDI looms large in Cold War political histories, very little has been actually written about the system itself and how it evolved over time. Even less has been written about the involvement of foreign countries in SDI research and development.[1] Of all the foreign participants, the United Kingdom was the most significant in terms of its political value for the Untied States and its access to highly classified areas of SDI research.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4116/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2021, 03:40
“Space ethics” according to space ethicists
by James S.J. Schwartz and Tony Milligan Monday, February 1, 2021

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Discussions of “space ethics” date back to at least the 1980s, as part of analyses of the feasibility of terraforming Mars. (credit: Daein Ballard CC BY-SA 3.0)

Late in 2020 two unexpected space ethics op-eds appeared. Unexpected, because space ethics does not usually command that sort of attention; it is more of a background discourse than a regular part of the political battleground. In one of the op-eds, “Wokeists Assault Space Exploration”, Robert Zubrin argued that the authors of a white paper from NASA’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Working Group (EDIWG) were threatening to “abort space exploration.” Not long after, Joel Sercel (of TransAstra Corporation) and Steve Kwast (a retired Air Force lieutenant general) wrote a more thoughtful piece arguing that “someone needs to create a carefully crafted new field of space ethics.” The former threw shade on space ethics, the latter looked more positively toward its constructive role as an enabling asset for spaceflight—as something that might allow us to do things better by, for instance, avoiding the kind of disasters that have periodically undermined public confidence in the US space program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4117/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 09, 2021, 18:35
Review: The Mission
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 8, 2021

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The Mission: A True Story
by David W. Brown
Custom House, 2021
hardcover, 480 pp.
ISBN 978-0-06-265442-7
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006265442X/spaceviews

NASA’s Europa Clipper mission is likely getting a new ride. The agency announced last week that it will issue, around the beginning of March, a formal request for proposals for launching the mission in October 2024. Congress had for years dictated that the mission launch on the Space Launch System, ensuring a speedy transit to Jupiter. NASA had objected, arguing it needed those SLS vehicles for the Artemis program and that a commercial launch option could save the agency as much as $1.5 billion. Congress relented in a spending bill passed in December after engineering analyses found potential issues with the vibrational environment the spacecraft will be exposed to during launch. That opens the door to using SpaceX’s existing Falcon Heavy, or potentially Blue Origin’s New Glenn and United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur vehicles yet to make their first launch.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4118/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 09, 2021, 18:35
It is very cold in space: Season 2 of “For All Mankind”
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, February 8, 2021

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The second season of the AppleTV+ series “For All Mankind” picks up the story in 1983, depicting a thriving lunar outpost, and increasing tensions in the Cold War. (credit: AppleTV+)

Early in the first episode of the second season of AppleTV+’s series “For All Mankind,” a group of astronauts assembles on the lunar surface to watch the sunrise accompanied by a bit of music that is clearly an homage to Brian Eno’s 1983 album “Apollo: Atmospheres and Soundtracks.” Eno recorded that music as the soundtrack to Al Reinert’s documentary “Apollo,” re-released under the title “For All Mankind.” Reinert’s documentary was a masterpiece, beautifully edited and composed, and the fact that it is referenced in the new series—reappearing in the final episode—is an indication of just how fluent the show’s makers are with the language and the culture of the American space program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4119/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 09, 2021, 18:35
How can you improve the Outer Space Treaty?
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 8, 2021

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While some think the Outer Space Treaty could use some “vitality” to bring it up to date with current space issues, there’s less consensus on how to do so. (credit: United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs)

The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 has long been hailed as the foundation of international space law, the basis for both a series of subsequent treaties and for other agreements. Last year, the US-led Artemis Accords sought to incorporate or “operationalize” many of the principles of that treaty in its agreements with other countries who wish to cooperation of the Artemis program of lunar exploration (see “The Artemis Accords take shape”, The Space Review, October 26, 2020).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4120/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 09, 2021, 18:35
EKS: Russia’s space-based missile early warning system
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, February 8, 2021

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The Tundra missile early warning satellite. Source

In May of last year, Russia launched the fourth of its new-generation missile early warning satellites called Tundra. Flying in highly elliptical orbits, they continuously monitor regions from which missile attacks could potentially be launched against Russian territory. The Tundra satellites are part of the Integrated Space System (EKS), which will also include several satellites in geostationary orbit. With the fourth Tundra launch, EKS is reported to have reached its minimum baseline configuration. This article attempts to shed new light on the system’s technical features and capabilities using a variety of openly available sources.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4121/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 16, 2021, 00:05
Review: Cosmic Careers
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 15, 2021

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Cosmic Careers: Exploring the Universe of Opportunities in the Space Industries
by Alastair Storm Browne and Maryann Karinch
HarperCollins Leadership, 2021
paperback, 256 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-400-22093-9
US$19.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1400220939/spaceviews

This may be the best job market in decades for people looking into get into the space industry. Many well-funded startups are hiring engineers and others needed to get their businesses off the ground—figuratively and literally—from launch vehicle companies to satellite manufacturers to those developing services based on data from space systems. SpaceX alone has several hundred job openings on its website; many are engineers and technicians, as you’d expect, but others range from finance managers and customer support staff for its Starlink satellite system to cooks and a barista.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4122/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 16, 2021, 00:05
Global navigation satellite systems: a Symbiotic Realist paradigm
by Nayef Al-Rodhan Monday, February 15, 2021

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The UK’s departure from the EU means it will no longer participate in the Galileo satellite navigation system, an example of the geopolitical issues involved with such networks. (credit: ESA)

The UK space sector has been forced to face up to issues of sovereignty, particularly regarding its satellite activity, as Chris Skidmore, the government’s former science minister, highlighted during a Parliamentary debate on the future of the space industry earlier this month. The UK also recently made its final significant industrial contribution to the EU’s Galileo satnav system, as it bid the multi-billion-pound project farewell in another nod to the country’s departure from the European Union.

While space quite literally appears to know no bounds, geopolitical developments on the ground have increasingly brought its geopolitical limitations, as well as questions of sovereignty, regulation, and multilateral relations, into the picture. Despite the UK’s close involvement, the EU ensured that key features of Galileo would only be accessible for bloc members. This raises questions about the exclusive framework that some of these systems operate in, their “global” ubiquitous nature, and how this feeds into the balance between competition and cooperation: what I call a Symbiotic Realist coexistence.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4123/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 16, 2021, 00:06
Reflecting core American values in the competition for the final economic frontier
by Josh Carlson Monday, February 15, 2021

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A “Second Space Race” may be emerging between the US and China regarding economic benefits derived from space. (credit: SpaceX)

One motif of space futurism, from some of the earliest examples in the 1860s to the modern day, is the expected timeline for the developments and blossoming space culture that is envisioned. Virtually every one of those predictions has been, in retrospect, too aggressive and unrealized. Bruce Cahan and Dr. Mir Sadat, in “U.S. Space Policy for the New Space Age: Competing on the Final Frontier”, address the missing element that threw those predictions off: economics. While we may have the technology to do most, if not all, of the things described, it is the economic impetus drives civilizations to act and achieve.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4124/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 16, 2021, 00:06
Space investors head to the exits, at last
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 15, 2021

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Astra, which nearly reached orbit with its Rocket 3.2 launch in December (above), announced this month it will merge with a special-purpose acquisition company, allowing it to raise nearly $500 million and go public. (credit: Astra/John Kraus)

For the last several years, the space startup ecosphere has looked a little like a roach motel: money comes in but it doesn’t come out. Billions of dollars of funding have flowed into launch vehicle, remote sensing, broadband megaconstellation, and other companies, but there have been few exits: opportunities for those investors to collect their return on that investment through either a sale of the company or a public offering of its stock.

That is starting to change. Investors are continuing to put money into space companies, and at an increasing rate. After a brief period of uncertainly last spring because of the pandemic, investors doubled down on the field.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4125/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 23, 2021, 02:26
In memoriam: Taylor Dinerman
by Christopher M. Stone Monday, February 22, 2021

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Taylor Dinerman. (credit: Christopher Stone)

Recently, The Space Review lost one of its longtime contributors, Taylor Dinerman. The son of a World War II veteran who was educated in Geneva one of the United Nations’ hubs in Europe, and himself a wounded combat veteran who defended the Jewish home state, Taylor was no stranger to the ways of the world, its diverse cultures and languages, and the many differences of opinion and perspectives that ranged the gambit of his interests in the overlapping studies influencing national and international dynamics. Because of this experience in the political, military, and academic realms, he was motivated to put these observations to pen in various newspapers, journals, and studies through such publications and think tanks as National Review, Gatestone Institute, Hudson Institute, Wall Street Journal, among many others.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4126/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 23, 2021, 02:26
The promise of return on investment does not disappear in cislunar space and beyond
by Vidvuds Beldavs Monday, February 22, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/2795a.jpg)
Alternative financing mechanisms may be needed to support development of lunar infrastructure without relying on uncertain government programs. (credit: Anna Nesterova/Alliance for Space Development)

In a recent essay, Josh Carlson discusses the importance of the United States taking a leadership role in commercial space activities (see “Reflecting core American values in the competition for the final economic frontier”, The Space Review, February 15, 2021). The premise of the article that “the economic impetus drives civilizations to act and achieve” can be debated, but political imperatives cannot motivate sustainable space development. Sustainable presence in outer space demands that the large investments required generate returns that are competitive with other investments and that promote further growth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4127/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 23, 2021, 02:26
NASA tests the perseverance of some space enthusiasts
by Svetoslav Alexandrov Monday, February 22, 2021

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An image from the surface of Mars taken by Perseverance and released by NASA the day after landing. The lack of more such images from the mission, a break with past Mars missions, has been a source of frustration for some people. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

In 2016, I wrote an article about the lack of rapid image releases when certain space missions reach their destination (see “Rethinking image release policies in the age of instant gratification”, The Space Review, August 29, 2016.) My article focused on projects such as Rosetta and New Horizons, which adopted more conservative approaches by offering monthly or weekly batches of imagery, in contrast to missions like Cassini, the Mars Exploration Rovers (MERs) Spirit and Opportunity, Phoenix, Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity), and InSight, whose science teams published photos as soon as they were received on Earth. Back then, I never imagined that the next Mars rover would find itself in the midst of a similar controversy. After all, it was mostly Mars surface missions that had their photos available on the web immediately after downlinking.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4128/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 23, 2021, 02:27
It only looks easy: Perseverance lands on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 22, 2021

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An image of the Perseverance Mars rover, dangling beneath the skycrane used to lower the rover to the surface, released by NASA a day after its February 18 landing. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

One of NASA’s most remarkable, if peculiar, skills is its ability to turn the amazing into the mundane. When it landed astronauts on the Moon in 1969 for the first time in human history, the world stopped to watch. By the time it did it for the sixth and final time (to date) in 1972, the world largely ignored it. Most shuttle missions faded into obscurity, gaining attention only when they involved unusual complexity or unfortunate tragedy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4129/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 02, 2021, 09:38
Review: Liftoff
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 1, 2021

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Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days That Launched SpaceX
by Eric Berger
Willam Morrow, 2021
hardcover, 288 pp.
ISBN 978-0-06-297997-1
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062979973/spaceviews

Rocket launches are coming back to Kwajalein. On Friday, NASA announced it awarded a contract to Astra to launch a constellation of cubesats called TROPICS that will study the structure of tropical cyclones. Those satellites will be launched on three of Astra’s Rocket 3 vehicles during a 120-day period in the first half of 2022, from Kwajalein Atoll.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4130/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 02, 2021, 09:38
Review: Apollo 11: Quarantine
by Christopher Cokinos Monday, March 1, 2021

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Apollo 11: Quarantine
Directed by Todd Douglas Miller
2021, 23 minutes
Available on streaming services from $3.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B08VDTS7VM/spaceviews

Todd Douglas Miller’s restored found-footage film Apollo 11 was rightly hailed as a masterpiece and it was one of the highlights of the 2019 50th anniversary celebration of the first human landing on the Moon (see “Review: Apollo 11”, The Space Review, March 4, 2019). It was even short-listed for an Oscar.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4131/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 02, 2021, 09:38
India’s foray into the commercial space market
by Ajey Lele
Monday, March 1, 2021

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An Indian PSLV on the pad before its February 28 launch carrying a Brazilian satellite and 18 secondary payloads. (credit: ISRO)

On Sunday, the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO) Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) successfully placed Brazil’s Amazônia-1 satellite, weighing 637 kilograms, into its desired orbit. This is the first Earth observation satellite developed entirely by Brazil. The PSLV also carried 18 secondary payloads placed a different orbit, including two from India. Satish Dhawan Sat (SD SAT) was developed by Space Kidz India to study space weather and radiation, while UNITYsat was the combination of three satellites by students from engineering and technology institutes. (A third Indian satellite, SinduNetra, was launched through a separate commercial arrangement, along with the SAI-1 NanoConnect-2 and 12 SpaceBEE satellites from the US on the rocket.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4132/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 02, 2021, 09:38
Don’t move US Space Command
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, March 1, 2021

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US Space Command, formally reestablished in 2019, is temporarily headquartered in Colorado, but the Air Force announced in January plans to move the headquarters to Alabama. (credit: DoD photo by Lisa Ferdinando)

On January 13, the United States Air Force selected Huntsville, Alabama, as the new home for the space domain combatant command, United States Space Command. You would not be alone if you misidentified this as the organize, train, and equip entity, the United States Space Force, but that, like all the other services, is led from the halls of the Pentagon. Space Command was re-established in August 2019. While initially established in 1988, it was deactivated in 2002 and merged with United States Strategic Command, the unified combatant command responsible for the United States nuclear triad’s employment, among other things.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4133/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 02, 2021, 09:38
Waiting is the hardest part
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 1, 2021

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Virgin Galactic pilots prepare for a SpaceShipTwo test flight. The company announced last week it was delaying the next powered flight of the vehicle until May to address an electromagnetic interference issue, the latest delay for that program. (credit: Quinn Tucker for Virgin Galactic)

There is one thing that nearly every space-related program has in common, be it launch vehicle or satellite, government or commercial, aerospace giant or young startup. It will run late.

That was made abundantly clear last week when three different programs announced delays, ranging from weeks to a year or more. That difficulty to adhere to schedule is at one level remarkable, and at another hardly surprising.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4134/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 09, 2021, 14:35
Review: First Light
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 8, 2021

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First Light: Switching on Stars at the Dawn of Time
by Emma Chapman
Bloomsbury Sigma, 2021
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-4729-6292-8
US$28
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1472962923/spaceviews

Astrophysics specializes in some of the most profound, but also puzzling questions. How did the universe form? How will it end? Just what is the universe made of? The simplicity of these questions belies the difficulty scientists have faced answering them, and the implications the answer to one has for others.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4135/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 09, 2021, 14:35
The enduring fantasy of space hotels
by A.J. Mackenzie Monday, March 8, 2021

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Voyager Space Station will start accepting gusts for luxury stays starting in 2027, assuming its developer can raise tens of billions of dollars and develop the giant space station on a rushed schedule. Good luck! (credit: Orbital Assembly Corp.)

You probably saw something in the last week about a new space hotel project by a company called Orbital Assembly Corporation. Most of that coverage was in tabloids and blogs, but it also made it to the Washington Post and CNN. That company says it will launch its first space hotel, a massive circular structure 200 meters across, and start hosting tourists there in 2027. Yes, 2027.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4136/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 09, 2021, 14:35
The new era of private human orbital spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 8, 2021

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A Crew Dragon spacecraft like this one currently docked to the ISS will be used for both an Axiom Space mission to the station next year and the Inspiration4 free-flight mission launching this fall. (credit: NASA)

Back about 15 years ago or so, one might have expected commercial human spaceflight to be relatively commonplace by now. The Ansari X PRIZE had been won, and promised to open a new era of suborbital spaceflight, while tourists were flying regularly on Soyuz mission to the International Space Station. Surely by the early 2020s thousands of people would be flying to space, at least suborbitally, on an annual basis.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4137/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 09, 2021, 14:35
Putting the SpaceX-FAA dispute in context
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, March 8, 2021

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The SpaceX Starship SN10 prototype coming in for a landing during a flight March 3 at Boca Chica, Texas. (credit: SpaceX)

On January 25, 1957, the first Thor IRBM launch occurred from Launch Complex 17 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The objectives of that first-ever Thor launch operation were modest: to proceed down through the countdown, load the liquid oxygen, and start the engine. Anything useful that occurred after that was pure gravy. As it turned out, contamination in the liquid oxygen led to a valve failure and Thor 101 barely rose off the launch pad before the engine quit and the vehicle fell back down, creating a massive explosion and damaging the launch pad. Nonetheless, since the objectives of the operation were all met, it was a “success.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4138/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 16, 2021, 00:31
Review: Three Sigma Leadership
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 15, 2021

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Three Sigma Leadership: Or, the Way of the Chief Engineer
by Steven R. Hirshorn
NASA, 2019
ebook
free
https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/three-sigma-leadership_detail

NASA engages in some of the most technically challenging projects, from building and operating the International Space Station to landing a one-ton rover on Mars. For all the complaints about those projects that run behind schedule or run over budget, not to mention to occasional failed mission, what is remarkable is that most of those projects are successful, often far beyond their original expectations. The ISS, for example, has been continuously crewed for more than two decades, and Perseverance is now rolling across the terrain of Jezero Crater on Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4139/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 16, 2021, 00:31
Mobility and surface access lessons for the Artemis lunar lander
by Philip Horzempa Monday, March 15, 2021

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A Lockheed Martin concept from the mid-2000s for a Centaur-derived lunar lander.

NASA will soon choose the company or companies that will develop crewed lunar landers for the Artemis program. Mobility and ease of surface access should be key design goals for these new spacecraft. In 2006, Lockheed Martin proposed a lander, based on their veteran Centaur upper stage, which addressed how those goals could be achieved. I will review that concept and highlight some of its advantages. This is not meant to advocate for Lockheed’s specific proposal but, rather, these “concepts are intended to illustrate different design features and provoke further thought.”[1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4140/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 16, 2021, 00:31
The case for scrapping the Space Launch System
by Ajay Kothari Monday, March 15, 2021

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The Space Launch System has been the subject of heated debates, but what’s the alternative for going to the Moon, Mars, and beyond? (credit: NASA)

Several days after the editorial board of Bloomberg recommended that the Biden Administration cancel the Space Launch System (SLS), Loren Thompson published a rebuttal in Forbes. But I respectfully, if strongly, disagree with Thompson. The future of the SLS is of immense importance to NASA and the country, and thus to the taxpayers, and hence we need to attempt as soon as possible to set the record straight.

Thompson says, “The editorial board at Bloomberg News launched a nonsensical attack on NASA’s human spaceflight program last week. It was full of dubious assertions about alternatives to the Space Launch System.” And yet it is his attack that seems motivated for self-centered reasons, and is full of questionable assertions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4141/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 16, 2021, 00:31
Spaceport traffic management
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 15, 2021

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A Falcon 9 stands on the pad at LC-39A last month as another Falcon 9 lifts off from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral, a sign of the increasing cadence of launches from the Eastern Range. (credit: SpaceX)

Early Sunday morning, just a few hours after clocks sprung ahead to daylight saving time, a Falcon 9 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center. An hour and five minutes later, it deployed its payload of 60 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit.

Those watching the launch could be excused for feeling a sense of déjà vu. Nearly 74 hours earlier, another Falcon 9 lifted off from nearby Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, carrying another set of Starlink satellites, again deployed 65 minutes after liftoff.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4142/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 23, 2021, 00:18
Review: Star Settlers
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 22, 2021

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Star Settlers: The Billionaires, Geniuses, and Crazed Visionaries Out to Conquer the Universe
by Fred Nadis
Pegasus Books, 2020
hardcover, 288 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-64313-448-2
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1643134485/spaceviews

Many industries have visionaries who predict how their companies and technologies will revolutionize life, but space seems to take that to a whole new level. Take, for example, Elon Musk, one of the world’s richest men, who has long talked about making humanity multiplanetary by settling Mars, and soon. Musk, replying Sunday to a tweet describing an architectural firm’s proposal to start building a Mars settlement in 2054, said, “Hopefully will happen this decade.” Then there’s Jeff Bezos, currently the world’s richest man, who many not have the same schedule or destination as Musk, but still talks about a goal of millions of people living and working in space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4143/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 23, 2021, 00:18
The politics of settling space
by Gregory Anderson Monday, March 22, 2021

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A SpaceX vision for a future Mars settlement. Politics will guide when and how settlements beyond Earth develop. (credit: SpaceX)

Around 100,000 years ago, people we refer to as modern humans because they were physically like us began to move out of their African home and into the wider world. Those few humans and their descendants had much to learn, but they learned well enough, and quickly enough, to survive, and multiply, and prosper, not just for a few generations, but to the present day. Intelligence capable of grappling with the cosmos may or may not exist elsewhere, but it exists here, partly because those few people decided to roam.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4144/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 23, 2021, 00:18
This woman’s work: “For All Mankind” and women’s pain
by Emily Carney Monday, March 22, 2021

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Danielle Poole contemplates her next step while visiting her old Apollo spacecraft. (credit: AppleTV+)

In February, Apple TV+’s “For All Mankind” debuted its second season (see “It is very cold in space: Season 2 of ‘For All Mankind’”, The Space Review, February 8, 2021), and caught up with the women characters we’ve grown acquainted with during the show’s first season. Perhaps the most notable and unique characteristic of “For All Mankind” is how it depicts its women—astronauts, ground support crew, and wives/mothers—as real people with real issues, similar to how the AMC show “Mad Men” turned the image of the well-coiffed, lipsticked 1960s woman inside out during its seven seasons. In the new episodes of “For All Mankind”, its cadre of women are again front and center, and are all experiencing deep emotional and/or physical pain as the events of the 1980s unfold. “For All Mankind’s” women deny the presence of pain at all, or reveal it only after it’s shoved vividly into the forefront. (Note: this piece contains spoilers of “For All Mankind” Season 1, and the first four episodes of Season 2.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4145/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 23, 2021, 00:18
Back to the future
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 22, 2021

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Bill Nelson, at the time a US senator from Florida, speaks at a September 2011 event unveiling the design of the Space Launch System, a vehicle established in a 2010 NASA authorization bill he helped author. Nelson was nominated Friday to be the agency’s next administrator. (credit: NASA/Paul E. Alers)

On Thursday afternoon, the core stage of the Space Launch System roared to life for a second time. Two months after its first test-firing was cut short after a little more than a minute because of what turned out to be “intentionally conservative” limits in software controlling the engines’ hydraulics (see “Green Run, yellow light”, The Space Review, January 18, 2021), the four RS-25 engines this time ignited and ran for a full 500 seconds. “Everything that we’ve seen in the test today looked nominal,” John Honeycutt, NASA SLS program manager, said in a briefing just after the test.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4146/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 30, 2021, 02:31
Review: Proxima
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 29, 2021

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Proxima
directed by Alice Winocour
2019, 107 minutes
Streaming on Hulu
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt7374926/

The European Space Agency is starting its search for a new class of astronauts. ESA will begin accepting applications Wednesday for that astronaut class, continuing through late May. That kicks off a selection process that will end in about 18 months with the agency selecting four to six new career astronauts, eligible for long-duration missions to the International Space Station or, eventually to the Moon. ESA will also select a larger number of “reserve” astronauts who could fly one-off missions, such as taking part in commercial flight opportunities, and will investigate the feasibility of so-called “parastronauts,” or people with physical limitations who would not otherwise ordinarily be considered.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4147/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 30, 2021, 02:31
Sustainable space manufacturing and design will help get us to the Moon, Mars, and beyond
by Dylan Taylor Monday, March 29, 2021

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In-space manufacturing and assembly can be enabled by the use of technologies to repair and recycle materials. (credit: Made In Space)

Sustainability isn’t merely an initiative that supports life on Earth. It also holds the power to propel the future of the space industry forward. The NewSpace industry and government agencies like NASA are focused on developing the commercial space industry, where technologies and methodologies are lower cost and more accessible in a rapidly growing market.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4148/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 30, 2021, 02:31
Space Force sounds like a joke thanks to pop culture: how that could be a problem for an important military branch
by Wendy Whitman Cobb Monday, March 29, 2021

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Mention “Space Force” to many members of the public, and they’ll think of the Netflix series starring Steve Carrell rather than the new military service. (credit: Netflix)

The US Space Force has a serious role to play in the modern world. Its stated mission is to train and equip personnel to defend US interests in space. Given the increasing military and economic importance of space, the Space Force is likely to grow in importance.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4149/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 30, 2021, 02:31
The growing case for active debris removal
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 29, 2021

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Astroscale will use the ELSA-d spacecraft, launched March 22, to demonstrate technologies needed for active debris removal. (credit: Astroscale)

There are, unfortunately, plenty of reminders of the growing problem of orbital debris. On March 18, the Space Force’s 18th Space Control Squadron (18 SPCS), responsible for tracking objects in Earth orbit, announced that the retired NOAA-17 polar-orbiting weather satellite had broken up eight days earlier, creating 16 pieces being tracked (and likely more too small to be tracked.) On March 22, 18 SPCS reported that a Chinese satellite, Yunhai 1-02, had broken up four days earlier, creating 21 pieces being tracked.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4150/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 06, 2021, 23:53
Review: Lunar Outfitters
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 5, 2021

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Lunar Outfitters: Making the Apollo Space Suit
by Bill Ayrey
Univ. Press of Florida, 2020
hardcover, 422 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-8130-6657-8
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0813066573/spaceviews

Most of the attention NASA’s Artemis lunar exploration program has received has been on its biggest programs: the Space Launch System, Orion spacecraft, lunar Gateway, and the Human Landing System program to commercially develop crewed lunar landers. A smaller yet still critical element of getting boots on the Moon is literally those boots, and the rest of the spacesuits that astronauts walking on the lunar surface will wear. NASA’s Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Unit (xEMU) program is developing that suit, building in part upon the lessons of the Apollo program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4151/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 06, 2021, 23:53
NASA revises its low Earth orbit commercialization plans
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 5, 2021

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Axiom Space plans to start with commercial modules attached to the International Space Station, but eventually undocking and adding elements to create a standalone commercial station. (credit: Axiom Space)

In June of 2019, NASA rolled out its new low Earth orbit commercialization initiative, an effort to build up both the supply of commercial capabilities in LEO as well as demand for them outside of NASA (see “NASA tries to commercialize the ISS, again”, The Space Review, June 10, 2019.) That initiative features several elements, from setting aside a fraction of International Space Station resources for commercial activities and allowing private astronaut missions to starting the process of supporting both commercial ISS modules and standalone commercial stations that could, eventually, succeed the ISS.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4152/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 06, 2021, 23:53
The Paper Chase: declassifying and releasing space history documents from the Cold War
by Dwayne A. Day and Asif Siddiqi Monday, April 5, 2021

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A Soviet Lunokhod lunar rover. In 2020 Roscosmos released a new set of documents about this program, part of a series of document releases about their secretive space program. (credit: Roscosmos)

In recent years, the Russian space agency Roscosmos has begun releasing documents from the history of the Soviet civilian space program, usually corresponding with anniversaries of key achievements in their long history. These have included document releases on the Lunokhod rovers, the Luna 16 mission that returned samples from the Moon, the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, and most recently, the Luna-9 mission, which became the first spacecraft to soft land on the Moon in February 1966. (See: “Handshakes and histories: The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, 45 years later,” The Space Review, July 20, 2020.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4153/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 06, 2021, 23:53
The status of Russia’s signals intelligence satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, April 5, 2021

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Lotos signals intelligence satellite, part of the Liana project. (source)

In early February, Russia launched the latest in a series of signals intelligence satellites that are part of a project called Liana. Initiated shortly after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the project has suffered significant technical problems and delays over the years and has so far failed to live up to expectations. A new generation of signals intelligence satellites is currently under development, but may take at least several more years to become fully operational.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4154/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 14, 2021, 01:25
Review: Institutions That Shaped Modern India: ISRO
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 12, 2021

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Institutions That Shaped Modern India: ISRO
by Ajey Lele
Rupa Publications India, 2021
ebook, 152 pp.
ISBN 9390356563
US$13.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B08RMWKP2K/spaceviews

Since Yuri Gagarin flew to space 60 years ago today, people from dozens of countries have followed on suborbital or orbital missions. Yet, to this day, only three countries have developed human spaceflight capabilities: the United States and the former Soviet Union 60 years ago, and China more than 40 years later. All the space travelers from other countries have flown on American or Russian vehicles.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4155/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 14, 2021, 01:25
Why venture? A memo for the Biden Administration
by Derek Webber
Monday, April 12, 2021

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NASA is expected to continue the Artemis program of human lunar exploration under Biden Administration, which could eventually support efforts to utilize space resources for the benefit of humanity. (credit: NASA)

It’s that time again. A new administration reassesses the funding, rationale, and specific projects being undertaken by the various space related departments. This is an inevitable consequence of the political vicissitudes that operate on a four-year time horizon as compared with the much longer timescales involved in space development, at least in these still-early years, when most of the funding still comes from government sources. Of course, there will always be geopolitical and even military considerations, which will vary with the tides of world affairs, but maybe it would be a good idea to re-state those basic rationales that transcend the politics of the moment. Why did Gagarin, Glenn, Armstrong, et al., risk their lives at the onset of the Space Age, and why do today’s astronauts line up for the challenges of the future? Space, above all else, is a global endeavor, and we should therefore be able to understand those common perspectives that all occupants of the planet share about the rationale of space exploration, whether it involves robots or people. In particular, it can be helpful to do this to get a handle on the timescales involved in developing space policy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4156/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 14, 2021, 01:25
A Moonshot to inspire: Building back better in space
by Alan Stern Monday, April 12, 2021
[Editor’s Note: A version of this essay was previous published by The Hill, and is republished here with permission.]

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President Joe Biden watching the landing of NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover from the White House in February. (credit: White House)

Recent Democratic presidents have supported and initiated important, bold, and sustainable robotic and commercial space efforts. But no Democrat since John F. Kennedy has set this nation onto a bold course that resulted in humans exploring new worlds.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4157/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 14, 2021, 01:25
For human spaceflight, better late than never
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 12, 2021

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SpaceX says the Crew Dragon that will fly the Inspiration4 private mission in September will be equipped with a cupola in place of the docking adapter on the nose of the capsule. (credit: SpaceX)

Anniversaries with nice round numbers tend to serve as prompts for reflection of the past and contemplation of potential futures. But some round numbers are more potent than others, so 40 and 60 tend to lose out to 50 in terms of significance. That means the commemorations today of the 60th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s flight and the 40th anniversary of the first Space Shuttle launch won’t have the impact of, say, Gagarin’s anniversary 10 years ago or, perhaps, the shuttle’s anniversary 10 years from now.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4158/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 20, 2021, 02:37
Review: The High Frontier
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 19, 2021

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The High Frontier: The Untold Story of Gerard K. O’Neill
directed by Ryan Stuit
2021, 90 mins., unrated
https://thehighfrontiermovie.com/

Among many space enthusiasts, Gerard K. O’Neill has achieved something akin to sainthood. More than 50 years ago, the Princeton physics professor first asked his students there if the surface of a planet was the best place for a technological civilization, a thought experiment that evolved over the course of several years into space colonies. It inspired a generation of space advocates, some of whom dubbed themselves “Gerry’s kids,” to carry forward his vision.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4159/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 20, 2021, 02:37
Putting SpaceX’s Starship program in the proper context
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, April 19, 2021

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A SpaceX Starship prototype at the company’s Boca Chica, Texas, test site before a recent test flight. (credit: SpaceX)

Where does the SpaceX Starship vehicle fit, anyway? It came out of nowhere, in response to no government RFP or recognized industry-wide need. There is no established market for its capabilities and apparently is being constructed for much the same reasons that people build little airplanes in their garage. It has been created based on the vision of one man. But perhaps the real question is, “Where should the Starship fit in the launch industry?”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4160/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 20, 2021, 02:37
Higher burning: The Air Launched Sortie Vehicle of the 1980s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, April 19, 2021

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The air-launched space shuttle in the AppleTV+ series "For All Mankind." From 1980-1983, the US Air Force hired several aerospace contractors including Pratt & Whitney, Rockwell, and Boeing, to study such a concept, although it never reached an advanced design phase. (credit: Apple TV+)

A recent episode of the AppleTV+ series “For All Mankind” featured a big reveal: an advanced space shuttle launched off the back of a C-5 Galaxy, headed for space on a military mission. It is a concept that has been around since the beginning of the shuttle program. In the early 1980s, the United States Air Force sponsored studies of what was initially designated a Space Sortie Vehicle, then renamed the Air Launched Sortie Vehicle, or ALSV. The ALSV would have launched into space off the back of a 747. In one early concept, the 747 would have been equipped with multiple rocket engines in its tail to boost it to launch altitude. Now, newly-acquired information indicates that Boeing conducted several studies of “Trans-Atmospheric Vehicles” in 1983, including a revised variant of the ALSV. This Sortie Vehicle, looking somewhat like a space shuttle orbiter that had been (lightly) stepped on by Godzilla, would have fired its own rocket engines while on top of the 747 and pushed both vehicles higher before separating the spacecraft to head into orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4161/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 20, 2021, 02:37
All in on Starship
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 19, 2021

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NASA said it picked SpaceX’s Starship lunar lander, and only SpaceX, becaused on both the quality of the proposals it received and the limited funding available. (credit: SpaceX)

History will show that SpaceX won two contracts last week to land spacecraft on the Moon, but few may remember the first. On Tuesday, Astrobotic announced it selected SpaceX to launch its Griffin lunar lander in 2023. That lander will carry to the south pole of the Moon NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) to search for deposits of water ice there. NASA awarded Astrobotic a contract worth nearly $200 million last year to launch VIPER through the agency’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services Program; Astrobotic did not disclose the terms of its contract with SpaceX, although the Falcon Heavy has a list price of $90 million.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4162/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 27, 2021, 08:01
Review: Not Necessarily Rocket Science
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 26, 2021

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Not Necessarily Rocket Science: A Beginner's Guide to Life in the Space Age
by Kellie Gerardi
Mango, 2020
hardcover, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-1-64250-410-1
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1642504106/spaceviews

For decades, the message to students interested in pursuing career in space was simple: study science and math. That was the way to get a job as an engineer or scientist at companies or government agencies involved in space. That’s understandable, given the essential nature of those fields to launching satellites, but it was also something of an exclusionary message: if you weren’t interested in science and math, or just not good at it, then you were out of luck.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4163/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 27, 2021, 08:02
Thanks, Dmitry!
by A.J. Mackenzie Monday, April 26, 2021

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In 2014, Dmitry Rogozin, Russian deputy prime minister, made threats about access to RD-180 engines and Soyuz seats that prompted a series of changes in the US. Will comments by Russia’s current deputy prime minister about the future of ISS have a similar impact? (credit: Roscosmos)

Russian officials stated last week that Russia could quit the International Space Station as soon as 2025. One of those officials, deputy prime minister Yuri Borisov, claimed “technical malfunctions” were taking place there at an increasing rate, and that Russia should instead build its own national space station, perhaps by 2030.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4164/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 27, 2021, 08:02
A message of continuity from NASA’s next administrator
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 26, 2021

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Bill Nelson, the Biden Administration’s nominee to lead NASA, talks to his former colleagues on the Senate Commerce Committee during his confirmation hearing April 21. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The last time the Senate Commerce Committee held a confirmation hearing for a NASA administrator nominee, Bill Nelson was not happy. As the top Democrat on the committee, the Florida senator used his opening remarks to make it clear he did not think the nominee, Jim Bridenstine, was the right person for the job. “While your time as a pilot, and your service to our country in the military is certainly commendable,” Nelson told Bridenstine, “it doesn’t make you qualified to make complex and nuanced engineering, safety, and budgetary decisions for which the head of NASA must be accountable.” (See “A contentious confirmation”, The Space Review, November 6, 2017.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4165/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 27, 2021, 08:03
With Starship, NASA is buying the Moon, but investing in Mars
by Casey Dreier and Jason Davis Monday, April 26, 2021

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NASA’s selection of SpaceX’s Starship to send humans to the Moon could help both organizations go to Mars. (credit: SpaceX)

NASA’s selection of SpaceX’s Starship for a crewed lunar landing is the most consequential decision in the Artemis program to date, not just as a major step toward the Moon, but for the long-term implications of investing in a Mars spacecraft.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4166/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 04, 2021, 10:44
Review: A Man on the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 3, 2021

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A Man on the Moon: The Voyages of the Apollo Astronauts
by Andrew Chaikin
The Folio Society, 2021
hardcover, 800 pp. (two volumes), illus.
US$225.00
https://www.foliosociety.com/usa/a-man-on-the-moon.html

The first copy of A Man on the Moon that I bought was when the book came out in 1994, timed to the 25th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing. I got a copy at a Boston bookstore just in time for a talk its author, Andrew Chaikin, gave at Boston University shortly before the book rode a wave of popularity tied to the 25th anniversary and other events, like the movie Apollo 13 that came out a year later, leading to the HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4167/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 04, 2021, 10:44
Don’t make space harder than it needs to be
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, May 3, 2021

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Space Force Gen. Jay Raymond has made the case for his service to lawmakers, but the Space Force needs to inform the general public about the importance of space in order to win widespread support. (credit: US Air Force photo by Wayne Clark)

In February, White House press secretary Jen Psaki called the Space Force “the plane of today”—a reference to media interest in the paint scheme of the new Air Force One—when asked whether the new administration supported the United States Space Force. The good news is that she later provided a coherent answer. The Biden Administration fully supports the Space Force and is not revisiting its instantiation. Around the same time, the Chief of Space Operations, Gen. Jay Raymond, remark when asked about it that “it is hard to understand the link between what the Space Force does and how it affects U.S. citizens.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4168/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 04, 2021, 10:46
The little Mars helicopter that could
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 3, 2021

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The Mastcam-Z camera on the Perseverance rover captured this image of Ingenuity during its second flight on Mars April 22. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/MSSS)

In the last decade, drones have become almost ubiquitous. They have found roles from providing aerial photography to delivery services to entertainment. You can go on Amazon and find a low-end quadcopter, with limited range and performance but still sporting high-definition cameras, for less than $100, and maybe under $50.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4169/
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 04, 2021, 10:46
Let’s take down the menace to our space dreams
by Alfred Anzaldúa Monday, May 3, 2021

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The growing problem of space junk requires not just technical solutions for removing debris but also new legal, regulatory, and business models. (credit: ESA/Spacejunk3D, LLC)

In March, the retired NOAA-17 polar-orbiting weather satellite and the Chinese Yunhai 1-02 satellite both broke up in orbit. The former breakup created 16 pieces of trackable objects and the latter 21 pieces. Both were in polar orbits,[1] the most popular orbit in the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) band from 200 to 2000 kilometers.[2] These trackable objects joined around 34,000 other trackable objects weighing 8,000 tons[3] larger than 10 centimeters in diameter and at least 128 million smaller pieces of untrackable debris able to shred a spacecraft.[4] Around 10,000 of the fragments were created by more than 250 collisions or explosions in orbit. Only 7% of the objects are functioning satellites.[5]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4170/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 11, 2021, 02:16
Review: Test Gods
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 10, 2021

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Test Gods: Virgin Galactic and the Making of a Modern Astronaut
by Nicholas Schmidle
Henry Holt and Co., 2021
hardcover, 352 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-250-22975-5
US$ 29.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1250229758/spaceviews

When Virgin Galactic first announced its suborbital spaceflight plans in 2004, working in cooperation with Scaled Composites just as that company’s SpaceShipOne was on the cusp of winning the $10 million Ansari X PRIZE, it said it would begin commercial service as soon as late 2007. It’s 2021, and the company has yet to take a paying customer to the edge of space. SpaceShipTwo hasn’t made a trip to suborbital space since February 2019, and a flight in December 2020 was aborted just as its hybrid engine ignited because of a computer malfunction that’s taken months to correct.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4171/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 11, 2021, 02:16
To catch a star: the technical and geopolitical arguments for autonomous on-orbit satellite servicing
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, May 10, 2021

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An infrared image of Intelsat 10-02 taken by the MEV-2 spacecraft shortly before docking. MEV-2 will remain docked to Intelsat 10-02 for several years, extending the satellite’s mission. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

On April 12, Northrop Grumman’s Mission Extension Vehicle-2 (MEV-2) successfully docked with a geostationary communications satellite, Intelsat 10-02. It is easy to see the applications for this technology. Besides extending the lives of satellites running out of propellant, for example, one can imagine satellites carrying less fuel in the first place, freeing up more weight for payloads. It’s easy to get caught up in the potential applications of this technology. Yet, while this accomplishment is substantial and noteworthy, it is not the first time satellite to have conducted rendezvous and proximity operations (RPO) to service another satellite.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4172/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 11, 2021, 02:16
Retaining both space policies and processes
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 10, 2021

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Biden Administration officials have suggested that the National Space Council, under Vice President Harris’s leadership, won’t have the same “big displays” as those by the council under Vice President Mike Pence, like this December 2020 meeting under the Saturn V on display at the Kennedy Space Center. (credit: White House)

When the Biden Administration took office in January, some in the space community were concerned about the future of initiatives started by the Trump Administration. Within a matter of weeks, though, the White House affirmed its support for both the US Space Force (which would have required an act of Congress to undo in any case) as well as NASA’s Artemis lunar exploration program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4173/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 11, 2021, 02:16
Spybirds: POPPY 8 and the dawn of satellite ocean surveillance
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 10, 2021

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Artist impression of the September 1969 launch of multiple satellites. The four yellow objects at the front represent the POPPY 8 signals intelligence satellites that for the first time had a mission of locating Soviet ships at sea by detecting their radar emissions. POPPY scanned large portions of the electromagnetic spectrum searching for new and unusual signals, and the use of four satellites in a constellation enabled precise location of detected radars. (credit: NRO)

At the end of September 1969, a Thor-Agena rocket roared off its launch pad in California and climbed high over the Pacific Ocean, heading south. The rocket dropped its stubby pencil-like solid booster motors not very long after lifting off and continued its arc. A few minutes later, its first stage, burning a mixture of kerosene and liquid oxygen, ran low on fuel and its engine shut down. The Agena upper stage separated and small motors fired, pushing it away and forcing the fuel in its tanks to settle to the rear, and in moments its Bell rocket engine ignited, pushing it faster and higher. Its bulbous nose cone separated and flew away, revealing a cluster of four shiny, egg-shaped satellites surrounding a small pointy object. Upon reaching orbital velocity the Agena’s engine shut down and the shiny satellites began to pop off, pushed away by springs. Each satellite was about the size of a toddler, and collectively they were known as POPPY 8. They were followed by several other satellites that also separated from the front of the Agena. Moments later, various small satellites were pushed off the rear of the Agena. Then came the finale: at the rear of the Agena, a box-shaped satellite the size of a fat suitcase and named WESTON rotated back on a hinge and was shoved away on springs before firing its solid rocket motor and heading to a higher orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4174/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 18, 2021, 03:22
Review: Developing Space and Settling Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 17, 2021

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Developing Space
by John Strickland with Sam Spencer and Anna Nesterova
Apogee Books, 2021
paperback, 354 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-989044-14-8
US$55.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/198904414X/spaceviews

Settling Space
by John Strickland with Sam Spencer and Anna Nesterova
Apogee Books, 2021
paperback, 398 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-989044-16-2
US$55.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1989044166/spaceviews

For all his talk about wanting to make humanity multiplanetary, Elon Musk hasn’t said much about how he would ensure people would stay alive on another world. Musk is happy to talk about how Starship can make it possible for people to go to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere in large numbers, including that vision of a million people living on Mars. But exactly what people would do once on Mars, and how they would survive the extreme environment there, is an exercise left for the reader.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4175/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 18, 2021, 03:22
Why the China-Russia space alliance will speed up human exploration of Mars
by John Wolfram Monday, May 17, 2021

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A Long March 5B rocket lifts off in April carrying the core module of China’s new space station. China and Russia have recently agreed to cooperate on space exploration activities, including missions to the Moon. (credit: Xinhua)

On March 9, the China National Space Administration and the Russian space agency Roscosmos signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) for the joint construction of a permanent research station on the Moon. Their explicit goal is to make this a base of future space exploration operations, with the implicit goals of planning a crewed mission to Mars and boldly challenging US leadership in space. Could this latest and largest step in the emerging “new space race” ultimately accelerate the landing of humans on Mars?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4176/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 18, 2021, 03:22
Build back better
by Robert G. Oler Monday, May 17, 2021

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SpaceX’s Starship SN15 on its successful flight May 5, going to an altitude of ten kilometers before landing safely, unlike four previous vehicles. (credit: SpaceX)

History loves ironies and maybe the future will as well. SpaceX stuck the first landing of its Starship prototype on the 60th anniversary of Alan Shepard’s first flight into space. A long road remains, but the event prompts a simple question: “What if Starship works?”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4177/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 18, 2021, 03:22
Redundancy now, or redundancy never?
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 17, 2021

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Lunar lander concepts by Blue Origin (left) and Dynetics. The two companies have filed protests with the GAO about NASA’s award of a single Human Landing System contract to SpaceX, while a Senate bill would require NASA to select a second company. (credit: Blue Origin/Dynetics)

A month after NASA selected SpaceX for the sole Human Landing System (HLS) award (see “All in on Starship”, The Space Review, April 19, 2021), the reverberations continue. NASA’s decision April 16 to make a single “Option A” award for the development and flight demonstration of lunar lander to SpaceX surprised many in the industry and, given the high stakes of the competition, was one that the losing companies were unlikely to accept easily.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4178/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 25, 2021, 23:28
Review: Amazon Unbound and its insights into Blue Origin
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 24, 2021

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Amazon Unbound: Jeff Bezos and the Invention of a Global Empire
by Brad Stone
Simon & Schuster, 2021
hardcover, 496 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-9821-3261-3
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1982132612/spaceviews

The good news is that you can now buy a seat on a New Shepard suborbital flight. The bad news is that you probably can’t afford it. Blue Origin announced early this month it would offer a single seat on the first crewed flight of New Shepard, scheduled for July 20, which it would auction off. Last week, the company unsealed the bids it received in the first phase, and moved into a more open bidding phase. As of early May 24, the current high bid was $2.8 million, with the bidding set to conclude with a live auction June 12.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4179/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 25, 2021, 23:28
Why the US should ban kinetic anti-satellite weapons
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, May 24, 2021

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A proliferation of kinetic anti-satellite weapons to countries like India, which tested one in 2019, raise questions about the long-term sustainability of low Earth orbit. (credit: DRDO)

The United States has long been the world leader in developing and leveraging space-based technology. While the gap between the US and other countries has shrunk in recent years, the United States remains the nation most dependent on space-based capabilities. As of June 2020, the total number of active satellites in orbit was 2,787, of which 1,425 belong to the US, 382 to China, and 172 to Russia. All other states account for the remaining 808.[1] At no time in the history of space exploration has space been more congested, contested, and competitive.[2] Since the 1960s, the global economic system has become increasingly dependent on precision timing provided by space-based capabilities, which facilitate air travel, communications, banking, and numerous other core sectors in the global economy.[3] A guiding objective in the National Space Policy published last December is to preserve the space environment to enhance space activities’ long-term sustainability.[4] Given this emphasis and the particular dependence of the US on space-based technologies, policymakers should lead the global charge to ban the use of kinetic anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons development and testing through international legislation and multilateral cooperation of all nations who have a stake in ensuring the continued use of space for the benefit of all humanity.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4180/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 25, 2021, 23:28
Red planet scare
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 24, 2021

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An image released last week by the China National Space Administration showing the Zhurong rover on the surface of Mars. (credit: CNSA)

Sometimes a Mars rover is just a Mars rover, but sometimes it’s not.

When China landed its Zhurong rover in the Utopia Planitia region of Mars May 14, many celebrated the technical achievement. China is just the second country, after the United States, to land a spacecraft on Mars and sustain its operations (the Soviet Union’s Mars 3 landed in 1971, but lost contact less than two minutes after touchdown, while Britain’s Beagle 2 may have landed safely in 2004 but never deployed its solar panels and antenna.) Scientists looked forward to what Zhurong’s instruments might reveal, such as its ground-penetrating radar designed to search for subsurface ice deposits.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4181/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 25, 2021, 23:28
Necessary but not sufficient: Presidents and space policy 60 years after Kennedy
by Wendy N. Whitman Cobb Monday, May 24, 2021

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Sixty years after John F. Kennedy called for landing a man on the Moon by the end of the decade, the influence of presidents on space policy remains important, but alone is not sufficient. (credit: NASA)

On May 25, 1961, still in the first months of his presidency but stung by recent failures at the Bay of Pigs and elsewhere, President John F. Kennedy prepared to address the Congress. Seeking a way to move the United States forward in the Cold War, Kennedy stated:

First, I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4182/1

Note: Because of the Memorial Day holiday, next week’s issue will be published on Tuesday, June 1.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 02, 2021, 03:10
Review: Beyond
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, June 1, 2021

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Beyond: The Astonishing Story of the First Human to Leave Our Planet and Journey into Space
by Stephen Walker
Harper, 2021
hardcover, 512 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-297815-8
US$29.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062978152/spaceviews

For all the rhetoric in recent months about a new space race developing between China and the United States, there’s little agreement about what exactly constitutes that race. Sending humans (back) to the Moon? Humans to Mars? A base on the Moon? The original Space Race between the United States and the Soviet Union was, in retrospect, a little more clear cut, with the two companies striving to be the first to land humans on the Moon, played out in a series of firsts—first satellite, first spacewalk, etc.—from 1957 to 1969.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4183/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 02, 2021, 03:10
The revival of the suborbital market
by Sam Dinkin Tuesday, June 1, 2021

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“Mannequin Skywalker” occupies a seat on a New Shepard suborbital vehicle earlier this year that, in July, will carry the winner of an ongoing auction to the edge of space. (credit: Blue Origin)

With the bidding for taking the first human-crewed suborbital flight of the New Shepard at $2.8 million, and the bidding not closing until June 12, a healthy market may be available, at least temporarily, for suborbital flights with paying spaceflight participants.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4184/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 02, 2021, 03:10
Should India join China and Russia’s Lunar Research Station?
by Ajey Lele Tuesday, June 1, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4185a.jpg)
An illustration of what the proposed China-Russia international lunar research station might one day look like. (credit: CNSA)

Last week, South Korea signed the Artemis Accords, becoming the tenth country to join. It was the latest sign of the ongoing global efforts to study the Moon and beyond, involving both state-centric programs and multilateral collaborations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4185/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 02, 2021, 03:10
An aggressive budget for more than just Earth science
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, June 1, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4186a.jpg)
NISAR, a synthetic aperture radar Earth science mission being jointly developed by NASA and the Indian space agency ISRO, will be a pathfinder for the Earth System Observatory series of missions to follow later in the decade. (credit: NASA)

Even before President Biden took office in January, it was clear that his administration was going to emphasize Earth science at NASA. The Biden campaign had identified climate change as a major priority across the government, and the Democratic party platform last summer included, in its brief discussion of space policy, “strengthening” Earth observation missions at both NASA and NOAA (see “Moon 2020-something”, The Space Review, November 9, 2020).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4186/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 08, 2021, 04:43
Review: Light in the Darkness
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4187a.jpg)

Light in the Darkness: Black Holes, the Universe, and Us
by Heino Falcke with Jörg Römer
HarperOne, 2021
hardcover, 368 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-302005-4
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006302005X/spaceviews

Even though the term “black hole” was introduced less than 60 years ago, the phenomenon has long since transcended astrophysics into popular culture. Almost everyone is familiar with the term, associating it not just stars and galaxies but also, more figuratively, with things from which one cannot escape, ravenously consuming everything in its path.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4187/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 08, 2021, 04:43
Revisiting the past’s future: ongoing ruminations about “For All Mankind”
by Emily Carney and Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4188a.jpg)
In the second season of “For All Mankind”, Skylab is the US space station in low Earth orbit, regularly serviced by—and refueling—space shuttles. (credit: AppleTV+)

Apple TV+’s “For All Mankind” finished its second season in April. That season was set entirely in 1983, in an alternate history where NASA builds a moonbase and ends up at the inflection point between peace and nuclear war. Two obsessive fans of the show who haven’t found enough opportunities to discuss it sat down and talked about it some more. Here is their extended commentary and speculation.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4188/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 08, 2021, 04:43
Venus is hot again
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4189a.jpg)
An illustration showing the various phases of the DAVINCI+ probe entering the atmosphere of Venus and descending towards the surface. (credit: NASA GSFC visualization and CI Labs Michael Lentz and colleagues)

Planetary scientists who study Venus went into the competition for NASA’s Discovery program with high hopes. Two Venus mission concepts, an orbiter and an atmospheric probe, were finalists. With NASA having announced its intent to select two missions in this round—a move to space out the competitions and thus reduce the workload on the scientific community of preparing proposals—scientists were optimistic at least one would be selected, ending a long drought of NASA missions to the planet.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4189/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 08, 2021, 04:43
Peeking behind the iron curtain: National Intelligence Estimates and the Soviet space program
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4190a.jpg)
The massive N1 rocket being elevated at its pad. American satellites photographed several launch vehicles on the pad during the late 1960s and early 1970s. (credit: Pavel Shubin, “Rocket Space System N1-L3”)

During the Cold War, the US intelligence community had a vast array of intelligence assets collecting information about the Soviet space program, from satellites to listening posts to radars pointed into space. Information was gathered up and processed and combined and then turned into products for decision makers. One of the major focuses at the time was the Soviet manned lunar landing program. American intelligence analysts had determined by around 1967 that the Soviet program, based on its huge N1 rocket, was not competitive with Apollo. Nevertheless, analysts in the US intelligence community maintained close tabs on Soviet space progress and regularly reported their assessments in a regular series of highly secret documents known as National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs). Now, new versions of several NIEs on the Soviet space program produced during the height of the space race have been released, and they shed further light on what the Soviets were doing, as well as some of the sources and methods used by the US intelligence community to keep tabs on their activities.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4190/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 15, 2021, 09:23
Review: Losing the Sky
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 14, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4191a.jpg)

Losing the Sky
by Andy Lawrence
Photon Productions, 2021
paperback,150 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-8383997-2-6
US$8.37
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1838399720/spaceviews

At a meeting of the American Astronomical Society last week, astronomers working on the issue of potential interference from satellite megaconstellations had some good news. Observations of the “VisorSat” versions of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites, so named because they’re equipped with visors intended to keep sunlight from hitting reflective surfaces on the satellites, were considerably darker than their unmodified counterparts. The original Starlink satellites had an average visual magnitude of 5 once in their final orbits, while the VisorSats were at magnitude 6.5, four times dimmer.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4191/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 15, 2021, 09:23
Sword and shield: defending against an American anti-satellite weapon during the Cold War
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 14, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4192a.jpg)
Launch of an ASM-135 anti-satellite missile from an F-15 Eagle in 1985. The missile was equipped with an infrared seeker and minutes later it destroyed an Air Force satellite. Two years before this test, the CIA identified possible Soviet countermeasures to the weapon, estimating that they could be available by the later 1990s. (credit: USAF)

On September 13, 1985, Major Wilbert D. “Doug” Pearson, flying an F-15A fighter aircraft named “Celestial Eagle,” pulled his aircraft into a steep climb and fired a single ASM-135 anti-satellite missile at the sky. Moments later, the missile slammed into the US Air Force’s Solwind P78-1 satellite, blasting it to smithereens—producing both orbital debris and considerable controversy. It was the culmination of an ASAT development program started in the 1970s and dedicated to giving the United States the capability to destroy Soviet satellites. Now, a newly declassified 1983 CIA report indicates that the United States was concerned about how the Soviet Union might defend against the American ASAT weapon. It offers interesting insights into the possible countermeasures that may still be valid today, nearly four decades later.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4192/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 15, 2021, 09:23
Giant ferocious steps from Jeff Bezos
by Sam Dinkin Monday, June 14, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3214a.jpg)
Jeff Bezos, seen here at a 2017 Blue Origin event, appears to be devoting more attention to his spaceflight company as he prepares to step down as Amazon CEO. (credit: J. Foust)

The Blue Origin motto is Gradatim Ferociter, Latin for step by step ferociously. In the past month, several of those steps have been revealed to be both giant and ferocious. In some ways Blue Origin’s owner, Jeff Bezos, is like Robert Heinlein’s character D.D. Harriman, who put everything on the line to open space and go there himself. Unlike Harriman, he is relying not only on Blue Origin’s industriousness, but also seeking a major government development contract.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4193/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 15, 2021, 09:24
Is a billionaire space race good for the industry?
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 14, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4194a.jpg)
Four people will be on the first crewed flight of New Shepard on July 20, including company founder Jeff Bezos and the person who bid $28 million for a seat in an auction Saturday. (credit: Blue Origin)

At one point in Saturday’s auction for a Blue Origin New Shepard seat, the bidding action slowed, prompting a rally cry of sorts from the auctioneer. “The more you pay for it, the more you enjoy it,” he implored.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4194/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 22, 2021, 16:51
Review: My Remarkable Journey
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 21, 2021

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My Remarkable Journey: A Memoir
by Katherine Johnson with Joylette Hylick and Katherine Moore
Amistad, 2021
hardcover, 256 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-289766-4
US$25.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062897667/spaceviews

At a hearing last week by a Senate appropriations subcommittee about NASA’s fiscal year 2022 budget proposal, Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) asked NASA administrator Bill Nelson about funding for the agency’s Independent Verification and Validation Facility, located in his state. In 2019, NASA renamed the facility after Katherine Johnson, the Black mathematician who became famous after the publication of the book Hidden Figures and the release of the movie of the same title. Nelson responded he would investigate the funding issue for the facility, then added, “if I might, tell you a story about Katherine Johnson.” He then mentioned the movie version of Hidden Figures.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4195/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 22, 2021, 16:51
Why Astrofeminism?
by Layla Martin Monday, June 21, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4196a.jpg)
There are few companies in the space industry founded by women, just one example of the field’s gender gap.

The ancient universal practice of studying the moon, planets and stars from Earth helped to define primordial calendars and shape our earliest conception of gods, spirits, seasons, and tides. Today, space-based assets educate and connect humanity as well as revealing information that furthers efforts to mitigate anthropogenic climate change. At its best, what space offers us is the possibility to evolve the human condition. The power of space has benefited the United States on a global scale for decades, inspiring generations while expanding democratic soft power. To illustrate, in every single place around the world I’ve spent time in, from Akiruno, Tokyo to Zanzibar, Tanzania, I’ve observed local people proudly wearing NASA t-shirts! From a non-scientific perspective, images of space reveal patterns of light and color that are so beautiful it’s difficult to describe them as anything other than magical. Yet, they are in fact, very real!
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4196/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 22, 2021, 16:51
A shifting balance of space cooperation?
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 21, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4197a.jpg)
Roscosmos director general Dmitry Rogozin used a conference last week to express support for international cooperation in space exploration, even while continuing to raise questions about the future of the International Space Station. (credit: Roscosmos)

For nearly three decades, cooperation in human spaceflight has been defined by the partnership between the United States and Russia in the International Space Station program. After the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US brought Russia into its space station program with the goal of keeping Russia’s space program engaged in peaceful endeavors rather than producing missiles for Iran or North Korea. (It also had the benefit of providing a new justification for a space station program that, in the US, was facing threats of cancellation.) For better or worse, the two countries have worked together, along with Europe, Japan, and Canada, to build and operate the ISS to this day.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4197/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 22, 2021, 16:51
Burning Frost, the view from the ground: shooting down a spy satellite in 2008
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 21, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4198a.jpg)
Launch of an SM-3 missile from the cruiser USS Lake Erie in February 2008 on an intercept course with a disabled American reconnaissance satellite. (credit: US Navy)

In February 2008, a missile fired from the Aegis class cruiser USS Lake Erie, several hundred kilometers northwest of Hawaii, blasted high into the sky and a few minutes later destroyed a malfunctioning top-secret American satellite. The operation was known as “Burnt Frost,” and according to American officials, it was undertaken to prevent potentially toxic debris from the satellite from falling on populated areas. The operation occurred only a few months after a heavily criticized Chinese anti-satellite test produced a large amount of orbital debris. The American action was designed to minimize the generation of debris but was nevertheless controversial. Now, a newly published account of the decision-making that led to the American action provides unique insight into how it was made. The author, orbital debris expert and longtime space writer Nicolas Johnson, died in April at age 71, and his article, titled “Operation Burnt Frost: A View From Inside,” was made available free of charge by the journal Space Policy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4198/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 22, 2021, 16:51
Scrutinizing the Russian-Iranian satellite deal
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, June 21, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4199a.jpg)
Signing of a pre-contractual agreement on a Russian-Iranian satellite project by Leonid Makridenko (VNIIEM), Alireza Zolali (Bonyan Danesh Shargh) and Sergei Baskov (NPK Barl) in August 2015. (Source)

On June 11, the Washington Post published an article claiming that Russia is preparing to supply Iran with an advanced remote sensing satellite that will give Tehran an unprecedented ability to track potential military targets across the Middle East and beyond. When asked to comment on the story the following day, President Vladimir Putin dismissed it as “fake news” and “nonsense”. However, plans for the joint satellite project were openly reported in the Russian and Iranian media until several years ago and an analysis of various recent Russian online sources corroborates the Post’s claim that it is not far away from launch.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4199/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2021, 07:05
Review: Project Hail Mary
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 28, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4200a.jpg)

Project Hail Mary: A Novel
by Andy Weir
Ballantine, 2021
hardcover, 496 pp.
ISBN 978-0-593-13520-4
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0593135202/spaceviews

When The Martian hit bookshelves in 2014 (see “Review: The Martian”, The Space Review, February 17, 2014), it became not just a bestselling novel but also a book embraced by the space exploration community. Andy Weir told a story of a stranded astronaut on Mars that was both thrilling and mostly accurate from science and engineering standpoints. By the time the film version hit theaters in the fall of 2015, even NASA hopped on the bandwagon, cooperating with the film’s production and using it to promote its own human Mars exploration plans (see “The Martian and real Martians”, The Space Review, October 5, 2015.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4200/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2021, 07:06
Global space traffic management measures to improve the safety and sustainability of outer space
by Jamil Castillo Monday, June 28, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4201a.jpg)
Minor damage to the Canadarm2 robotic arm on the International Space Station, presumably from a debris strike, is the latest examine of the hazards posed by space debris. (credit: NASA/CSA)

Relying on space being “big” is no longer an option. More than 3,000 satellites operate in Earth orbit along with hundreds of thousands of pieces of debris. In October 2020, a company that tracks objects in low Earth orbit warned about an old satellite and a rocket’s upper stage, both inoperable, that had a greater than 10% chance of colliding. Inspections in May of this year revealed that a piece of debris had hit Canadarm2, the International Space Station’s robotic arm.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4201/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2021, 07:06
Before you go, Administrator Nelson
by Roger Handberg Monday, June 28, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4202a.jpg)
Astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Thomas Pesquet perform a spacewalk earlier this month to install new solar arrays on the International Space Station. NASA needs to plan now for a successor to the ISS, which may not last beyond 2030. (credit: NASA)

Every NASA administrator has an expiration date when they enter office, just like Major League Baseball managers or NBA coaches. The boundaries on their tenure can come with the end of the appointing president’s tenure: surviving across administrations is possible but usually limited to until a successor is nominated. More likely, the administrator either will leave office when the president does, or earlier due to issues with the administration—especially White House staff—or of their own volition.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4202/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2021, 07:06
Jumpstarting European NewSpace
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 28, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4203a.jpg)
Thierry Breton, the EU commissioner responsible for space, holds up a signed agreement between the European Commission and European Space Agency after a ceremony Tuesday in Brussels. (credit: ESA)

On June 22, officials from the European Commission and the European Space Agency gathered in Brussels for a signing ceremony. After many months of negotiations, the two sides had finally reached an agreement, formally known as the Financial Framework Partnership Agreement, governing how they will cooperate on programs such as the Galileo navigation satellite constellation and the Copernicus series of Earth observation satellites.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4203/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2021, 07:06
Shipkillers: from satellite to shooter at sea
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 28, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4204a.jpg)
The nuclear-powered cruiser Admiral Ushakov (ex-Kirov) next to the Slava-class cruiser Marshal Ustinov. These ships, which entered service in the late 1970s and early 1980s, were bristling with antennas and anti-ship missiles. Their targets were U.S. Navy aircraft carriers. (credit: Wikipedia (US Navy photograph during a port visit in 1992))

In late summer 1973, a US reconnaissance satellite photographed a large warship under construction at Leningrad Shipyard Ordzhonikid 189 on the Baltic. The warship had a distinctive bottom plate and was obviously one of the largest vessels ever built by the Soviet Union. The CIA soon designated it as Baltic Combatant #1, or BALCOM 1 for short. Throughout the 1970s satellites continued to fly overhead as the warship took shape, photographing the shipyard as workers installed a nuclear reactor and large diagonal silos for launching massive cruise missiles.[1] Eventually the ship was named Kirov and arrived in Northern Fleet waters in early October 1980. Late that year, the ship was conducting cruise missile and surface-to-air missile firings. By that time, a second Kirov was under construction and preparing for launch in 1981.[2]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4204/1

Note: Because of the Fourth of July holiday weekend, next week’s issue will be published on Tuesday, July 6.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2021, 10:09
Reviews: Examining the life of John Glenn
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, July 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4205a.jpg)

The Last American Hero: The Remarkable Life of John Glenn
by Alice L. George
Chicago Review Press, 2020
hardcover 368 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-64160-213-6
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1641602139/spaceviews

Mercury Rising: John Glenn, John Kennedy, and the New Battleground of the Cold War
by Jeff Shesol
W.W. Norton & Co., 2021
hardcover, 416 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-324-00324-3
US$28.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1324003243/spaceviews

John Glenn is clearly one of the most famous figures in the history of American spaceflight despite a relatively brief career at NASA. Selected as part of the Mercury 7 class in 1959, he became the first American to orbit the Earth in 1962, providing a much-needed shot of confidence (or, at least, reassurance) for the country after a series of spaceflight firsts by the Soviets. By 1964, though, Glenn was out of NASA, pursuing new careers in business and politics that led to four terms in the Senate, capped by a second flight to space on the shuttle.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4205/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2021, 10:09
Did ancient astronomers set a message in stone for us?
by Sam Dinkin Tuesday, July 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4206a.jpg)
A sky chart superimposed on a scene in a pillar from an ancient temple: a depiction of an impact or guide to heaven? (credit: Andrew Collins)

Back in 2003, The Space Review first started repeating the story of the danger of large impacts (“Asteroids are probably a threat. Maybe?” The Space Review, September 9, 2003). It is possible we are recapitulating a tradition that started more than 11,000 years before present (BP). Ancient astronomers may have provided us with a report about what may be “the worst day ever in human history” according to Martin B. Sweatman and Dimitrios Tsikritsis (“Decoding Göbekli Tepe with Archaeoastronomy: What does the fox say?”, 2017).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4206/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2021, 10:09
The nanosatellite gold rush demands new routes to space
by Steve Heller Tuesday, July 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4207a.jpg)
A SpaceX Falcon 9 launched 88 small satellites last week, but rideshare missions like this should be complemented by other means to easily and affordably get smallsats into orbit. (credit: SpaceX)

More than six decades since the launch of Sputnik 1, the first satellite in history, nanosatellites have opened up a new era in private space innovation. They’ve created a wealth of new opportunities for upstart satellite developers, and new challenges to solve for those who seek to help them make their impact.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4207/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2021, 10:09
Flights to Mars, real and LEGO
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, July 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4208a.jpg)
In 1968, Boeing produced a detailed study of a human mission to Mars. Now somebody has produced the spacecraft using LEGO. Here it is in two different scales. (credit: Joe Chambers)

In early 1968, The Boeing Company delivered to NASA a thick, multi-volume report on how to send humans to Mars. That report, titled “Integrated Manned Interplanetary Spacecraft Concept Definition,” described a large, nuclear-powered spacecraft that would be launched in components atop Saturn V rockets, and after assembly in orbit would head off to the Red Planet. Boeing’s Mars spacecraft design concept was further refined by NASA in 1969 and would become iconic for the next decade and a half, appearing in artwork and on book covers and in the pages of novels until it was replaced by another concept for a human mission to Mars that resulted from the Case For Mars conference and was often referred to as the “Mars Cycler.” That Mars spaceship design entered the zeitgeist for another decade or so. But Boeing’s design has shown remarkable staying power and still appears in artwork decades later. Now, Boeing’s design has been recreated in LEGO form, in three-dimensional plastic glory that you can build yourself.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4208/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 07, 2021, 10:09
Ingenuity, InSight, and Ice Mapper
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, July 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4209a.jpg)
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars helicopter took this image of its shadow on the Martian surface during its most recent flight July 4. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

It is a golden era for rovers on Mars. For the first time, there are now three operating rovers on the Red Planet. Curiosity has been at work for nearly nine years now, working its way up Mount Sharp in the center of Gale Crater and traveling through time as it studies different rock layers there. Perseverance, which landed on Mars in February, is ramping up its science operations in Jezero Crater, including plans for caching samples for later return to Earth. And China’s first Mars rover, Zhurong, is exploring the Utopia Planitia region of the planet, although Chinese officials have provided few details since its May landing beyond some images and videos.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4209/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 13, 2021, 10:31
Review: Across the Airless Wilds
by Jeff Foust
Monday, July 12, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4210a.jpg)

Across the Airless Wilds: The Lunar Rover and the Triumph of the Final Moon Landings
by Earl Swift
Custom House, 2021
hardcover, 384 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-298653-5
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062986538/spaceviews

In late May, Lockheed Martin announced it was partnering with General Motors on concepts for future lunar rovers. Executives with the aerospace and automotive giants said they would combine the best technologies of both companies, such as GM’s work on batteries and autonomous driving, for future NASA competitions to develop lunar rovers for the Artemis program. Beyond that, though, there were few details about how the two companies will work together, in part because NASA has yet to release any requests for proposals to develop lunar rovers.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4210/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 13, 2021, 10:31
When it comes to spacewalks, size matters
by Steven Moore Monday, July 12, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4211a.jpg)
NASA astronaut Shane Kimbrough (left) and ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet perform a spacewalk outside the space station in June, using suits that have far exceeded their original design life. (credit: NASA)

On June 25, astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Thomas Pesquet successfully completed an almost seven-hour EVA (extravehicular activity, or spacewalk) to install solar panels on the International Space Station, the last in a series of three such EVAs they performed in June. What does it take to don a spacesuit and venture out on such a technical and dangerous mission? Surprisingly, one of the main criteria (besides the years of astronaut training) is body size.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4211/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 13, 2021, 10:31
China is using mythology and sci-fi to sell its space program to the world
by Molly Silk Monday, July 12, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4212a.jpg)
The movie The Wandering Earth is one example of how China is using science fiction to shape perceptions of its space ambitions. (credit: Netflix)

On the morning of June 17, China launched its long-awaited Shenzhou-12 spacecraft, carrying three Chinese astronauts, or taikonauts, towards the Tianhe core module. The module itself was launched at the end of April, forming part of the permanent Tiangong space station, which is planned to remain in orbit for the next ten years.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4212/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 13, 2021, 10:31
The suborbital spaceflight race isn’t over
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 12, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4213a.jpg)
A view of SpaceShipTwo ascending on its suborbital spaceflight July 11 with six people, including Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson, on board. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

It was never a race, Branson insisted. Not that anyone believed him.

Branson was sitting on a stage in a temporary building adjacent to the main hangar at Spaceport America in New Mexico, a couple of hours after making his long-awaited and highly anticipated suborbital journey on SpaceShipTwo on Sunday. He and other members of the “Unity 22” crew faced the media for a press conference where one reporter, unsurprisingly, asked him what it felt like to beat Jeff Bezos, founder of rival Blue Origin, to space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4213/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 20, 2021, 00:05
Review: Leadership Moments from NASA
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 19, 2021

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Leadership Moments from NASA: Achieving the Impossible
by Dave Williams and Elizabeth Howell
ECW Press, 2021
hardcover, 328 pp.
ISBN 978-1-77041-604-8
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1770416048/spaceviews

Over the course of more than six decades, NASA has provided plenty of examples of leadership, good and bad. Many of those cases are well known even outside the agency, from the successful return of the Apollo 13 astronauts to the losses of Challenger and Columbia. There are, though, many more events within the agency, at large and small scales, that can provide insights on management and leadership.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4214/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 20, 2021, 00:05
Assessing and celebrating the global impact of the “First Lady Astronaut Trainees”
by James Oberg Monday, July 19, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4215a.jpg)
Jerrie Cobb (left), one of the “Mercury 13” women, meets with Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman in space. The Mercury 13 testing effort helped prompt the Soviets to fly Tereshkova.

This month’s “billionaire’s space race” drama portends a very interesting future of more private citizen access to space, first on brief up-and-down hops and soon after on full orbital expeditions. Previous episodic very-high-priced space tourist missions will give way to much more frequent and much less expensive jaunts.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4215/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 20, 2021, 00:06
Astronomy flagships, past and future
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 19, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4216a.jpg)
The James Webb Space Telescope undergoes final preparations for shipment to the launch site in French Guiana for a launch on an Ariane 5 now likely to take place in November. (credit: NASA/Chris Gunn)

Sometimes it’s the missions that are behind schedule. Other times it’s the reports about the missions that are behind schedule.

For months, the astronomy community in the United States has been eagerly awaiting the final report of the astrophysics decadal survey, known as “Astro2020.” As the name suggests, the study originally expected to publish its final report in 2020 (the previous astrophysics decadal survey report was released in August 2010.) Even before the pandemic, though, it appeared likely the final report would not be ready until the beginning of 2021, a schedule further delayed by the shift to virtual meetings and deliberations since last spring.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4216/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 20, 2021, 00:06
Flattops from space: the once (and future?) meme of photographing aircraft carriers from orbit
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 19, 2021

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The cover of Jane’s Defence Weekly in 1984 that featured reconnaissance satellite imagery of a Soviet carrier under construction.

In 1984, Samuel Loring Morison, an analyst at the Naval Intelligence Support Center outside of Washington, DC, picked three photos off the desk of a colleague. He clipped the security classification stamps off the sides of the photos and provided them to Jane’s Defence Weekly, which had only recently begun publishing. The photos were taken by a satellite of a Soviet Union military shipyard. Knowing that they had a real scoop, the editors at Jane’s put one of the photos on the cover of the magazine and featured the other two in a short article about the latest Soviet naval developments.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4217/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 27, 2021, 06:11
Review: The Burning Blue
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 26, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4218a.jpg)

The Burning Blue: The Untold Story of Christa McAuliffe and NASA’s Challenger Disaster
by Kevin Cook
Henry Holt and Co., 2021
hardcover, 288 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-250-75555-1
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1250755557/spaceviews

Depending on your age, the loss of the shuttle Challenger more than 35 years ago can either seem like it happened yesterday or feel like it’s ancient history. If you’re old enough to remember the tragedy, the memories run deep and can come bubbling back to the surface with just the slightest mention. For anyone younger than about 40, though, who lack the first-hand memories of the event, the events lose their visceral, emotional punch.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4218/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 27, 2021, 06:11
The case for suborbital scholarships
by A.J. Mackenzie Monday, July 26, 2021

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Oliver Daemen, Jeff Bezos, Wally Funk, and Mark Bezos (left to right) pose in front of the booster that launched them on their suborbital spaceflight July 20. (credit: J. Foust)

With the successful suborbital flights this month by Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, space is now wide open to not just professional astronauts but just about anyone. Or, rather, anyone wealthy enough to afford a ticket. And that’s a problem.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4219/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 27, 2021, 06:11
John Glenn’s fan mail and the ambitions of the girls who wrote to him
by Roshanna P. SylvestervMonday, July 26, 2021

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John Glenn, seen here in the NASA mailroom after his 1962 spaceflight, received letters from fans of all ages. (credit: John Glenn Archives, The Ohio State University)

Pioneering spacefarer John Herschel Glenn Jr. would have turned 100 on July 18. When Glenn died in 2016, the famed astronaut was lauded as “the last genuine American hero.” NASA, the US Marine Corps, President Barack Obama, and many others posted tributes on social media.

Hundreds of nostalgic fans testified to Glenn’s impact on their own senses of youthful possibility. One woman recalled being a fifth grader in February 1962, listening to coverage of Glenn’s orbital flight at school on a transistor radio: “This was the definition of the future… I wanted to do hard math with slide rules and learn hard languages and solve mysteries. I wanted to be like John Glenn.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4220/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 27, 2021, 06:11
Will suborbital space tourism take a suborbital trajectory?
by Jeff FoustvMonday, July 26, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4221a.jpg)
Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin, celebrates after his suborbital spaceflight on New Shepard July 20. (credit: Blue Origin)

After an extended launch delay, suborbital space tourism is finally ready for liftoff.

Many in the industry thought that was the case nearly 17 years ago, when SpaceShipOne, built by Scaled Composites and funded by billionaire Paul Allen, won the $10 million Ansari XPRIZE. Around the same time, Virgin Galactic announced a deal to license the technology, proposing to start flying people in 2007 or 2008.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4221/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 03, 2021, 13:22
Review: America’s New Destiny in Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 2, 2021

America’s New Destiny in Space
by Glenn Harlan Reynolds
Encounter Books, 2020
paperback, 54 pp.
ISBN 978-1-64177-182-5
US$9.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1641771828/spaceviews

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4222a.jpg)

The suborbital flights last month of Richard Branson on SpaceShipTwo and Jeff Bezos on New Shepard triggered an avalanche of criticism of the two men specifically and of privately funded spaceflight more generally. Some were outraged at Bezos in particular, the world’s wealthiest person, for spending money on spaceflight rather than on climate change or alleviating poverty or simply improving the wages and working conditions of employees at Amazon—criticism he did little to assuage afterwards by thanking Amazon employees and customers for making his flight possible. Others worried more broadly about giving the private sector too much control over what happens in space, fearing a mostly harmless suborbital race could turn into a high-stakes battle over the heavens.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4222/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 03, 2021, 13:22
Six things to think about (besides the price) for prospective space tourists
by Steven Freeland
Monday, August 2, 2021

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Blue Origin’s successful flight last month, along with one by Virgin Galactic days earlier, suggests the era of suborbital space tourism is finally here. (credit: J. Foust)

It’s been a momentous month for space-faring billionaires. On July 11, British entrepreneur Richard Branson’s VSS Unity rocketplane flew him and five fellow passengers about 85 kilometers above Earth. Nine days later, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ New Shepard capsule reached an altitude of 106 kilometers, carrying Bezos, his brother, and the oldest and youngest people ever to reach such a height. Passengers on both flights experienced several minutes of weightlessness and took in breathtaking views of our beautiful and fragile Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4223/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 03, 2021, 13:22
Relaunching a lunar lander program
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 2, 2021

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NASA con move ahead with the contract it awarded to SpaceX to develop a lunar lander based on its Starship vehicle after the GAO rejected protests from the two losing bidders July 30. (credit: SpaceX)

No doubt there were some sighs of relief among NASA leadership on Friday afternoon, and they had nothing to do with the situation on the International Space Station.

NASA leadership, including administrator Bill Nelson, had traveled to the Kennedy Space Center in hopes of observing the launch of an Atlas V carrying Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner on a second uncrewed test flight, a rerun of the December 2019 test flight cut short by problems with the spacecraft. But a day earlier, NASA postponed the launch after the station temporarily lost attitude control when the new Russian Nauka module, which docked to the station Thursday morning, started firing its thrusters hours later. Controllers were able to get the station reoriented after about an hour, but the incident led NASA to delay the launch until this week to give the station time to get back to normal.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4224/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 03, 2021, 13:22
Little Wizards: Signals intelligence satellites during the Cold War
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 2, 2021

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A Titan II rocket on the launch pad at Vandenberg Air Force Base in 1988. This rocket apparently carried the FARRAH III satellite into orbit, one of the last P-11 signals intelligence satellites launched. According to ground observers, the satellite is still in operation 33 years later. (credit: USAF)

In the early 1960s, somebody at Lockheed Missiles and Space Company—it is not clear who—came up with the idea of putting a small satellite on the back end of an Agena spacecraft and popping it off when the Agena reached orbit. The Agena served as a second stage and also provided stability, power, and communications for numerous military and intelligence payloads, making it both a rocket stage and a spacecraft. There was extra room near the Agena’s engine, and somebody realized that a small satellite could be placed there, getting a free ride to orbit. The deployed satellite could even have a small solid rocket motor that could propel it to a higher orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4225/1

Note: The Space Review is going on a reduced publishing schedule for August. We will not publish the weeks of August 9 and 23. We will publish August 16 and resume our regular weekly schedule August 30.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
Review: The Impact of Lunar Dust on Human Exploration
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 16, 2021

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The Impact of Lunar Dust on Human Exploration
by Joel S. Levine (ed.)
Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2021
hardcover, 303 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5275-6308-7
GBP64.99 (approx. US$90)
https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-6308-7

NASA’s inspector general last week dealt another blow to the agency’s plans to return humans to the surface of the Moon by 2024. A report concluded that the next-generation spacesuits that the astronauts would wear on the moonwalks won’t be ready until at least April 2025, thanks to a mix of technical, funding, and management issues. The spacesuits, called Exploration Extravehicular Mobility Units or xEMUs, will cost about $1 billion to develop.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4226/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
Is it time to create the designation of non-governmental astronaut?
by Michael Listner Monday, August 16, 2021

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Jeff Bezos and others celebrated the first crewed flight of New Shepard last month, but they may not qualify as “astronauts” under some legal definitions. (credit: Blue Origin)

The flights of Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin with their respective founders has reinvigorated the debate as to what an astronaut is and, specifically, whether non-governmentals are indeed astronauts. Nevertheless, these two flights open a broader discussion as non-governmental space activities increase in measure and scope how they will be looked upon and treated by international law, especially as outer space activities expand.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4227/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
The little satellite that could

How a vice president’s dream led—after a very long delay—to the DSCOVR spacecraft
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 16, 2021

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The first image taken by the DSCOVR satellite from space showing the Earth’s day side. DSCOVR was originally named Triana and conceived by Vice President Al Gore in 1998. It did not launch until 17 years later. (credit: NOAA)

If satellites had personalities, DSCOVR would be a scrappy little fighter: battered, bloody, but always stumbling back to its feet and getting back into the ring to fight some more. This little satellite, about the size of a college dorm room refrigerator, finally launched in February 2015, 16 years after it was first thought up in a dream.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4228/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
ISRO’s cryogenic conundrum
by Ajey Lele Monday, August 16, 2021

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A GSLV Mark II rocket lifts off August 12, only to suffer a mission-ending malfunction of its cryogenic upper stage five minutes into the flight. (credit: ISRO)

On August 12, the Indian Space Research Organisation’s (ISRO’s) GSLV-F10 mission failed. This GSLV (Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle) was a three-stage rocket carrying the EOS-03 (GISAT-1) Earth observation satellite. The mission took off correctly and the performance of first and second stages was normal. However, ignition of the Cryogenic Upper Stage (CUS) did not happen due to a technical anomaly, resulting in a disastrous failure.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4229/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
Space exploration and development is essential to fighting climate change
by Alex Gilbert Monday, August 16, 2021

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Vice President Kamala Harris has said she will make climate change a priority of the National Space Council, expected to hold its first meeting of the Biden Administration this fall. (credit: White House photo by Cameron Smith)

The recently released Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change presents a worrying scientific consensus: climate change is happening, humans are causing it, even our best efforts cannot prevent negative effects, and reducing emissions now is essential to preventing catastrophic consequences. The Biden Administration recognizes the urgency of addressing this challenge. In continuing as head of the National Space Council, Vice President Kamala Harris has made climate one of her priorities for the interagency White House office. This prioritization rightly reflects the growing capabilities of the public and private space sectors to help our society understand, adapt, and mitigate climate change.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4230/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 17, 2021, 07:18
Starliner sidelined
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 16, 2021

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The Boeing CST-100 Starliner spacecraft in July, being prepared for the OFT-2 mission. That mission is now facing an indefinite delay because of problems with valves in its propulsion system. (credit: Boeing)

On the morning of July 29, NASA held a pair of press conferences that marked, in retrospect, the peak of their optimism about the upcoming uncrewed test flight of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft. At the first, agency leadership, including administrator Bill Nelson, talked up the Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 mission, scheduled at the time to lift off the next afternoon.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4231/1

Note: The Space Review will not publish the week of August 23. We will resume our normal weekly publication schedule on August 30.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 31, 2021, 12:50
Review: European-Russian Space Cooperation
by Gurbir Singh Monday, August 30, 2021

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European-Russian Space Cooperation: From de Gaulle to ExoMars

by Brian Harvey
Springer Praxis, 2021
Paperback 391 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-3-030-67684-1
US$34.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/3030676846/spaceviews

The Cold War was primarily the story of the USSR and the USA and their respective allies. By chronicling in meticulous detail European-Russian space cooperation, Brian Harvey has uncovered a strategic relationship between France and the USSR that modulated the larger USSR-USA Cold War relationship that dominated geopolitics between the end of World War II and demise of the USSR in 1991. It is not just about historical events. The final chapter illustrates the same geopolitical forces are at work shaping international cooperation in space today with the turbulent story of ExoMars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4232/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 31, 2021, 12:50
The billionaires compete and the US wins the 21st century space race
by Eytan Tepper Monday, August 30, 2021

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Richard Branson floats through the cabin of SpaceShipTwo during the microgravity phase of his July 11 SpaceShipTwo flight. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

Whoever is declared the winner in the so-called billionaire space race, the US wins the new space race. In the new era of space exploration, where commercial companies are taking the lead, they are mostly US-based. Symbolically, British billionaire Richard Branson, the first in space, launched from Spaceport America in New Mexico, where his company is based.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4233/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 31, 2021, 12:50
“Starship to orbit” ought to be a tipping point for policy makers
by Doug Plata Monday, August 30, 2021

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Construction workers between the stages of the Starship while undergoing a stacking test. (credit: SpaceX)

We are watching history in the making.

Starship represents a turning point in human history because it will be the vehicle upon which humans start spreading beyond Earth. When Starship reaches orbit, it will fundamentally bring into question which path forward the United States should take. Given the likelihood that a reusable, very cost-effective, super-heavy-lift vehicle (SHLV) with a high flight rate will become available for the nation to use, we call upon the decision makers in Washington (i.e., the administration, Congress, and NASA) to place Starship at the center of the country’s human spaceflight program after it achieves orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4234/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 31, 2021, 12:50
Cooperation, competition, conferences, and COVID
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 30, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4235a.jpg)
NASA administrator Bill Nelson (fourth from right) speaks during a panel featuring heads of agencies at the 36th Space Symposium August 25. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The largest in-person space event in nearly 18 months was a reminder of what had changed—and what hadn’t—in the industry over that time.

The 36th Space Symposium at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs last week looked, at first glance, like many of its predecessors. There were the usual government officials and industry executives speaking in sessions over three days, an exhibit hall with companies displaying their wares and offering tchotchkes, and side meetings and general networking that often went well into the evening.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4235/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 31, 2021, 12:51
The little satellite that could (part 2): from Triana to DSCOVR to orbit
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 30, 2021

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The DSCOVR satellite in October 2008 after spending seven years in storage. Originally named Triana, the satellite was renamed the Deep Space Climate Observatory in 2003. (credit: Phil Horzempa)

Triana had been dreamed up by Vice President Al Gore in 1998 and gone through a contentious development process. The original goal had been to launch it into orbit on a space shuttle mission in 2001. But by 2001, with Republican President George W. Bush in the White House, the program was grounded; funding was suspended a little over a week after the inauguration. Officially, NASA indicated that the space agency would eventually launch the spacecraft, which was intended for a unique orbit at the Lagrange 1 point where it would be able to view both the Earth and the Sun. But for the next eight years, NASA did not announce any launch plans, and what little news did emerge about the spacecraft was always followed with longer periods of silence and inactivity. Triana risked becoming what pilots often refer to as a “hangar queen,” sitting in storage, cannibalized for spare parts (see “The little satellite that could (part 1)”, The Space Review, August 16, 2021.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4236/1

Note:Because of the Labor Day holiday, next week’s issue will be published on Tuesday, September 7.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 08, 2021, 05:14
Review: The Red Planet
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4237a.jpg)

The Red Planet: A Natural History of Mars
by Simon Morden
Elliott & Thompson, 2021
hardcover, 240 pp.
ISBN 978-1-78396-561-4
US$20.64
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1783965614/spaceviews

Three rovers are traversing the rocky, red surface of Mars today. NASA’s Perseverance rover, which arrived in February, has collected its first sample, NASA announced late Monday, after an initial sampling attempt with another rock a month ago went awry when the rock turned to powder before it could be placed in a sample tube. Curiosity continues its ascent up Mount Sharp in Gale Crater, its instruments probing the changes in the terrain as is goes across different layers and different geological eras. China’s Zhurong rover, meanwhile, continues to explore its landing site after exceeding its planned three-month mission, although Chinese scientists have not offered many details about the rover’s scientific output so far.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4237/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 08, 2021, 05:14
The privatized frontier: the ethical implications and role of private companies in space exploration
by Maanas Sharma Tuesday, September 7, 2021

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NASA is relying on SpaceX to transport astronauts to the space station, one sign of a growing role for the private sector in spaceflight. (credit: SpaceX)

In recent years, private companies have taken on a larger role in the space exploration system. With lower costs and faster production times, they have displaced some functions of government space agencies. Though many have levied criticism against privatized space exploration, it also allows room for more altruistic actions by government space agencies and the benefits from increased space exploration as a whole. Thus, we should encourage this development, as the process is net ethical in the end. Especially if performed in conjunction with adequate government action on the topic, private space exploration can overcome possible shortcomings in its risky and capitalistic nature and ensure a positive contribution to the general public on Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4238/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 08, 2021, 05:14
Wizards redux: revisiting the P-11 signals intelligence satellites
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, September 7, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4239a.jpg)
One of the URSULA small signals intelligence satellites of the 1970s. A proposed upgrade was named “DRACULA,” for “Direct ReAdout URSULA,” but the name was rejected because a senior Air Force officer did not want to go to Washington and face jokes about “another blood-sucking program.” (credit: NRO)

September 2021 is the 60th anniversary of the establishment of the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). For the 50th anniversary, the NRO declassified two major Cold War era photo-reconnaissance satellites named HEXAGON and GAMBIT. Will the NRO do something similar this time? Those who follow the NRO’s history have heard rumors that they might declassify the KH-11 KENNEN near-real-time reconnaissance satellite that first flew in 1976, although that might be a bit of wishful thinking. (See “Intersections in real time: the decision to build the KH-11 KENNEN reconnaissance satellite,” The Space Review, September 9, 2019.) One small step the NRO could take is to finish the declassification of the P-11 signals intelligence satellites that were built and launched from 1963 to 1992.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4239/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 08, 2021, 05:15
The making of an Enterprise: How NASA, the Smithsonian and the aerospace industry helped create Star Trek
by Glen E. Swanson Tuesday, September 7, 2021

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The cast and production crew from Star Trek toured NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, California on April 13, 1967. Shown left to right are: Unknown NASA; actor James “Jimmy” Montgomery Doohan who played chief engineer Montgomery Scott or “Scotty;” Walter Matthew “Matt” Jefferies, Jr., art director and production designer for the series; Herbert Schlosser, who at that time, was head of NBC’s programming and oversaw Star Trek’s development during the network’s production of the series; Star’s Trek’s creator Gene Roddenberry; assistant director, production manager and associate producer Gregg Peters; series director Marc Daniels; assistant director and producer Robert “Bob” Harris Justman; actor Jackson DeForest Kelley who played chief medical officer Leonard “Bones” McCoy; director Joseph “Joe” Pevney; and unknown. Shown behind the cast is NASA’s HL-10 experimental lifting body. (credit: NASA)

This month marks the 55th anniversary of the premiere of Star Trek. On Thursday evening, September 8, 1966, beginning at 8:30 pm Eastern, households in the US tuned in to a new type of television show called Star Trek that featured the adventures of Captain Kirk, Mr. Spock, and the crew of the Starship U.S.S. Enterprise as they traveled throughout the galaxy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4240/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 08, 2021, 05:15
Small launch vehicles face their biggest test
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 7, 2021

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An explosion destroys Firefly Aerospace’s Alpha launch vehicle two and a half minutes into its first launch September 2. (credit: J. Foust)

Astrobiology has a concept known as the “Great Filter.” It is an attempt to explain why, despite the hundreds of billions of stars in our galaxy, there is currently no evidence of intelligent life beyond Earth. It argues that, somewhere in the progression of factors laid out in the Drake Equation six decades ago from the number of stars to the number of intelligent civilizations, there is a factor that greatly diminishes the prospects of intelligent life to exist.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4241/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 14, 2021, 03:05
Review: Asteroids
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 13, 2021

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Asteroids: How Love, Fear, and Greed Will Determine Our Future in Space
by Martin Elvis
Yale University Press, 2021
hardcover, 312 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-300-23192-2
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/030023192X/spaceviews

It’s been nearly a decade since the first great asteroid mining boom. Planetary Resources announced its plans to prospect and eventually extract resources from asteroids in 2012, followed months later by Deep Space Industries with similar ambitions. The companies raised millions of dollars from sources as diverse as Silicon Valley billionaires and the government of Luxembourg, and stimulated new laws in the United States and elsewhere to ensure they would have the right to own the resources they extracted. But, by the beginning of 2019 both were effectively out of business: Planetary Resources was acquired by a blockchain company, Consensys, which later shut it down, while Deep Space Industries, having pivoted to smallsat development, was acquired by Bradford Space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4242/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 14, 2021, 03:05
Thor the lifesaver?
by Ajay Kothari Monday, September 13, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4243a.jpg)
A model of a molten salt reactor which could use thorium to generate power, offering an alternative to space-based solar power.

Space-Based Solar Power (SBSP) is being touted as a solution to the climate change problem that is currently engaging humanity worldwide, and is apt to occupy this administration even more so in the future. While developing that technology, one should also bear in mind another potential solution that may be simpler, cheaper, and faster to implement, something that could be quicker to take advantage of while we wait for other solutions such as SBSP and controlled fusion. It may also have applications as a distributed power source on the lunar surface and later on Mars. Its potential application to rocket propulsion should also be determined, though is not the focus of this commentary.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4243/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 14, 2021, 03:05
The problem with space cowboys
by Layla Martin Monday, September 13, 2021

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Jeff Bezos, wearing a cowboy hat, walks across a platform to board the New Shepard suborbital vehicle on his July flight. (credit: Blue Origin)

The “space race” is a good thing. Why? Private-sector competition spurs innovation creating new jobs, substantial price cuts, and progress. Yes, but who is competing? The promise of new jobs to achieve what and based upon whose vision?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4244/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 14, 2021, 03:05
Paradigmatic shifts in space?
by Namrata Goswami Monday, September 13, 2021

Space policies of China and India: priorities, long-term focuses, and differences

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China is developing new launch vehicles, spacecraft, and space stations to demonstrate it is a leading nation. (credit: Xinhua)

Space has animated both China and India since ancient times, with mythology and folklore about what lay up there amongst the stars. Chinese mythology has given us folktales like that of Chang’e the Moon goddess, Tianwen or heavenly questions, and the Yuegong-1 or heavenly palace. For India, the mythology of space can be inferred from such ancient mythical invocations like the Navagraha (nine planets), the folklore around eclipses and the invisible planets, and Rahu and Ketu (astrological connotations), which by 499 AD resulted in mathematical calculations by Aryabhatta, and his study of solar and lunar eclipses. Aryabhatta correctly attributed the brightness of the Moon and planets as reflected sunlight. India’s first satellite that was launched in 1975 was named after him. The seven main stars of the cup shaped Ursa Major were viewed as the seven sages (सप्तर्षि-Saptarishi or saptarṣī) in Indian mythology. In Indian epics like Mahabharata (written on events about 5,000 to 3,000 years ago), topics ranging from philosophy, cosmology, statecraft, and ethics were discussed. Steven R. Weisman, writing in The New York Times on “Many Faces of the Mahabharatha”, specified:

Modern India is a country in which a lawyer and teacher will tell you with certainty that references to the cosmic weapons used by a hero in the Mahabharata intentionally prefigured the space-based Strategic Defense Initiative of President Reagan.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4245/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 14, 2021, 03:05
The great space company sale
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 13, 2021

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The Satellite 2021 exhibit hall included a wide range of companies, from major operators and manufacturers to small component suppliers. One CEO predicted the wave of newly public space companies will seek to acquire many of those suppliers. (credit: J. Foust)

The exhibit hall at last week’s Satellite 2021 conference in the suburbs of Washington, DC, was a little quiet. Some companies that normally exhibit at the show, one of the major conferences in the commercial space industry, elected to reduce their presence or not exhibit at all, either because of the timing of the conference—it normally takes place in the spring—or because of ongoing pandemic travel restrictions. There was, though, still an assortment of satellite operators, manufacturers, and suppliers of components and related services.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4246/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 21, 2021, 16:20
Review: The Wonderful
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 20, 2021

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The Wonderful: Stories from the Space Station
directed by Clare Lewins
2021, 127 mins., not rated
https://www.thewonderfulfilm.com/

The International Space Station, over its more than two decades of continuous occupation, has become something of an institution. Having shifted a decade ago from assembly to full-fledged operations, discussions about the station have focused on getting people to and from the station, the research that goes on there, its upkeep, and, most recently, what its long-term future will be (see “What is the future of the International Space Station?”, The Space Review, this issue.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4247/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 21, 2021, 16:20
Astrofeminism as a theory of change: save our planet, not escape from it
by Layla Martin Monday, September 20, 2021

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JAstrofeminism offers a different perspective for looking at spaceflight through different priorities and different participants.

Do you have a $55 million slush fund for a joyride up to the International Space Station (ISS)? Does a settler’s ticket to Mars include a fridge stocked with groceries and someone to feed the dog and help with homework for my family here on Earth? The macho space invasion is seriously lacking a critical assessment and careful consideration of implications. As in, what are some of the costs? Not the price but the cost.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4248/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 21, 2021, 16:20
What is the future of the International Space Station?
by Roger Handberg Monday, September 20, 2021

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Commercial space station modules and standalong space stations, like what Axiom Space is proposing to develop, may represent the future after the ISS, but that transition remains uncertain. (credit: Axiom Space)

Time is not a friend for the International Space Station. American efforts to extend its closing until 2030 possibly beyond are dependent upon evaluations of its continued safety and integrity. Materials in space age under the stresses of the space environment and deteriorate over time. Yet, evaluating the possible future for the ISS will not be strictly based upon technical factors. The states participating in the ISS all pursue various agendas. For most, being on the ISS is only part of their space portfolio, albeit a large one in many cases. So, ending the ISS and deorbiting the structure is a dramatic shift in direction for them, especially if terminated earlier than projected. What would replace that endeavor remains unclear.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4249/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 21, 2021, 16:20
An inspiration for private human spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 20, 2021

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The Crew Dragon spacecraft Resilience moments before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean to complete the Inspiration4 mission. (credit: SpaceX)

The “billionaire space race” this summer was billed as a competition between Blue Origin’s Jeff Bezos and Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson for who would be the first to go to space in their companies’ suborbital vehicles. Branson won that race, going to the fringes of space on SpaceShipTwo nine days before Bezos on New Shepard. But the real winner of the billionaire space race, though, might be someone most people in the space industry hadn't heard of before February of this year.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4250/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 28, 2021, 11:01
Review: Diary of an Apprentice Astronaut
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 27, 2021

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Diary of an Apprentice Astronaut
by Samantha Cristoforetti
The Experiment, 2021
paperback, 400 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-61519-842-9
US$17.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1615198423/spaceviews

Next spring, a SpaceX Crew Dragon will launch to the International Space Station on the Crew-4 mission. Among the astronauts on board will be the European Space Agency’s Samantha Cristoforetti, making her second trip to the station. Later in the year she will become commander of ISS Expedition 68, as one might expect for a veteran astronaut like her.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4251/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 28, 2021, 11:01
Covid and Mars
by Frank Stratford Monday, September 27, 2021

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The changes in society caused by the pandemic may make human missions to Mars more likely. (credit: SpaceX)

In July 1969, the first two humans walked on the surface of the Moon after a decade of breakthrough developments that proved to be both incredibly costly in dollar terms and lives lost. Yet history was made 52 years ago in a time of international crisis and war. The computing systems that enabled these voyages of discovery were barely enough to power a modern calculator. So many factors argued against the success of the Apollo program at the time it seems impossible to our minds today.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4252/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 28, 2021, 11:01
Criticism of space cowboys isn’t enough
by Blake Horn Monday, September 27, 2021

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Jeff Bezos, founder of Blue Origin, celebrates after his suborbital spaceflight on New Shepard July 20. (credit: Blue Origin)

Anyone who has ever looked up at the night sky can attest to the mesmerising effect of space. Of being blinded by emptiness, by scale, by possibility. The desire to reach, and to understand, what lies beyond our planet is the closest thing to a universal human goal that we are ever likely to have.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4253/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 28, 2021, 11:02
Two directorate heads are better than one
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 27, 2021

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Kathy Luders (right), who now runs the Space Operations Mission Directorate, speaks with Jim Free, the new head of the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, at a town hall meeting September 21. (credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

In August 2011, weeks after the end of the final shuttle mission, NASA reorganized the management of its human spaceflight programs. It merged the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, which had been responsible for the Constellation program and now had what remained, the Orion spacecraft and the congressionally mandated Space Launch System, with the Space Operations Mission Directorate, which had the shuttle and continued to have the International Space Station. The combined organization would be known as Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate, or HEOMD.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4254/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 05, 2021, 07:23
Review: Countdown
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021

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Countdown: Inspiration4 Mission to Space
directed by Jason Hehir
Netflix, 2021
Five episodes, 244 minutes
Rated TV-14
https://www.netflix.com/pl/title/81441273

A new era of commercial human spaceflight means a new era in media relations—and also, perhaps, a return to the earliest days of the Space Age. When Blue Origin conducted its first crewed New Shepard suborbital flight in July, Jeff Bezos and crewmates performed a handful of television interviews the day before the flight and immediately after landing. But, at a post-flight event billed to attending journalists as a press conference, he took questions from just three reporters before moving on. Virgin Galactic, at its flight earlier that month, did take more questions from reporters during a half-hour press conference after its SpaceShipTwo flight. However, it kept journalists at a distance from other attendees earlier in the morning at Spaceport America, even going as far as having a security guard shoo away any guests who had wandered over to the fence separating them from the media section to willingly chat with reporters.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4255/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 05, 2021, 07:23
Inspiration4 sent four people with minimal training to orbit and brought space tourism closer to reality
by Wendy Whitman Cobb Monday, October 4, 2021

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The Crew Dragon spacecraft Resilience moments before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean to complete the Inspiration4 mission. (credit: SpaceX)

Just after 8:00 pm EDT September 15, the latest batch of space tourists lifted off aboard a SpaceX rocket. Organized and funded by entrepreneur Jared Isaacman, the Inspiration4 mission touts itself as “the first all-civilian mission to orbit” and represents a new type of space tourism (see “An inspiration for private human spaceflight”, The Space Review, September 20, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4256/1 20, 2021).
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 05, 2021, 07:24
Resilience and space situational awareness: an interview with NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021

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Mike Hopkins signs his name next to the patch for the Crew-1 mission on the International Space Station in April, near the end of his six-month stay there. (credit: NASA)

When the Crew Dragon spacecraft was making its second trip to space last month on the Inspiration4 mission, the commander of the spacecraft’s first flight was in Hawaii, but not on a well-earned vacation.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4257/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 05, 2021, 07:24
Five big questions about the International Space Station becoming a movie set
by Alice Gorman Monday, October 4, 2021

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Actress Yulia Peresild (left) and director Klim Shipenko (right) will spend nearly two weeks on the ISS this month to film a movie, launching with Roscosmos cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov (center). (credit: Roscosmos)

On October 5, an unusual crew will fly to the International Space Station. Director Klim Shipenko and actor Yulia Peresild will spend a week and a half on the station shooting scenes for the Russian movie Challenge. Peresild plays a surgeon who must conduct a heart operation on a sick cosmonaut.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4258/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 12, 2021, 07:07
Review: Asteroids
by Thomas E. Simmons Monday, October 11, 2021

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Asteroids
by Clifford J. Cunningham
Reaktion Books, 2021
hardcover, 190 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-78914-358-4
US$40
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1789143586/spaceviews

The strength of Asteroids lies in its historical studies. The primary thrust of the author’s previous scholarship has also been similarly situated. Thus, the personalities and quirks of 19th and 20th century astronomers take center stage.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4259/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 12, 2021, 07:07
The UK looks for its place in space
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 11, 2021

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UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson at Spaceport Cornwall, the future UK base of Virgin Orbit, in June. Enabling British launch vehicles and spaceports is one element of a broader national space strategy unveiled last month. (credit: Virgin Orbit)

It was a line that launched a thousand jokes. When the British government released a national space strategy document September 27, it included a foreword from Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who decided to riff off the concept the government had been pushing of a “Global Britain” in the post-Brexit era.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4260/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 12, 2021, 07:07
Lollipops and ASATs
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 11, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4261a.jpg)
Discoverer 28, which carried a CORONA reconnaissance camera, also had two AFTRACK payloads located forward of the Agena upper stage engine. One was for detecting Soviet air defense radars. The other, known as STOPPER, was to detect if the satellite was being tracked in orbit. “Vulnerability payloads” like STOPPER were carried on many American reconnaissance satellites during the 1960s and into the 1970s. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection)

Although most of the secret satellites launched by the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) in the 1960s have now been declassified, there are very few photos of the completed spacecraft preparing for launch. Except for a few photos of early CORONA satellites being readied for launch at Vandenberg Air Force Base, there is almost nothing else, even though we would expect at least a few to have been released by now. The reason may be due to systems that the CIA and NRO added to the satellites to protect them from anti-satellite attack. The CIA was worried about possible attack on reconnaissance satellites from the beginning, and some information on early “vulnerability payloads” has been declassified, but there are also hints that as the Soviet ASAT threat grew, so did efforts to protect American reconnaissance satellites that would have been their obvious targets.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4261/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 12, 2021, 07:07
Aerostat: a Russian long-range anti-ballistic missile system with possible counterspace capabilities
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, October 11, 2021

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The MIT Corporation is the manufacturer of the Aerostat missile. Composite image showing MIT’s headquarters in Moscow and one of its road-mobile ICBMs. (Source)

Russia has been working for several years on a long-range anti-ballistic missile system named Aerostat. The fact that it is being developed by the country’s sole manufacturer of solid-fuel intercontinental ballistic missiles suggests that it may very well have a range allowing it to double as a counterspace system. The oddly named ABM system (“aerostat” is a general term for unpowered balloons and airships) has never been mentioned in the Russian press or openly discussed by Russian military analysts, but its existence and basic design features can be determined through open-source intelligence.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4262/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 19, 2021, 10:01
Grimes and space communes
by Layla Martin Monday, October 18, 2021

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When Grimes talkes about space communes, should we take her less serious than when Elon Musk talks about cities on Mars? (credit: Twitter @Grimezsz)

I kept a copy of the Communist Manifesto in the freezer when I lived in Los Feliz. It served as a reminder to slow down and consider the preferences of rational decision makers. Like agreeing to your third margarita in Bangkok, some ideas are good in theory but not in practice. Information asymmetry, and too much tequila, may both lead to epic failures.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4263/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 19, 2021, 10:02
The Indian Space Association seeks to broaden commercial interests
by Ajey Lele Monday, October 18, 2021

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At present, the Indian satellite industry is around 2% of the $360 billion global market. However, India wants to make it big. Can India do it? Does India having the technological base to make a difference? Or is India becoming overambitious and trying to punch above its own weight?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4264/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 19, 2021, 10:02
Black ugliness and the covering of blue: William Shatner’s suborbital flight to “death”
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, October 18, 2021

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A photo 53 years in the making. Left is a clip showing Captain Kirk (center) on the bridge of the U.S.S. Enterprise from the original Star Trek third season episode “Spock’s Brain” which first aired in 1968. To the right is William Shatner looking out at the Earth from space while onboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard spacecraft on October 13, 2021. Photos courtesy CBS and Blue Origin. Photomontage by Kipp Teague and Karl Tate.

Is outer space a horrifying place? It depends on whom you ask. As seen from Earth, clear nights with the Moon, Venus, and the Milky Way ablaze make space seem like a beautiful, unreachable dream. Horror movies, on the other hand, populate the celestial reaches with terrifying aliens that kill human beings or use us to nefarious ends. Most astronauts speak of the beauty of space, especially the gorgeous vision of Earth, whether seen from the Moon or from a much closer orbit. Few have spoken of space as “death,” the way William Shatner put it upon his return from his Blue Origin flight on October 13, 2021.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4265/1


Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 19, 2021, 10:02
The normalization of space tourism
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 18, 2021

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The New Shepard crew capsule descends under parachutes near the end of the NS-18 flight last week in West Texas. (credit: Blue Origin)

For a brief moment last Wednesday, there were two professional actors in space at the same time.

On the International Space Station, Russian actress Yulia Peresild was filming scenes for a Russian movie called Vyzov, or Challenge, where she plays a doctor sent to the station to perform surgery on a cosmonaut too ill to return to Earth. Klim Shipenko accompanied her to the station, with actual Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy reportedly playing the role of the ailing cosmonaut (see “Five big questions about the International Space Station becoming a movie set”, The Space Review, October 4, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4266/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 19, 2021, 10:02
The Artemis Accords after one year of international progress
by Paul Stimers and Audrey Jammes Monday, October 18, 2021

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Peter Crabtree, head of the New Zealand Space Agency, and Charge d’Affaires Kevin Cover of the US Embassy in New Zealand pose following an Artemis Accords signing ceremony in May. New Zealand was 11th country to join the Accords. (credit: NASA)

NASA’s Artemis program, which will send the first woman and the first person of color to the Moon, is being closely watched by the rest of the world. The program’s success or failure will answer important questions with strategic implications for US leadership here on Earth: can the United States still achieve great things? Can it still lead by developing international consensus? Can it maintain a long-term effort despite political changes? Can it be a more compelling partner for space exploration than China?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4267/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 26, 2021, 14:28
Review: Back to Earth
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 25, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4268a.jpg)

Back to Earth: What Life in Space Taught Me About Our Home Planet—And Our Mission to Protect It
by Nicole Stott Seal Press, 2021
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5416-7504-9
US$30
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1541675045/spaceviews

Most people in the space industry have heard of the Overview Effect, the change in perspective about the Earth that comes from seeing it from space. It got renewed attention earlier this month when William Shatner went on a Blue Origin suborbital spaceflight, and talked about the experience for what seemed like longer than the flight itself (see “Black ugliness and the covering of blue: William Shatner’s suborbital flight to ‘death’”, The Space Review, October 18, 2021). The topic is likely to come up among some of the astronaut panels at this week’s International Astronautical Congress in Dubai as well.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4268/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 26, 2021, 14:28
How space tourism could affect older people
by Nick Caplan and Christopher Newman
Monday, October 25, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4269a.jpg)
Is space really the final frontier? William Shatner has found out after boldly going where no 90-year-old has gone before. Some 55 years after Captain James T. Kirk hit our screens in the original Star Trek, Shatner recently launched to the edge of space aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard for a ten-minute suborbital flight (see “The normalization of space tourism”, The Space Review, October 18, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4269/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 26, 2021, 14:29
Is outer space a de jure common-pool resource?
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, October 25, 2021

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The scarcity of lunar resources like volatiles illustrates the need to deconflict activities on the Moon in a way that is acceptable by all participants. (credit: NASA)

As 2021 comes to a close, humanity is facing a historical crisis, when just a slight change will lead to widely different futures. The closest parallel occurred five centuries ago, when countries with advanced technology sought to exploit the resources of “new” worlds. The resulting Age of Imperialism was marked by needless war, suffering, and neglect, whose effects are still being felt today. How close are we to repeating that pattern? What role can space law play in avoiding it?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4270/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 26, 2021, 14:29
The battle for Boca Chica
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 25, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4271a.jpg)
SpaceX is continuing preparations for orbital launches of its Starship/Super Heavy vehicle at Boca Chica, Texas, also called “Starbase”, as the FAA continues its environmental review. (credit: SpaceX)

Few companies in the space industry are as polarizing as SpaceX, and few projects are as polarizing as its Starship vehicle. To advocates, it is humanity’s best hope to become a multiplanetary species, to use the phase frequently invoked by both the company and its supporters. To others, Starship is a high-risk venture, not just for the company and the space industry but also to the people and environment in the corner of Texas where it is being built.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4271/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 26, 2021, 14:29
Engineering the arts for space: developing the concept of “mission laureates”
by Christopher Cokinos Monday, October 25, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4272a.jpg)
NASA’s best-known links to arts is through an arts program that included works by artists like Andy Warhol, but there’s an opportunity to expand the scope of that partnership. (credit: Andy Warhol)

The arts have long been engaged with the night sky, astronomy, and, more recently, with space programs. Consider, in the latter case, NASA’s famed fine arts program that placed painters and illustrators such as Norman Rockwell and Robert Rauschenberg in the middle of launch facilities, training centers and recovery zones. There is a long tradition of “space art,” first popularized by Chesley Bonestell. Fine arts photographers, such as Michael Light, have given their craft over to space imagery. Many writers have turned their attention to space; in the modern era, consider Oriana Fallaci or Margaret Lazarus Dean. As co-editor of Beyond Earth’s Edge: The Poetry of Spaceflight, I know that poets have responded vigorously—if not always enthusiastically—to the Space Age.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4272/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Adam.Przybyla w Październik 26, 2021, 19:31
.. jednym slowem, kazda misja powinna miec swojego ... Cacofonix-a :) Z powazaniem
                                                                                                                            Adam Przybyla
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 02, 2021, 16:14
Strategic geographical points in outer space
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, November 1, 2021

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Spaceports like Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and the Kennedy Space Center could serve as choke points for space, given the relatively small number of such facilities and their vulnerability to a wider range of threats. (credit: NASA)

Geography has long been a critical factor influencing national strategy, playing a vital role in both international politics and military planning. Captured in history’s stories are countless examples of how geography shaped everything from economics and trade to military conflict. While space can appear both abstract and intimidating, traditional studies of strategy and geography can be successfully applied to the space domain. For example, Halford Mackinder’s heartland theory and Nicholas Spykman’s rimland theory claim that controlling the heartland or rimland, respectively, is the key to controlling the world. The central tenet—states that best understand how to exploit geography create decisive advantages—applies equally well to strategic geographical points in the space domain.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4273/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 02, 2021, 16:14
How a small, distant space telescope can solve astrophysical mysteries big ones can’t
by Michael Zemcov Monday, November 1, 2021

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A small telescope could be incorporated on future missions to the outer solar system and beyond, such as the proposed Interstellar Probe. (credit: JHUAPL)

Dozens of space-based telescopes operate near Earth and provide incredible images of the universe. But imagine a telescope far away in the outer solar system, 10 or even 100 times farther from the Sun than Earth. The ability to look back at our solar system or peer into the darkness of the distant cosmos would make this a uniquely powerful scientific tool.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4274/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 02, 2021, 16:14
Will SpaceX follow Tesla to a $1 trillion market capitalization?
by Sam Dinkin Monday, November 1, 2021

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Starship could enable new business opportunities for SpaceX that could cause its valuation of $100 billion today to grow to $1 trillion or more. (credit: SpaceX)

SpaceX is readying its first test of Starship and Super Heavy, where Starship will splash down about 90 minutes after takeoff 84% of the Earth’s circumference around the world to the east near Kauai. Like launching Elon Musk’s old Tesla roadster beyond Mars orbit, this may result in further proof that Starship may soon reduce the price of access to low Earth orbit substantially more than Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy already have. With its 100-tonne capacity in reusable mode according to its user guide, or 136 tonnes “when fully optimized” and 227 tonnes in expendable mode, according to Musk in a tweet, it has the potential to increase global launch capacity by a giant leap. That would be especially true if Elon Musk devotes his possibly soon-to-be trillion-plus net worth to building extra Starships to settle Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4275/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 02, 2021, 16:14
The commercial space station race
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 1, 2021

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Nanoracks, Voyager Space, and Lockheed Martin are cooperating on a commercial space station called Starlab that could be operational as soon as 2027. (credit: Nanoracks)

The International Astronautical Congress (IAC) returned last week after the pandemic forced last year’s event to move online. An estimated 5,000 people traveled to Dubai for the usual panel discussions and technical sessions on a wide range of space topics.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4276/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 11, 2021, 07:55
Review: Holdout
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 8, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4277a.jpg)

Holdout: A Novel
by Jeffrey Kluger
Dutton, 2021
hardcover, 352 pp.
ISBN 978-0-593-18469-1
US$26.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0593184696/spaceviews

NASA astronauts have, by and large, been pretty well behaved on their missions over six decades of spaceflight. Only a few cases stand out, including the disagreements between Apollo 7 commander Wally Schirra and ground controllers on their mission and the so-called “strike” by the crew of the third and final Skylab mission in late 1973 (which, a NASA historical review noted last year, didn’t actually happen.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4277/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 11, 2021, 07:55
Witch-hunts, power, and privilege from Salem to the stars
by Layla Martin Monday, November 8, 2021

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“Space Witch,” an NFT created by the author ©2021

And, stating that sounds absurd. Why don’t we apply that same notion of absurdity to the idea of witches here on Earth? Witches and witch-hunts are an accepted, even celebrated, phenomena below the Kármán line. Yet, in reality there are no witches here on Earth and never have been.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4278/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 11, 2021, 07:55
For private space travelers, questions of vistas and titles
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 8, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4279a.jpg)
Private astronaut Chris Boshuizen, Emirati astronaut Hazzaa AlMansoori, and NASA astronaut Jessica Meir during a panel of astronauts at the International Astronautical Congress in Dubai October 29. (credit: J. Foust)

One of the selling points of commercial human spaceflight has been the ability to see the Earth from space, including the prospect of the Overview Effect: the shift in perspective that many astronauts have reported experiencing. But would a brief suborbital flight, spending only minutes in space, be long enough to trigger that effect in people?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4279/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 11, 2021, 07:55
Boldly insure where no one has gone
by Christopher McKeon, Ann Satovich, McKay Simmons, Christopher O’Connor and Brad Barger Monday, November 8, 2021

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The growth of satellite constellations and other commercial space activities create new opportunities, and new risks, for insurers. (credit: OneWeb)

Space today has become big business that will only expand thanks to the excitement and focus driven by the likes of Bezos, Branson, and Musk.

In the last decade, the space sector has seen more than 50% growth in commercial space initiatives. The commercial portion of the space ecosystem saw $200 billion of investment in 1,500 companies.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4280/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 16, 2021, 10:41
Review: Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 15, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4281a.jpg)

Bright Galaxies, Dark Matter, and Beyond: The Life of Astronomer Vera Rubin
by Ashley Jean Yeager
MIT Press, 2021
hardcover, 256pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-262-04612-1
US$24.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262046121/spaceviews

For several years a major new observatory has been taking shape on a mountaintop in Chile. The 8.4-meter telescope is designed to survey the entire sky visible from the site every few nights, collecting images with a 3.2-gigapixel camera. For much of its development, the observatory was known by the descriptive, if inelegant, name of Large Synoptic Survey Telescope, or LSST. Two years ago, though, an act of Congress renamed the telescope the Vera C. Rubin Observatory.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4281/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 16, 2021, 10:41
An assessment of EU decarbonization options including astroelectricity
by Mike Snead
Monday, November 15, 2021

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The recent COP26 climate change conference saw numerous pledges to decarbonize energy systems, but how feasible are they with current alternative energy sources? (credit: UN)

The European Union (EU), comprised of 27 countries with a total 2019 population of 446.4 million people, is ambitiously hoping to become a climate neutral continent by 2050. From an energy security perspective, decarbonization—meaning the general end of the use of fossil carbon fuels—is a wise policy given the likely end of middle-class affordable fossil carbon fuel supplies in the coming decades. (I first wrote about this in 2008 in The End of Easy Energy and What to Do About It.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4282/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 16, 2021, 10:41
Musk versus Bezos: a real rivalry or a fake feud?
by Ben Little
Monday, November 15, 2021

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Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are viewed as heated rivals in space, but how much of that public posturing is real? (credit: Blue Origin (left) and NASA/Bill Ingalls (right))

Flick through a news feed on your phone and you are likely to scroll across an article discussing the heated rivalries of the new space race. Forget the geopolitical struggles of a cold war. This time, it’s Tesla CEO Elon Musk versus Amazon founder Jeff Bezos: the two richest men in the world duking it out over whether SpaceX or Blue Origin, their respective companies, will be the dominant force in the new industry of private spaceflight.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4283/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 16, 2021, 10:42
Resetting Artemis
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 15, 2021

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NASA and SpaceX can move ahead with their HLS contract after a half year of legal delays that NASA said contributed to tis decision to push back the Artemis 3 mission to no earlier than 2025. (credit: SpaceX)

There are rarely slow weeks at SpaceX, but last week was certainly was not one of them. The company started the week bringing back a Crew Dragon spacecraft from the International Space Station with four astronauts on board who spent more than six months in space. Less than 48 hours after that Crew Dragon splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico, another Crew Dragon launched on a Falcon 9 from the Kennedy Space Center, delivering a new group of four astronauts to the station within 24 hours of liftoff. Early Saturday, a Falcon 9 lifted off from a nearby pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, placing 53 Starlink satellites in orbit. And, amid all that activity in Florida, the company performed a brief static fire of the six Raptor engines in its first orbital Starship vehicle at Boca Chica, Texas, another step towards a launch some time next year.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4284/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 23, 2021, 15:19
Review: The Greatest Adventure
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 22, 2021

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The Greatest Adventure: A History of Human Space Exploration
by Colin Burgess
Reaktion Books, 2021
hardcover, 368 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-78914-460-4
US$40.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1789144604/spaceviews

There is no shortage of books about human spaceflight. Many dive deep into details about specific programs or missions, or offer biographies (or autobiographies) of those who have flown in space and others than enabled such flights. Nonetheless, there is still a place for an overall history of the subject, one that spans decades of activity to both provide an introduction to newcomers and to put such activities into a broader context.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4285/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 23, 2021, 15:19
Risk, teamwork, and opportunity: the tale of a Soyuz abort
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 22, 2021

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NASA’s Nick Hague (left) and Roscosmos’s Alexey Ovchinin discuss their Soyuz MS-10 abort at the International Astronautical Congress in Dubai October 27. (credit: J. Foust)

The annual International Astronautical Congress (IAC) is a sprawling event, often with dozens of parallel tracks of technical paper presentations or panel discussions. With so much going on over the course of a week and a sometimes confusion alphanumeric notation system for tracks—is this session A2.7 or A7.2?—it’s easy to miss out on some interesting presentations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4286/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 23, 2021, 15:20
Tracking unknown satellites
by Charles Phillips and Mykola Kulichenko Monday, November 22, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3926a.jpg)
Some satellites appear in one catalog but not in another, while the identity of others is unknown. (credit: ESA)

Tracking satellites used to be something that only large organizations could do, but today enthusiastic amateurs track many satellites. But to track many of the more interesting satellites it helps to have an observatory with professional support. This is the story of how some people are doing just that, and the contribution to safety in space that they are making.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4287/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 23, 2021, 15:20
After another ASAT test, will governments finally take action?
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 22, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4288a.jpg)
A simulation of the intercept of the Cosmos 1408 satellite by a Russian ASAT missile in the November 15 test. (credit: COMSPOC)

On November 12, a group of companies and organizations announced an initiative to address the growing population of satellites and debris in orbit, unaware that their efforts were just days away from being undone.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4288/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 30, 2021, 11:33
Review: To Boldly Go
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 29, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4289a.jpg)

To Boldly Go: Leadership, Strategy, and Conflict in the 21st Century and Beyond
by Jonathan Klug and Steven Leonard (eds.)
Casemate, 2021
hardcover, 304 pp.
ISBN 978-1-63624-062-6
US$34.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1636240623/spaceviews

Science fiction’s role in shaping the Space Age has long been appreciated. Countless scientists and engineers have cited the inspiration provided by science fiction novels, movies, and TV shows to pursue careers in the industry and work on spacecraft, launch vehicles, and other technologies linked to those accounts. But besides that inspiration—and, of course, entertainment—is there anything else science fiction can offer?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4289/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 30, 2021, 11:34
Space law hasn’t been changed since 1967, but the UN aims to update laws and keep space peaceful
by Michelle L.D. Hanlon and Greg Autry Monday, November 29, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4288a.jpg)
A simulation of the intercept of the Cosmos 1408 satellite by a Russian ASAT missile in the November 15 test. (credit: COMSPOC)

On November 15, Russia destroyed one of its own old satellites using a missile launched from the surface of the Earth, creating a massive debris cloud that threatens many space assets, including astronauts onboard the International Space Station (see “After another ASAT test, will governments finally take action?”, The Space Review, November 22, 2021). This happened only two weeks after the United Nations General Assembly First Committee formally recognized the vital role that space and space assets play in international efforts to better the human experience – and the risks military activities in space pose to those goals.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4290/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 30, 2021, 11:34
How America wins the future
by Frank Slazer Monday, November 29, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4291a.jpg)
Vice President Kamala Harris, seen here speaking at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center November 5, will lead the administration’s first National Space Council meeting this week. (credit: NASA/Taylor Mickal)

On December 1, Vice President Kamala Harris will convene the Biden Administration’s first meeting of the National Space Council in Washington. The gathering will provide an opportunity for Harris to refine the Biden Administration’s priorities for space, especially for NASA.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4291/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 30, 2021, 11:34
A new approach to flagship space telescopes
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 29, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4292a.jpg)
The astrophysics decadal survey recommended a scaled-down version of a space telescope concept called LUVOIR as the first in a line of flagship space observatories to be developed over the next few decades. (credit: NASA/GSFC

For much of this year, the biggest puzzle for astrophysicists had nothing to do with dark matter, dark energy, or discrepancies in the value of the Hubble Constant. Instead, the question at the top of their minds was: when was Astro2020 coming out?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4292/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 07, 2021, 21:50
Space at Expo 2020
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4293a.jpg)
A full-sized replica of a Falcon 9 first stage stands next to the US pavilion at Expo 2020 Dubai. (credit: J. Foust)

For some people, trapped in a pandemic-induced time warp, it’s seemed like it’s been 2020 since last March. Sometimes, though, it’s still officially 2020, like the Summer Olympics in Tokyo that were still officially called the 2020 Games even though they were delayed a year. Likewise, Expo 2020 Dubai, the modern-day version of the world’s fair, retained the 2020 name even though its opening was delayed a year to the start of this October.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4293/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 07, 2021, 21:50
A new era of planetary exploration: what we discovered on the far side of the Moon
by Iraklis Giannakis Monday, December 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4294a.jpg)
Data from China’s Yutu-2 rover is helping scientists understand the structure below the surface of the Moon. (credit: CLEP)

Seven months after it was launched, the US robotic rover Perseverance successfully landed on Mars on February 18. The landing was part of the Mars 2020 mission and was viewed live by millions of people worldwide, reflecting the renewed global interest in space exploration. It was soon followed by China’s Tianwen-1, an interplanetary Mars mission consisting of an orbiter, lander and rover called Zhurong.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4294/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 07, 2021, 21:50
How to clarify human futures beyond Earth
by Joe Carroll Monday, December 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4295a.jpg)
Figure 1. Surface gravity clustering in our solar system

Figure 1 above shows a remarkable coincidence: clustering of surface gravity levels in our solar system. All bodies with 9% to 250% of Earth gravity cluster near Earth, Mars, or Moon gravity. Those 3 gravity levels seem like the only levels available for us to live in this solar system. I stumbled onto this only after 34 years in aerospace. [1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4295/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 07, 2021, 21:50
A Biden space policy take shape
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 6, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4296a.jpg)
Vice President Kamala Harris gives opening remarks at the National Space Council meeting December 1. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

Every presidential administration, through its actions (and, sometimes, inaction) puts its stamp on space policy. The Trump Administration directed NASA to return humans to the Moon in an accelerated fashion and supported the establishment of the Space Force. The Obama Administration cancelled the Constellation program but started the commercial crew program. So, what would the Biden Administration do?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4296/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 14, 2021, 11:13
Review: The Apollo Murders
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 13, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4297a.jpg)

The Apollo Murders
by Chris Hadfield
Mulholland Books, 2021
hardcover, 480 pp.
ISBN 978-0-316-26453-2
US$28.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0316264539/spaceviews

It’s not uncommon for retired astronauts to take pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard, and write a book. Most are memoirs about how they became astronauts and highlights of astronaut careers. Some turn their attention to other topics, like spaceflight or issues related to or inspired by it. A few even try their hand at fiction, like Buzz Aldrin, who teamed with John Barnes for the sci-fi novels Encounter with Tiber and The Return.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4297/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 14, 2021, 11:13
Who was missing at COP26 and why it’s a problem
by Layla Martin
Monday, December 13, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4298c.jpg)
Sustainable Cities winner: Net-zero Transition Photobioreactor, by Simone Tramonte, taken in ReykjanesbĂŚr, Iceland. A photobioreactor at Algalif’s facilities in Reykjanesbaer, Iceland, produces sustainable astaxanthin using clean geothermal energy. Featured at The New York Times Climate Hub, Glasgow (2021).

I attended the United Nations Climate Conference (COP26) this November in Glasgow and observed a lack of participation from the aerospace & defense (A&D) sector. I am in possession of the COP26 attendee list, which is 1,616 pages long. After cross-checking the attendee list, I was unable to confirm any representatives from The Boeing Company, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon Technologies, Virgin Orbit, and SpaceX in attendance at the climate summit. After individually reviewing the physical materials I gathered at the conference against the corporate sponsors, I was unable to confirm one of the preceding A&D companies sponsored COP26. If corporate sponsorship was considered “too green” by the board, why were employees with titles such as “Director of Sustainability” not listed on the roster at COP26?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4298/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 14, 2021, 11:13
Private space stations are coming. Will they be better than their predecessors?
by Justin St. P. Walsh and Alice Gorman Monday, December 13, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4299a.jpg)
A Northrop Grumman concept for a commercial space station is one of three that won NASA funding for studies earlier this month. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

A new era of space stations is about to kick off. NASA has announced three commercial space station proposals for development, joining an earlier proposal by Axiom Space.

These proposals are the first attempts to create places for humans to live and work in space outside the framework of government space agencies. They’re part of what has been called “Space 4.0”, where space technology is driven by commercial opportunities. Many believe this is what it will take to get humans to Mars and beyond.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4299/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 14, 2021, 11:13
Private human spaceflight become more regular, but not routine
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 13, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4300a.jpg)
The crew capsule of Blue Origin’s New Shepard vehicle descends during the NS-19 mission December 11. (credit: Blue Origin)

In the end, the FAA decided to declare victory and go home.

On Friday, the FAA announced that it would retire its Commercial Astronaut Wings program at the end of this year. The program started in 2004 but, after awarding the first wings to SpaceShipOne pilots Mike Melvill and Brian Binnie that year, it was dormant until 2019, when five SpaceShipTwo crew members got wings for two suborbital flights of that vehicle.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4300/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 21, 2021, 16:32
Review: 50 Years of Solar System Exploration
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 20, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4301a.jpg)

50 Years of Solar System Exploration: Historical Perspectives
by Linda Billings (ed.)
NASA, 2021
ebook, 352 pp., illus.
NASA SP-2021-4705
Free
https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/50-years-of-solar-system-exploration.html

Some projects take a while: ask those involved with the James Webb Space Telescope, finally launching later this week (barring any last-minute issues) after many years of delays. Even books about space projects can take time to complete. NASA released earlier this month 50 Years of Solar System Exploration, a collection of essays on various topics of NASA’s planetary science program. The book stems from a conference to mark the 50th anniversary of NASA’s first mission to another planet, the Mariner 2 flyby of Venus in 1962. That conference took place in 2012, or nine years ago. Next year will mark the 60th anniversary of that mission.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4301/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 21, 2021, 16:32
Growing the global space community: onboarding spacefaring nations
by Cody Knipfer Monday, December 20, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4302a.jpg)
England’s Spaceport Cornwall, located at Cornwall Airport Newquay, plans to start hosting Virgin Orbit LauncherOne missions as soon as 2022. (credit: Spaceport Cornwall)

The space sector is truly going global. The massive influx of private investment into the commercial space sector over the past decade is no longer centered on the United States space startups are now a common fixture of the space ecosystem in regions such as Europe and Asia. Recognizing the many benefits that space capabilities provide, more and more countries across the world are actively developing robust domestic space sectors of their own: standing up dedicated space agencies, crafting forward-looking space strategies, and initiating work on a variety of new space projects.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4302/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 21, 2021, 16:32
For JWST, the launch is only the beginning of the drama
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 20, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4303a.jpg)
The Ariane 5 payload fairing is lowered into position around the James Webb Space Telescope last week ahead of its Christmas Eve launch. (credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace)

It’s finally here. A wait once measured in years and months is now best calibrated in days, a moment many in the space community wondered would ever arrive.

On Friday morning—yes, Christmas Eve—at 7:20 am EST, an Ariane 5 is scheduled to lift off from Kourou, French Guiana, carrying the most valuable payload in that rocket’s quarter-century history, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). A $10 billion mission decades in the making, and delayed by many years, will get off the ground at last.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4303/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 21, 2021, 16:32
Dark side of the Moon: the lost Surveyor missions
by Dwayne Day Monday, December 20, 2021

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4304a.jpg)
NASA Administrator James Webb showing President Lyndon Johnson how Surveyor would be used in support of Apollo landings. After the initial Surveyor missions, NASA planned on using some Surveyor missions to certify specific sites as safe for the Lunar Module to land. Although 17 Surveyor missions were initially planned, only seven ultimately flew, with five successes. (credit: NASA)

It may happen as soon as next year: an American robotic spacecraft may once again set down on the surface of the Moon, for the first time in more than 50 years. The last time that happened was in January 1968, when Surveyor 7 touched down on the outer rim of the giant crater Tycho, the site of the mysterious monolith in the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey. If American scientists had gotten their wish, Surveyor 7 would have been followed by more robotic missions into the 1970s, some equipped to last much longer than a single lunar day, and some possibly carrying a small rover that could extend exploration efforts beyond the initial landing site. At one point, the Surveyor program planned to send 17 missions to the Moon. But Surveyor was dramatically pared back by the mid-1960s, and although some American scientists apparently held out hope of continued robotic exploration of the Moon after Apollo, those hopes did not flourish.[1] Surveyor had started out as a scientific spacecraft, but the race to the Moon changed its goals and ultimately determined its fate.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4304/1

Note: Happy Holidays! The Space Review will not publish next week. We will return on Monday, January 3, 2022.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 04, 2022, 15:24
Review: Shatner in Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 3, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4305a.jpg)

Shatner in Space
Amazon Studios, 2021
46 mins, unrated
https://www.amazon.com/Shatner-in-Space/dp/B09NCH5D56/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=shatner+in+space&qid=1641199437&s=instant-video&sprefix=shatner%2Cinstant-video%2C93&sr=1-1

Last year was not only a pivotal year for commercial human spaceflight, but also for television programming regarding those missions. The flights of Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo and Blue Origin’s New Shepard nine days apart in July got wall-to-wall coverage, as did the orbital Inspiration4 flight in September. The Inspiration4 flight was also the subject of a five-part Netflix documentary about the training for the flight and the mission itself (see “Review: Countdown”, The Space Review, October 4, 2021.) When former football player, now TV host, Michael Strahan flew on New Shepard last month, the flight got extensive coverage on ABC’s “Good Morning America” worth likely far more to Blue Origin than if it sold the seat to a paying customer.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4305/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 04, 2022, 15:25
China says Elon Musk’s Starlink is “phenomenal,” but what is the real message?
by Michelle Hanlon and Josh Smith Monday, January 3, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4306a.jpg)
China claimed it had to move its new space station twice last year to avoid close approaches by SpaceX Starlink satellites. (credit: CMSA)

On December 3, 2021, China used a diplomatic message known as a Note Verbale to inform the Secretary General of the United Nations of a “phenomena” they discovered in outer space that “could constitute a danger to the life or health of astronauts.” The perilous culprit was not a threatening alien spacecraft or even a hazardous field of space debris, as was created by Russia when it tested an anti-satellite weapon in November. No, this danger to life or health was Elon Musk.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4306/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 04, 2022, 15:25
Blackbirds and black satellites: the A-12 OXCART as a satellite launcher
by Dwayne Day Monday, January 3, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4307a.jpg)
The A-12 OXCART reconnaissance aircraft was capable of flying in excess of Mach 3. In 1962, Lockheed proposed using this aircraft to launch a rocket with a reconnaissance camera. The vehicle would have completed less than a single orbit around the globe before returning its exposed film for recovery and processing. (credit: CIA)

The history of American aerospace is littered with contractor proposals that never went anywhere. Sometimes these proposals were borderline crazy, often they were dubious: ideas that made little sense, met nonexistent needs, or would have required huge investments to make them work, assuming that they did not violate the laws of physics. But considering that the US Air Force provided extensive funding for ridiculous studies of nuclear-powered airplanes, you cannot blame aerospace contractors for at least trying to pitch every idea they came up with, no matter how unconventional. And if they had an aircraft that already accomplished amazing things, it wasn’t that outlandish for them to push it for other unusual missions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4307/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 04, 2022, 15:25
Transfer of tension
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 3, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4308a.jpg)
The James Webb Space Telescope separating from the upper stage of the Ariane 5 after launch December 25. (credit: Arianespace)

Sure, the James Webb Space Telescope was launching on a rocket with an excellent track record, one that hadn’t suffered a catastrophic failure in nearly two decades. It didn’t mean people weren’t nervous when that rocket finally lifted off on Christmas morning.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4308/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 11, 2022, 11:00
Review: Flashes of Creation
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 10, 2022

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Flashes of Creation: George Gamow, Fred Hoyle, and the Great Big Bang Debate
by Paul Halpern
Basic Books, 2021
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5416-7359-5
US$30
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/154167359X/spaceviews

On Saturday, controllers completed the last of the major deployments of the James Webb Space Telescope when the second of two “wings” holding segments of its primary mirror swung into place. Months of work still lie ahead to align the telescope optics and commission the instruments, but astronomers were both relieved the deployments had gone so well and confident the telescope will fulfill its ambitious science goals. “The core science of this telescope was to see the very first light in the universe: the first galaxies that formed, perhaps even the first stars,” said Heidi Hammel, vice president for science at the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, during a press conference Saturday. “That’s why it was built the way it was built.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4309/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 11, 2022, 11:00
Steady growth beyond the skies: five trends in outer space from 2021
by Harini Madhusudan Monday, January 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4310a.jpg)
SpaceX launched 31 Falcon 9 rockets in 2021, part of a worldwide surge in orbital launch activity last year. (credit: SpaceX)

Outer space was one of the most successful domains in 2021 amidst fluctuations in politics and industry worldwide. The world observed dynamic growth in space, specifically in the participation of non-state players, while among the government players there was significant institutionalization. There were an estimated 141 orbital launches in the year with 132 successes and up to ten missions that were related to various planetary achievements. The 2020s have seen a significant increase in investment in space, and many of the missions undertaken in the past decade have come to fruition in the past two years. These achievements individually have added a lot of value and have set the ball rolling for a Space Race 2.0. This time, it includes many more contenders than the US or the former USSR, and have expanded to include major corporations competing at an unprecedented scale. What are the highlights of space activities in 2021?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4310/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 11, 2022, 11:00
New year, new (and overdue) rockets
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4311a.jpg)
The first SLS in the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center, awaiting a first launch some time in 2022. (credit: NASA/Frank Michaux)

In a race to see which will launch first, neither the Space Launch System nor Starship appears to be winning.

Both giant launch vehicles are set to make their first launches early this year. In the case of SLS, that launch comes after years of delays that have had ripple effects on the overall Artemis program. SpaceX’s Starship had also fallen behind the aspirational schedules of its founder, Elon Musk, who in September 2019 predicted that the company would “try to reach orbit in less than six months” (see “Starships are meant to fly”, The Space Review, September 30, 2019).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4311/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 11, 2022, 11:01
Blacker than a very black thing: the HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite signals intelligence payloads
by Dwayne Day Monday, January 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4312a.jpg)
HEXAGON satellites had a large forward section that could carry deployable satellites as well as attached "pallets" used for collecting signals intelligence.

On April 18, 1986, a giant Titan 34D rocket roared off its launch pad at California’s Vandenberg Air Force Base and promptly blew itself to smithereens.

The rocket exploded only a few hundred feet above the ground, relatively close to the ocean, and rained pieces of rocket, propellant, and a top secret spy satellite all over the surrounding area. The satellite was a HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite, the last of its type, and its loss was a major blow to the American intelligence community, happening less than a year after another Titan launching from Vandenberg destroyed another reconnaissance satellite called CRYSTAL (originally KENNEN), leaving the United States with very limited reconnaissance capability.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4312/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 18, 2022, 15:18
Review: Not Yet Imagined
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 17, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4313a.jpg)

Not Yet Imagined: A Study of Hubble Space Telescope Operations
by Christopher Gainor
NASA, 2021
ebook, 452 pp., illus.
free

The James Webb Space Telescope is, in many respects, unlike any other astrophysics mission launched to date: a massive telescope that required an intricate series of deployments after launch last month to take its final shape, with months of commissioning of its mirrors and instruments still ahead, all to peer deeper into the universe than any previous observatory. Yet, it’s based on the legacy and the institutions of its predecessors, notably the Hubble Space Telescope.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4313/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 18, 2022, 15:18
Liability and insurance framework for manufacturers of space objects in India
by Biswanath Gupta, Lavanya Pathak, and Kunwar Surya Pratap Monday, January 17, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4314a.jpg)
India is working to commercialize its launch and satellite manufacturing sectors, but those efforts require reforms in areas like liability and insurance. (credit: ISRO)

On June 24, 2020, India approved the participation of Non-Government-Private-Entities (“NGPEs”),[1] in end-to-end space activities. This shift from exclusive reliance on a state-owned agency, Indian Space Research Organization (“ISRO”), is likely to boost the economy and allow ISRO to focus on capacity building. Thus, ISRO and New Space India Limited (“NSIL”), a public undertaking, will now outsource work to NGPEs on a demand basis and an autonomous nodal agency will regulate private endeavors.[2]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4314/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 18, 2022, 15:18
When SPACs are attacked
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 17, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4315a.jpg)
Virgin Orbit’s stock got a boost when it put a replica of LauncherOne on display in Times Square earlier this month. But when an actual LauncherOne boosted seven cubesats into orbit less than a week later, the company’s stock fell. (credit: Virgin Orbit)

For publicly traded space companies, it may be better to look good than to feel good.

Take Virgin Orbit, the air-launch company that became the latest in a wave of space companies to go public in the last year when it completed its merger with a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) in late December. On January 7, the company took part in a ceremony at Nasdaq’s headquarters in New York, ringing the opening bell. A full-sized mockup of its LauncherOne rocket went on display in Times Square as company executives talked up the company’s prospects for the coming year. It looked good, and the market responded accordingly: the company’s stock closed up nearly 25% after dropping nearly every day since its public debut.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4315/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 18, 2022, 15:18
Stealing secrets from the ether: missile and satellite telemetry interception during the Cold War
by Dwayne Day Monday, January 17, 2022

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The dishes of the STONEHOUSE site in Ethiopia. STONEHOUSE was used to intercept Soviet deep space signals, such as those emitted by lunar and planetary spacecraft. A site in Turkey was used to intercept the signals that were sent up to the spacecraft. STONEHOUSE was closed in the mid-1970s after civil unrest in Ethiopia made the location unsafe. (credit: NSA)

Atop a mountain in northeast Iran there sit several buildings and some satellite dishes. What they are doing is not clear, but the Iranians have improved the site and added equipment over the past 15 years, indicating that it is active and probably serves as a post for Iran to intercept signals from American and other satellites. That site is notable for another reason: it used to be a CIA facility known as TACKSMAN. TACKSMAN was established in the late 1950s by the CIA to monitor Soviet missile launches from their Baikonur launch facility in Kazakhstan, the same location where Sputnik and Yuri Gagarin launched into space. It was an important Cold War missile telemetry interception cite. CIA officials sometimes had a knack for applying winking codenames to their projects, and this facility was a classic case, because “tacksman” is a Scottish term for somebody who paid rent to his landlord, usually a clan chief. The United States certainly paid the Shah of Iran for the use of land at his hunting palace, in return for the opportunity to hunt Soviet missiles and rockets.[1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4316/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 25, 2022, 07:52
Review: Becoming Off-Worldly
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4317a.jpg)
Becoming Off-Worldly: Learning from Astronauts to Prepare for Your Spaceflight Journey

by Laura Forczyk
Astralytical, 2022
paperback, 255 pp.
ISBN 978-1-7344622-2-7
US$19.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1734462221/spaceviews

Last year finally opened the doors of the space tourism market, after years, if not decades, of anticipation. Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic flew people suborbitally, while SpaceX performed its first commercial Crew Dragon flight to orbit. Even the Russians got back into the space tourism business, flying commercial customers to the International Space Station on Soyuz spacecraft for the first time in more than a decade. More private astronauts are set to fly this year, with Blue Origin expected to conduct several crewed New Shepard flights and Axiom Space sending its first customers to the ISS on a Crew Dragon launching at the end of March.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4317/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 25, 2022, 07:53
Cold War Pony Express in the western Pacific
by Mike Beuster Monday, January 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4318a.jpg)
USNS General H.H. Arnold off Adak Island, Alaska. (courtesy of the author)

Recently, The Space Review ran an article about Cold War collection of telemetry from Soviet missiles and satellites. This was done at ground stations in remote places like an Alaskan island, as well as at sea, on both big and small ships equipped with multiple antennas (see “Stealing secrets from the ether: missile and satellite telemetry interception during the Cold War,” The Space Review, January 17, 2022.) During the Cold War, I was one of the relatively few members of the United States Air Force who spent a significant amount of time at sea performing this mission. As a USAF Security Service Electronic Intelligence Operations Operator/Analyst, I earned my sea legs on the USNS General H.H. Arnold during the final months of my Air Force enlistment. The Arnold was a modified World War II-era troop transport, originally named the General R.E. Callan, that in the early 1960s had been equipped to track American ballistic missiles during tests and renamed for the founding general of the Air Force. But the ship was soon pressed into additional duties.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4318/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 25, 2022, 07:53
A phoenix dying in Samos ashes: The SPARTAN reconnaissance satellite program
by Dwayne Day Monday, January 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4319a.jpg)
The Thrust Augmented Thor Agena became the workhorse for the American reconnaissance satellite program in the early 1960s. In 1963, the National Reconnaissance Office began work on the SPARTAN project to adapt a Samos E-6 camera to use the TAT Agena and a proven CORONA reentry vehicle. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection)

One of the first American efforts to develop a reconnaissance satellite was known as Samos. Several of the Samos projects involved taking photographs using film and returning it to Earth in a reentry vehicle. One of these projects, designated E-6, was a search satellite equipped with two Eastman-Kodak cameras designed to photograph large amounts of territory at medium resolution. The satellite held promise but failed because of reentry vehicle problems. In 1963 the E-6 project was briefly revived as part of a program designated SPARTAN, the proverbial effort to make a silk’s purse out of a sow’s ear.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4319/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 25, 2022, 07:53
Space policy, geopolitics, and the ISS
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4320a.jpg)
The International Space Station as seen bya departing Crew Dragon spacecraft in November. The international partnership that made the station possible is facing its strongest geopolitical challenge to date as Russia threatens to invade Ukraine. (credit: NASA)

On the International Space Station, it is business as usual these days for the seven-person multinational crew. A Dragon cargo spacecraft undocked from the station Sunday, returning experiments and other equipment to Earth after a month-long stay. Last week, the station’s two Russian cosmonauts, Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov, spend seven hours outside the station on a spacewalk working on the Prichal module, added to the Russian segment of the station in November. That spacewalk was covered live on NASA TV, much like those involving NASA and other western astronauts.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4320/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2022, 09:19
Review: Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4321a.jpg)

Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars: The Story of the First American Woman to Command a Space Mission
by Eileen M. Collins with Jonathan H. Ward
Arcade, 2021
hardcover, 368 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-950994-05-2
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1950994058/spaceviews

Astronauts write memoirs for many reasons, including to stop people from bugging them about writing a memoir. “I wrote this book to stop that pesky question I’ve heard so many times since 1995: ‘Where is your book?’” Eileen Collins writes near the end of her book, Through the Glass Ceiling to the Stars. Even after retiring from NASA 15 years ago, she said, she was too busy raising her children and doing other work to consider writing a book. Only a couple years ago, after being contacted by writer Jonathan Ward, did she believe it was time to tell her life story.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4321/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2022, 09:19
Reconsidering the efficacy of an “Incidents in [Outer] Space Agreement” for outer space security
by Michael J. Listner Monday, January 31, 2022

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A simulation of the intercept of the Cosmos 1408 satellite by a Russian ASAT missile in November 15. (credit: COMSPOC)

This author posited in an essay here 13 years ago (see “A bilateral approach from maritime law to prevent incidents in space,” The Space Review, February 16, 2009) that five events in the years preceding 2009 brought the issue of “space weapons” and outer space security to the forefront, including the collision of the Iridium 33 and Cosmos 2251.[1] The author suggested at that time a solution to the burgeoning challenges to outer space security might be had in a bilateral agreement analogous to the Incidents on the High Seas Agreement entered into by the United States and the Soviet Union on May 5, 1972, in the form of an “Incidents in Space Agreement.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4322/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2022, 09:19
Building a commercial space sustainability ecosystem
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4323a.jpg)
Astroscale launched its ELSA-d mission last year to demonstrate technologies to capture and deorbit defunct satellites and other debris. (credit: Astroscale)

Few would disagree that there’s a growing problem with space debris, particularly in low Earth orbit. The sharply increasing population of active satellites, thanks to megaconstellations like SpaceX’s Starlink, along with defunct spacecraft and other objects result in far more close approaches and risks of collisions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4323/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 02, 2022, 09:19
The NRO and the Space Shuttle
by Dwayne Day Monday, January 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4324a.jpg)
The NRO was going to be a major user of the Space Shuttle, including launches of reconnaissance satellites from Vandenberg Air Force Base. (credit: USAF)

One of the few remaining gaps in the history of the space shuttle program is how it was affected and used by the secretive National Reconnaissance Office (NRO). The NRO was involved with the shuttle in several key ways: it influenced the initial design of the shuttle in the early 1970s, it negotiated with NASA over the use of the shuttle during the 1970s and planned for the transition of its own spacecraft to the shuttle when it became operational, and then it used the shuttle during approximately a half dozen missions between 1985 and 1992.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4324/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 08, 2022, 06:56
Are space movie studios sci-fi fantasies?
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4325a.jpg)
Space Entertainment Enterprise said last month it is working with Axiom Space on a spherical module that could be added to Axiom’s future commercial ISS module as an entertainment studio. (credit: SEE)

Remember all the excitement a couple years ago when Hollywood media reported that Tom Cruise planned to film a movie in space? The NASA administrator at the time, Jim Bridenstine, confirmed that NASA was in talks with the famous actor for filming some kind of movie—no one was really sure what it would be about—on the International Space Station, but there’s been little overt progress since then. Cruise remains grounded for the foreseeable future: given the schedule of missions to the ISS, the soonest he could go is early 2023.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4325/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 08, 2022, 06:56
What to really worry about when a rocket stage crashes on the Moon
by David Rothery Monday, February 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4326a.jpg)
The Falcon 9 that launched the DSCOVR mission in 2015. The upper stage of that rocket will crash into the Moon next month. (credit: SpaceX)

It’s not often that the sudden appearance of a new impact crater on the Moon can be predicted, but it’s going to happen on March 4, when a derelict SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will crash into it.

The rocket launched in 2015, carrying NASA’s Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) probe into a position 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth, facing the Sun. But the expended upper stage of the rocket had insufficient speed to escape into an independent orbit around the Sun and was abandoned without an option to steer back into the Earth’s atmosphere. That would be normal practice, allowing stages to burn up on reentry, thus reducing the clutter in near-Earth space caused by dangerous junk.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4326/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 08, 2022, 06:57
FROG: The Film Read Out GAMBIT program
by Dwayne Day Monday, February 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4327a.jpg)
Launch of a GAMBIT-3 high-resolution reconnaissance satellite in 1971, around the same time that the Film Read Out GAMBIT (FROG) program was approved. FROG would have used the same optics system as the GAMBIT-3, but would have scanned the film in orbit and relayed it to the ground. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection)

In September of 2021, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) declassified thousands of pages of documents on the development of the first near-real-time electro-optical satellite, the KH-11 KENNEN. The KENNEN was probably the most famous top secret satellite ever, the result of an embarrassing incident soon after it entered service in 1976 when a CIA employee sold a document to the KGB that contained technical details of the satellite. But included in the NRO’s 2021 release was significant information on an obscure and never-flown satellite proposal. KENNEN means “to know” in old English (and German). This other satellite had a less-weighty name: FROG.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4327/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 08, 2022, 06:57
Defining European space ambitions
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4328a.jpg)
ESA is looking to the upcoming space summit to win political support for initiative that include a new human space exploration program. (credit: ESA)

On February 16, European space leaders will gather in Toulouse, France, for what organizers call a “space summit” to discuss potential future space initiatives. It’s a one-day meeting that reflects both Europe’s ambitions in space, but also the complexities in trying to realize those ambitions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4328/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 15, 2022, 09:01
Review: Picturing the Space Shuttle: The Early Years
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 14, 2022

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Picturing the Space Shuttle: The Early Years
by John Bisney and J.L. Pickering
Univ. of Florida Press, 2021
hardcover, 288 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-68340-205-3
US$45.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1683402057/spaceviews

Fifty years ago last month, President Richard Nixon gave his formal approval for the Space Shuttle program. That decision set in motion a program whose effects continue to be belt to this day, more than a decade after the final shuttle mission ended. Shuttle-era hardware is currently in the Vehicle Assembly Building at the Kennedy Space Center, this time in the form of the first Space Launch System rocket set to lift off—hopefully—some time this spring.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4329/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 15, 2022, 09:02
America’s moral obligation to develop astroelectricity
by Mike Snead Monday, February 14, 2022

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Providing people with freedom from want can be a reason to develop astroelectricity.

Over the last two centuries, non-renewable energy-powered industrialism has created a prosperous American middle class. While not extravagantly rich, these Americans live comfortably through earnings from their talents and labors. This path to middle class prosperity through industrialization has been widely embraced worldwide and is now considered to be an inalienable human right.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4330/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 15, 2022, 09:02
Nuclear thermal propulsion is key to keeping peace in space
by Alex Gilbert Monday, February 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4331a.jpg)
DARPA is pursuing a nuclear thermal propulsion project called DRACO that could be ready for tests in cislunar space as soon as 2025. (credit: DARPA)

In mid-January, the Mitchell Institute released a landmark report on the “strategic mandate for nuclear propulsion” of US satellites and space-based assets to evade the growing threat from Russia and China’s anti-satellite weapons. The report’s analysis and conclusions are sound and timely, but nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) has broader applicability in space, including commercial and “soft power” uses. The US should pursue a concerted, sustained whole-of-government approach to it. Beyond achieving a first-mover advantage, this will allow the US to develop norms and solidify rules of the road espoused by the UN last fall, rules aimed at preventing war in the heavens.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4331/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 15, 2022, 09:03
Starship status check
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4332a.jpg)
A fully stacked Starship vehicle stands on the pad next to its launch tower at Boca Chica, Texas, last week. Flying in the background are two jets affiliated with Jared Isaacman, who announced February 14 he is flying a series of missions with SpaceX that includes the first crewed Starship launch. (credit: John Kraus/Polaris Program)

The series of updates by SpaceX founder Elon Musk about the development of what would become known as Starship has become something of a cultural phenomenon in the space community. When Musk spoke at the 2016 International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexico, SpaceX fans lined up hours in advance and rushed in as soon as the doors opening, peppering Musk in a later Q&A session with questions and requests that were, well, unusual. Musk returned to the IAC the following year in Adelaide, Australia, where organizers learned the lessons from that event and strictly controlled access—and also didn’t include any Q&A.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4332/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 22, 2022, 08:14
Building Musk’s path to Mars
by John K. Strickland Monday, February 21, 2022

What have Elon and his team built and what will they be able to do with it?

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4333a.jpg)
A Mars development base showing a fuel production area with direct excavation of shallow water ice and conversion to propellants. Cryogenic tanks are inside a covered depot for shade. (credit: Anna Nesterova)

This path is supported by a mixture of pure determination, massive cooperation and support, and the solid mathematics of significantly improving designs and increasing production rate of vehicles. The numbers are like bacteria multiplying in a Petri dish: in a few days the individually invisible cells become a visible colony, overwhelming some others in sheer numbers.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4333/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 22, 2022, 08:14
Smallsat launch and the real world
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 21, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4334a.jpg)
Astra’s Rocker 3.3 lifts off February 10 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. The rocket failed to reach orbit when its upper stage tumbled out fo control immediately after stage separation. (credit: Astra Space/NASASpaceFlight.com)

Most conference panels are fairly anodyne affairs. Participants, even competitors in the same field, stick to their talking points and, at most, only politely disagree with one another. It often requires prodding from the panel’s moderator, or audience questions, to bring differences among the panelists into sharper focus.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4334/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 22, 2022, 08:14
Front line on the TELINT Cold War

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4335a.jpg)
An RB-47E(TT) Tell Two signals intelligence aircraft during the 1960s. The large antennas on either side of the fuselage were used to intercept Soviet missile and satellite telemetry. They were later replaced with smaller antennas. (credit: Robert S. Hopkins III)

In March 1965, Alexei Leonov made the first spacewalk, exiting his Voskhod spacecraft for twelve minutes to achieve a historic first. Far below Voskhod 2, a specially equipped United States Air Force B-47 aircraft was gathering signals from his craft, using its antennas and electronic equipment to collect and record the telemetry the spacecraft was sending to a Soviet ground station. The aircraft was part of the highly secretive “Tell Two” program. Now, due to the diligent work of a retired military pilot and historian, Tell Two is becoming less mysterious.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4335/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 22, 2022, 08:14
Arms control in outer space won’t work
by Brian Britt Monday, February 21, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4288a.jpg)
A simulation of the intercept of the Cosmos 1408 satellite by a Russian ASAT missile in a November 15, 2021 test. (credit: COMSPOC)

It was early evening in Washington on January 11, 2007, when an SC-19 ballistic missile took off from the Sichuan province in the People's Republic of China.[1] The missile climbed 860 kilometers before releasing a 600-kilogram payload that slammed into the defunct Chinese FengYun 1C weather satellite.[2] The test generated an estimated 35,000 pieces of orbital debris spanning 3,540 vertical kilometers, the largest debris-creating event to date that would threaten private, civil, and international assets in space, including the International Space Station.[3]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4336/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 01, 2022, 09:35
Review: Discovering Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4337a.jpg)

Discovering Mars: A History of Observation and Exploration of the Red Planet
by William Sheehan and Jim Bell
Univ. of Arizona Press, 2021
hardcover, 744 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-8165-3210-0
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0816532109/spaceviews

Earlier this month, NASA marked the first anniversary of the successful landing of the Perseverance rover on the surface of Mars. Since that landing the rover has explored part of the floor of Jezero Crater, collecting several samples intended to be returned to Earth on future missions, and is heading towards the remains of a river delta. The Ingenuity helicopter, a technology demonstration that NASA planned to fly up to five times last spring just completed its 20th flight, having become an aerial scout for the rover.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4337/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 01, 2022, 09:35
The Starlink-China Space Station near-collision: Questions, solutions, and an opportunity
by Chen Lan Monday, February 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4306a.jpg)
China claimed it had to move its new space station twice last year to avoid close approaches by SpaceX Starlink satellites. (credit: CMSA)

Last December, China filed a note verbale to the UN claiming that two SpaceX Starlink satellites made close encounters to the China Space Station (CSS) and the latter had to perform emergency maneuvers to avoid a catastrophic collision. Now, the US side has finally responded with another note verbale to the UN, as reported by SpaceNews on February 15.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4338/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 01, 2022, 09:35
Prophets of the High Frontier
by Dwayne Day Monday, February 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4339a.jpg)
Advocates have promoted space-based solar power for half a century, with little progress. (credit: NASA)

How long is long enough to wait for a vision to come true?

Gerard K. O’Neill, although no longer in the wider public consciousness, was at one time the most well-known advocate for a human future in space. In the 1970s, O’Neill’s vision of giant cities in space was briefly in the zeitgeist. He made television appearances and gave talks and even spawned a pro-space movement with the formation of the L-5 Society. O’Neill’s vision was tied to the concept of space-based solar power, an idea that was even evaluated by NASA and big aerospace companies around the same time. And yet here we are, half a century later, and these visions of cities in space and giant space solar power stations have not become reality. Does that mean they are false, or just premature? Is there even a way to distinguish false prophecies and those that simply have not come true?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4339/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 01, 2022, 09:35
What would FDR do?
by Robert G. Oler Monday, February 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4340a.jpg)
The time may have come to reconsider the International Space Station partnership. (credit: NASA)

Imagine it’s the start of World War II in Europe and the US and The Third Reich have a mutual science base. We are not in active combat, but the Third Reich is gobbling up Poland. Would then President Franklin D. Roosevelt have kept that association?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4340/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 01, 2022, 09:36
The ending of an era in international space cooperation
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4341a.jpg)
A Soyuz rocket on the launch pad in French Guiana. Russia said February 26 it is suspending cooperation on future Soyuz launches there in response to European sanctions, but the facility’s long-term future was already uncertain. (credit: ESA - S. Corvaja)

Three decades ago, the collapse of the Soviet Union promised to usher in a new era of cooperation between the West, particularly the United States, and Russia. With the Cold War in the rearview mirror, the combination of American resources and Russian expertise promised new opportunities in space, from the International Space Station to rockets powered by Russian engines.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4341/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 08, 2022, 11:31
Review: Impact
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4342a.jpg)

Impact: How Rocks from Space Led to Life, Culture, and Donkey Kong
by Greg Brennecka
William Morrow, 2022
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-307892-5
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0063078929/spaceviews

The threat posed by asteroids to the Earth has gotten plenty of attention in recent years, possibly to the point of being overhyped: harmless flybys of asteroids a few million kilometers from the Earth now become fodder for clickbait articles in tabloids. Yet space rocks—tiny ones—hit the Earth every day. Rather that pose a threat to humanity, these meteorites provide a wealth of knowledge about the solar system to scientists, and occasionally wealth to the meteorite hunters who find, buy, and sell them.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4342/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 08, 2022, 11:31
Guarding Gateway’s goodness: protecting a steppingstone’s genuine utility
by Bob Mahoney Monday, March 7, 2022

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NASA’s Gateway Architecture as originally envisioned. (credit: NASA)

Whisper the word “Gateway” to any random spaceflight fan passing on the sidewalk and you’ll likely receive one of three reactions: unbridled enthusiasm, abject disdain, or disengaged disinterest. (At least all can quietly rejoice at the name’s vernacular pruning.)[1]

Putting aside (for now) those not interested, count me among the enthusiastic, despite my harboring a profoundly serious concern.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4343/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 08, 2022, 11:31
A FAB approach to Mars exploration
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4344a.jpg)
A quarter-century after Mars Pathfinder demonstrated the potential for low-cost Mars landers, scientists and engineers are proposing a new line of such missions that can use new technologies and new commercial partnerships. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

This week, many planetary scientists are focused on the annual Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference (LPSC), a hybrid event taking place both in the Houston suburbs and online to discuss the latest findings across the solar system. Lurking in the background, though, is perhaps a bigger event: the upcoming release of the planetary science decadal survey, expected to be public by the middle of April. (Original plans projected the release of the survey at LPSC, but not even reports are immune to schedule slips, especially during a pandemic.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4344/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 08, 2022, 11:32
The moral equivalent of war: a new metaphor for space resource utilization
by Jack Reid Monday, March 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4074a.jpg)
For all the discussion about the importance of using space resources, there’s been little action. Is a better argument needed? (credit: ESA)

While science fiction and the popular consciousness about space often focus on human exploration and settlement of outer space (see Elon Musk’s goal of settling Mars), the exploitation and utilization of space resources in order to benefit those living on Earth are hardly lacking boosters at the moment.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4345/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 15, 2022, 07:37
1/ III 2022

Review: Imaging Our Solar System
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4346a.jpg)

Imaging Our Solar System: The Evolution of Space Mission Cameras and Instruments
by Bernard Henin
Springer, 2022
paperback, 293 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-3-030-90498-2
US$37.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/3030904989/spaceviews

It is easy to take for granted the torrent of images that come from planetary probes. Long-lived orbiters and rovers can generate huge volumes of images over the years to the delight of scientists as well as hobbyists, who are encouraged to do their own analysis and remixing of images from those publicly funded missions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4346/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 15, 2022, 07:37
Red Heaven: China sets its sights on the stars (part 1)
by Jason Szeftel Monday, March 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4332a.jpg)
SpaceX’s development of Starship may render many other launch vehicles obsolete, and has led China to revamp its own approach to launch vehicle development and exploration. (credit: John Kraus/Polaris Program)

At a conference in Hong Kong on July 24, 2021, China revealed an overhauled design for its most important future rocket: the Long March 9. Earlier images of this upcoming super-heavy-lift rocket showed a launch vehicle with a few engines at the bottom and four solid rockets strapped to its side. But Chinese rocket scientists were now showing off a very different rocket. The new Long March 9 design envisioned one larger, taller rocket with a single cluster of 16 engines at the base. With little fanfare China had just unveiled a complete transformation of its most powerful and advanced rocket, the country's key to the heavens and to competing with the United States.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4347/1

Regulatory issues for a growing launch industry
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4348a.jpg)
A SpaceX Falcon 9 lifts off on one of 13 FAA-licensed commercial launches so far this year as of March 14. (credit: SpaceX)

Nearly every presentation about the commercial launch industry today mentions the just how much more active it is than a decade ago. In 2012, the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation, or AST, licensed seven commercial launches. At the time of publication of this article, there had been 13 FAA-licensed commercial launches so far this calendar year, mostly by SpaceX but also including Astra, Rocket Lab, and Virgin Orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4348/1

Missions to Mercury: From Mariner to MESSENGER
by Dwayne Day Monday, March 14, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4349a.jpg)
If all goes to plan, the European Space Agency’s BepiColombo spacecraft will arrive at Mercury in December 2025. BepiColombo consists of two spacecraft that will circle the planet, one focusing on Mercury’s surface and the other, supplied by Japan, studying its magnetosphere. The spacecraft is named after Giuseppe “Bepi” Colombo, an Italian scientist, mathematician, and engineer at the University of Padua in Italy who calculated how to get a spacecraft into a resonant orbit with Mercury enabling multiple flybys. His technique was used for the successful NASA Mariner 10 mission that flew past Mercury in 1975.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4349/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 15, 2022, 07:37
2/ III 2022

Reviews: Space films at SXSW
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 21, 2022

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SXSW attendees line up to attend a screening of Apollo 10½: A Space Age Childhood in Austin, Texas, March 13. (credit: J. Foust)

Space has had a growing presence in recent years at South by Southwest (SXSW), the annual film, music, and technology festival in Austin, Texas. That presence has largely been limited to the technology conference sessions, with panels on topics from space commercialization to the search for life beyond Earth. This year’s SXSW earlier this month—the first in-person festival since 2019 because of the pandemic—included a two-day “Space Rush Summit” with two tracks of panel discussions, as well as some other scattered space-related events.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4350/1

Financing space-derived data as commodities
by Lucien and Paul Rapp Monday, March 21, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3078a.jpg)
The growth of commercial satellite systems raises questions about how to finance them, and what to do with the assets when a company defaults. (credit: OneWeb)

The once-exclusive place—still dominant today—of states in civil and military space activities has for a long time concealed the difficulties of their financing. The opening to competition of a real market of space activities, whose economic operators are no longer only public or para-public entities, highlights them today.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4351/1

Red Heaven: China sets its sights on the stars (part 2)
by Jason Szeftel
Monday, March 21, 2022 Part 1 was published last week.

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4352a.jpg)
China has fostered the development of dozens of space launch startups like LandSpace. (credit: LandSpace)

Spaceflight China: Imitation is the highest form of praise

Five years after NASA issued the first commercial spaceflight contracts, China decided to cultivate its own private rocket industry. In 2014, it designated space a domain for civil innovation, prompting companies across the country to get to work on new engines, rockets, and other systems for its space sector. By the end of 2020 China had more than 160 commercial space companies, at least 25 of which were actively developing new launch vehicles. Only the United States has seen anything close to this level of activity.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4352/1

SLS crawls towards its first launch
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 21, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4353a.jpg)
The SLS emerges from the fog March 18 at Launch Complex 39B, hours after completing its rollout to the pad for a countdown test. (credit: J. Foust)

For the Space Launch System, even the photo ops are delayed.

NASA advised media to show up at the Kennedy Space Center press site between 6:45 and 7 am Friday morning for an opportunity to see the first SLS on the pad at Launch Complex 39B. But when journalists showed up, it was clear that was not going to happen on schedule because it was not clear: fog had rolled in, making it impossible to see the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) across the street, let alone the launch pad several kilometers away.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4353/1

3/ III 2022

Launch failures: fairings
by Wayne Eleazer Monday, March 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4354a.jpg)
One of the most infamous payload fairing failures involved the docking target for the Gemini 9 mission, creating the “Angry Alligator.” (credit: NASA)

An Astra launch failed on February 10 when the payload fairing failed to separate, preventing proper deployment of the second stage. Fairing-related mission failures don’t occur very often, although they are unusual in that they are among the few that have repeated the exact same failure mode with the same type of vehicle.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4354/1

Red Heaven: China sets its sights on the stars (part 3)
by Jason Szeftel Monday, March 28, 2022

Part 2 was published last week.

Starship: The state of the art

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4185a.jpg)
An illustration of what a proposed China-led international lunar research station might one day look like. (credit: CNSA)

As it stands China is two generations behind SpaceX, and therefore the United States, in terms of launch technology. To catch up, China is trying to emulate American advances in both its old state organizations as well as in its new private, or at least quasi-private, companies. On the state side, it plans to catch up with the Falcon 9 by making its new Long March 8 rocket reusable. The aspirational date for this achievement is 2025. This is an optimistic but not entirely unreasonable timeline. Rocket landings already feel routine and by 2025 the reusable Falcon 9 will be a decade old. That is more than enough time to copy and imitate its systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4355/1

The launch market squeeze
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4356a.jpg)
A Soyuz rocket launches a batch of OneWeb satellites in late 2021. With Soyuz no longer available, OneWeb has had to turn to a competitor, SpaceX, to launch its satellites. (credit: Arianespace)

If politics makes strange bedfellows, then geopolitics makes strange business relationships, as OneWeb and SpaceX revealed last week.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4356/1

Dark clouds: The secret meteorological satellite program (part 1)
by Dwayne Day Monday, March 28, 2022

The RAND Corporation and cloud reconnaissance

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4357a.jpg)
This Lockheed illustration from 1959 shows the possible uses of a photographic satellite. Although the reproduction is poor, it illustrates that in addition to military reconnaissance, such a satellite could also be used for monitoring crops and forests, and weather prediction. (credit: Lockheed via the NRO)

Amrom Katz was a short, energetic, outspoken physicist who worked for the RAND Corporation in the 1950s. RAND was located in the Los Angeles oceanside suburb of Santa Monica, California. It was a “think tank” where engineers, scientists, and policy experts studied advanced technologies and ideas for the US Air Force. At lunch, RAND’s thinkers would sip margaritas at a beachside bar and then return to their offices to think about nuclear war, earning the moniker “wizards of Armageddon.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4357/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 15, 2022, 07:37
1/ IV 2022

Review: Voyager: Photographs from Humanity’s Greatest Journey
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 4, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4358a.jpg)

Voyager: Photographs from Humanity’s Greatest Journey
by Jens Bezemer, Joel Meter, Simon Phillipson, Delano Steenmeijer, and Ted Stryk
teNeues, 2020
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-3-96171-291-5
US$65.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/3961712913/spaceviews

The new documentary It’s Quieter in the Twilight examines the Voyager missions as they approach their end, tended to by a small group of employees, some of whom have been working on the spacecraft for decades. At this point, the mission is almost forgotten, and when most of the documentary was filmed in 2019 and 2020, the Voyager team was exiled to an office building off the campus from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (see “Reviews: Space films at SXSW”, The Space Review, March 21, 2022).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4358/1

Effective altruism, corporate responsibility, and space sustainability
by Layla Martin Monday, April 4, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4170a.jpg)
Effective space sustainability requires thinking differently from the approaches that led to the climate crisis. (credit: ESA/Spacejunk3D, LLC)

The maxim, or general rule, is that we pick and choose which ethical rules to follow. Culture, religion, law, and the desire to stay out of prison, inform our preferences. While I may want to get into trouble at an epic party in Phuket, steering clear of the Bangkok Hilton overrides my fleeting preference to test the effectiveness of Thai law enforcement.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4359/1

Keep space dialogue going, astronautics federation says
by Philippe Cosyn Monday, April 4, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4360a.jpg)
IAF President Pascale Ehrenfreund said that despite the “current tragedy unfolding in Ukraine” she hopes the organization could continue to be a forum for space cooperation. (credit: IAF)

At the 70th anniversary celebration of the International Astronautical Federation (IAF), held in Paris March 26, leaders of the world’s foremost space organizations called for a “continued dialogue” among the world’s space actors in the wake of the “tragic events unfolding in Ukraine.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4360/1

Space travelers by any other name
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 4, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4361a.jpg)
The Ax-1 crew of (from left) Mark Pathy, Larry Connor, Michael López-Alegría, and Eytan Stibbe. Connor says he consideres his crew private astronauts, a distinction separate from suborbital space tourists. (credit: Axiom Space)

The space industry has struggled to come up with a common term for people who fly to space on commercial vehicles who are not part of the flight crew. There’s space tourists, private astronauts, and spaceflight participants, the last option having the advantage of being the term used in federal law and regulations (but the disadvantage that is sounds, well, bureaucratic.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4361/1

Dark clouds: The secret meteorological satellite program (part 2)
The Radio Corporation of America and the Army’s reconnaissance satellite
by Dwayne Day Monday, April 4, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4362a.jpg)
The Tiros weather satellite evolved from a rejected proposal by the Radio Corporation of America to the Air Force for a reconnaissance satellite. RCA pitched the idea to the Army, which was not allowed to develop a reconnaissance satellite and instead decided to develop a weather satellite. Tiros was transferred to NASA in 1958 and launched in 1960. (credit: NASA)

In late 1955, following the RAND Corporation’s Feed Back report, the US Air Force conducted a competition to select a contractor to build a television-based reconnaissance satellite. Three companies submitted proposals: Lockheed Aircraft, the Radio Corporation of America, and the Glenn L. Martin Company. Air Force officials considered the Martin proposal to be poor. The Air Force officers evaluating the other two proposals considered both of them to be impressive. Indeed, some felt that technically, the RCA proposal was the better of the two. But according to one participant, RCA’s presentation of its proposal was a disaster: the person who delivered it was unprepared and nobody from RCA’s senior management was there to state that the company valued such a relatively small contract.[1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4362/1

2/ IV 2022

Review: NASA Missions to Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4363a.jpg)

NASA Missions to Mars: A Visual History of Our Quest to Explore the Red Planet
by Piers Bizony
Motorbooks, 2022
hardcover, 196 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-7603-7314-9
US$50
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0760373140/spaceviews

As NASA publicizes milestones in its Artemis program to return humans to the Moon—the rollout and testing of the Space Launch System rocket ahead of its first launch, an upcoming competition to select a second company to develop a crewed lunar lander—agency officials emphasize their long-term goal remains on Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4363/1

Review: Return to Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4364a.jpg)
Return to Space
directed by Jimmy Chin and Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi
128 minutes, rated TV-MA
streaming on Netflix
https://www.netflix.com/pl/title/81111324

Last Friday, a Falcon 9 lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center and placed into orbit a Crew Dragon spacecraft called Endeavour. The spacecraft docked to the International Space Station less than 24 hours later, delivering four private astronauts on the Ax-1 mission for Axiom Space. Shortly after Endeavour returns from its ten-day mission, another Crew Dragon, named Freedom, will launch on the Crew-4 mission for NASA, delivering American and European astronauts for a five-month stay.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4364/1

What is China doing at the lunar distant retrograde orbit?
by Kristin Burke Monday, April 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4365a.jpg)
An illustration of the Chang’e-5 orbiter and sample return capsule hearing back to Earth from the Moon in 2020. The orbiter is now in a distant retrograde orbit around the Moon, perhaps to prepare for the next phase of China’s lunar exploration plans. (credit: CNSA)

China’s Chang’e 5 (CE-5) orbiter, which as of January 2022 has likely moved to the lunar distant retrograde orbit (DRO), is probably conducting enabling telemetry, tracking and control and Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) tests to support Chinese preparations for the next stage of China’s Lunar Exploration Program (CLEP), according to Chinese government information and Chinese academics.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4365/1

Red and black: The secretive National Reconnaissance Office finally faces the budgeteers
by Dwayne Day Monday, April 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4366a.jpg)
Jimmie Hill, front center, was the Deputy Director of the National Reconnaissance Office from 1982 to 1996. A few months before assuming that position, he gave a classified and very candid interview where he discussed his relationship with the Office of Management and Budget and increased oversight of the NRO. Here Hill is accompanied by members of the NRO Staff, which oversaw the secret organization's operations in the Pentagon. Hill was not a fan of the OMB. (credit: NRO)

When it was created in the early 1960s, the National Reconnaissance Office was so secretive that even its name was classified. There was no nameplate on its door in the Pentagon, and those who worked for it would never mention the acronym “NRO” outside of secure rooms that had been swept for eavesdropping devices.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4366/1

A megaconstellation megadeal
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4367a.jpg)
The Amazon deal includes 38 launches of Vulcan Centaur rockets, more than all the previous orders for the vehicle combined. (credit: ULA)

Megaconstellations need mega rockets. Or, rather, mega amounts of rockets.

Last week, Amazon outlined its launch plans for a broadband constellation called Project Kuiper. The company received an FCC license in July 2020 for the system, which will place 3,236 satellites into low Earth orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4367/1

3/ IV 2022

Review: Never Panic Early
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4368a.jpg)

Never Panic Early: An Apollo 13 Astronaut’s Journey
by Fred Haise with Bill Moore
Smithsonian Books, 2022
hardcover, 216pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-58834-713-8
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1588347133/spaceviews

Fifty-two years ago yesterday, Apollo 13 splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, safely returning three astronauts after an explosion on their way to the Moon crippled their spacecraft and put their lives in jeopardy. The story of the mission has been told many times, as well as the life of its commander, Jim Lovell. The mission’s command module pilot, Jack Swigert, died of cancer in 1982 before he could tell his life story. One would think surely that the mission’s lunar module pilot, Fred Haise, alive and well today at age 88, would have written about his life, like so many other astronauts.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4368/1

How solar storms can destroy satellites with ease
by Piyush Mehta Monday, April 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4369a.jpg)
A Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) image of the Sun showing an active region near the limb. (credit: NASA/SDO and the AIA, EVE, and HMI science teams)

On February 4, SpaceX launched 49 Starlink satellites, most of which burned up in the atmosphere days later. The cause of this more than US$50 million failure was a geomagnetic storm caused by the Sun.

Geomagnetic storms occur when space weather hits and interacts with the Earth. Space weather is caused by fluctuations within the Sun that blast electrons, protons, and other particles into space. I study the hazards space weather poses to space-based assets and how scientists can improve the models and prediction of space weather to protect against these hazards.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4369/1

Investing in these innovations will get us to Mars and beyond
by Dylan Taylor Monday, April 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4370a.jpg)
A NASA experiment called LOFTID will test an inflatable heat shield, a technology that could enable heat shields much larger than what can fit inside rockets today. (credit: NASA)

Last year was historic for Mars exploration. While humans have been exploring the planet in some capacity for 50 years, 2021 marked several firsts in space exploration, including the first time probes from three countries arrived at the Red Planet.

Progress is partially due to the convergence of many exciting trends that are helping to advance space innovations within the sector. Startups have flocked to the space industry to bring sophisticated technologies like quantum computing, phased array radar, artificial intelligence, cubesats, and other services. Along with NASA, the NewSpace sector is working to transform innovations that can help us reach and settle Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4370/1

A second chance at the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4089a.jpg)
In the original HLS competition, a “National Team” led by Blue Origin proposed a lunar lander. The new competition may feature both a different design for the lander and different partners for Blue Origin. (credit: Blue Origin)

Companies rarely get second chances at competitions they lose. Unless a contract is overturned by a protest or other legal action, bidders who lose out on government contracts have to lick their wounds and try again on a future program.

But for the companies that lost out in the Human Landing System (HLS) competition to SpaceX last year, an effort that prompted both unsuccessful protests with the Government Accountability Office and a lawsuit rejected in federal court, there will be a second chance to offer landers capable of taking astronauts to and from the lunar surface. That second chance, though, doesn’t mean a repeat of the same teams offering the same landers.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4371/1

4/ IV 2022

Review: The End of Astronauts
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4372a.jpg)
The End of Astronauts: Why Robots Are the Future of Exploration
by Donald Goldsmith and Martin Rees
Belknap Press, 2022
hardcover, 192 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-674-25772-6
US$25.95
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4372/1

Last week, a committee of the National Academies released the decadal survey for planetary science and astrobiology, the once-per-decade report outlining priorities for planetary science missions for NASA to pursue. The latest report recommended NASA continue its Mars Sample Return campaign and also two new flagship missions, one to the planet Uranus and another to orbit and land on Saturn’s moon Enceladus, which has a subsurface ocean that is potentially habitable.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4372/1

Space blocs: The future of international cooperation in space is splitting along lines of power on Earth
by Svetla Ben-Itzhak Monday, April 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4373a.jpg)
Representatives of the governments of Singapore and the United States, including NASA deputy administrator Pam Melroy (second from right) at a ceremony March 28 where Singapore signed the Artemis Accords, becoming the 18th nation to join. (credit: Ministry of Communications and Information, Singapore)

Even during times of conflict on the ground, space has historically been an arena of collaboration among nations. But trends in the past decade suggest that the nature of cooperation in space is shifting, and fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has highlighted these changes.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4373/1

A small ban of ASATs, a giant leap for space security?
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 25, 2022

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Vice President Kamala Harris announced the ban on ASAT testing in an April 18 speech at Vandenberg Space Force Base. (credit: US Space Force photo by Michael Peterson)

When the office of Vice President Kamala Harris announced earlier this month she would visit Vandenberg Space Force Base in California and given remarks there, it appeared at first to be a routine visit, an opportunity to visit the base while in her home state. It might also be a reminder of her role as chair of the National Space Council, which has kept a low profile in the current administration since a public meeting in early December (see “A Biden space policy takes shape”, The Space Review, December 6, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4374/1

War at sea, seen from above
by Dwayne Day Monday, April 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4375a.jpg)
Photo of the guided missile cruiser Moskva burning, taken by a sailor on one of the vessels that went to its assistance. The cruiser was struck amidships by two Neptune missiles and was still burning the next day. A fire boat is behind the Moskva spraying water. The ship's life rafts are missing.

Less than two weeks ago, the world was stunned when a Russian warship, the guided missile cruiser Moskva, was struck by two Ukrainian missiles and sent to the bottom of the Black Sea—the largest warship sunk in combat since World War II. For some, it evoked memories of an event almost exactly 40 years earlier, when an Argentine cruiser was sunk by a British submarine. That conflict had a space component that is only slowly—very slowly—being revealed. It poses an interesting contrast to how much has changed when it comes to space assets and war at sea.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4375/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 04, 2022, 07:12
Maj rozpoczynają 4 artykuły powiązane z załogowymi lotami kosmicznymi: od przeszłości ku przeszłości. Pierwsza część opracowania poświęcona jest w dużej mierze japońskiej polityce lotów załogowych. Mimo rosnących wydatków JAXA na załogową astronautykę, tak jak w przypadku innych agencji kosmicznych, możliwości aktywności na wielu polach są ograniczone przez znaczące wydatki na ISS.

1/ V 2022

Review: The Sky Above
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 2, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4376a.jpg)

The Sky Above: An Astronaut’s Memoir of Adventure, Persistence, and Faith
by John Casper
Purdue University Press, 2022
hardcover, 306 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-61249-716-7
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1612497160/spaceviews

In retrospect, the 1990s were something of a golden age for the shuttle program. At the beginning of the decade, the shuttle was getting back up to speed after recovering from the Challenger accident. By the end of the decade, it was flying regularly, having demonstrated the key capabilities needed for assembling the International Space Station, along the way doing research missions while also deploying and servicing the Hubble Space Telescope.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4376/1

Raising the flag on the Moon and Mars: future human space exploration in Japan (part 1)
by Makusu Tsuizaki Monday, May 2, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4377a.jpg)
A Japanese HTV cargo spacecraft departing the International Space Station, an example of the capabilities Japan has developed that could support future human exploration programs. (credit: NASA)

Japan has progressed in the development and utilization of space over the past 50 years. During this time, space activity has grown from academic research and technology interests to civil and industrial interests. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has been the single national organization for aerospace and space research, technology development, and performing launch of satellites, resulting from the 2003 merger of three previously independent organizations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4377/1

Act now on contingencies for Russian non-participation in ISS
by Srikanth Raviprasad and Steve Hoeser Monday, May 2, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4378a.jpg)
NASA needs to develop and share plans to keep the ISS operational even if Russia exits the partnership. (credit: NASA)

The International Space Station (ISS) has for decades been a pinnacle of human scientific, technological and political achievement. It remains the sole example of how an international team can productively and successfully cooperate over the course of decades in space.[1] Yet recent demands from Russia threaten the safety of ISS, people on Earth, and the cooperative mission objectives, including the transition to commercial space facility operations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4378/1

Lessons from a new era of destinations
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 2, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4379a.jpg)
A Crww Dragon spacecraft splashes down off the Florida coast April 25 to end the Ax-1 private astronaut mission to the ISS. (credit: SpaceX)

A delayed flight home is usually a bad thing—unless, perhaps, you’re in space.

The four private astronauts on Axiom Space’s Ax-1 mission arrived at the International Space Station April 9 on a Crew Dragon spacecraft for what was supposed to be an eight-day stay. Instead, the four remained on the station for more than 15 days before departing late April 24, safely splashing down the next day off the coast from Jacksonville, Florida.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4379/1

2/ V 2022

Review: The Universe: A Biography
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 9, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4380a.jpg)

The Universe: A Biography
by Paul Murdin
Thames & Hudson, 2022
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-500-02464-5
US$34.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0500024642/spaceviews

There’s no shortage of biographies in the space field. There are biographies of astronauts and cosmonauts, of engineers and administrators, and of scientists and businesspeople. But none, by definition, can be as expansive as a biography as the universe.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4380/1

Raising the flag on the Moon and Mars: future human space exploration in Japan (part 2)
by Makusu Tsuizaki Monday, May 9, 2022 [Editor’s note: Part 1 was published last week.]

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4381a.jpg)
Japan’s Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) is one of several Moon and Mars exploration initiatives underway by the country. (credit: JAXA)

International cooperation
1) Lessons learned from ISS


In terms of human space exploration, five states have coordinated ISS development and utilization for about 30 years. These states have managed sharing costs based on an international cooperation agreement. It has been suggested that such an “international cooperation” scheme also functioned as motivation for gaining and keeping domestic budgets in some cooperating countries.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4381/1

Anti-satellite weapons: the US has sworn off tests, and Australia should follow suit
by Cassandra Steer Monday, May 9, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4382a.jpg)
Australia’s military recently established a Space Command, which has led to media speculation about its plans in space. (credit: Royal Australian Air Force)

When United States Vice President Kamala Harris was at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California last month, she said the US would not conduct tests of destructive, direct-ascent anti-satellite missiles (see “A small ban of ASATs, a giant leap for space security?”, The Space Review, April 25, 2022).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4382/1

The future of Mars science missions
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 9, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4383a.jpg)
A concept of a sample retrieval lander that would take samples cached by the Perseverance rover and launch them into orbit for return to Earth. (credit: NASA)

The first, and inevitable, reaction to the planetary science decadal survey were jokes, or dread about the inevitable jokes. Not only was the decadal recommending that NASA send a mission to Uranus, it was endorsing a Uranus orbiter and probe.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4383/1

3/ V 2022

Kosmos 482: questions around a failed Venera lander from 1972 still orbiting Earth (but not for long)
by Marco Langbroek Monday, May 16, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4384a.jpg)
A museum replica of the Venera 8 descent craft that is in a decaying orbit around the Earth. (credit: NASA)

Fifty years ago, on March 31, 1972, just days after the launch of Venera 8, the Soviet Union made an attempt to launch yet another Venera probe. While it was meant to fly to Venus, something went wrong and it got stuck in Earth orbit instead. It subsequently was post-designated Kosmos 482 by the Soviets. Half a century later, one object associated to this launch is still on orbit, but it won’t be for long anymore. This object is 1972-023E, the Kosmos 482 Descent Craft, ostensibly the landing module of the Venera in its approximately one-meter protective shell.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4384/1

All the myriad worlds
by Dwayne Day Monday, May 16, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4385a.jpg)
Triton’s surface is relatively smooth, with few craters. This indicates that it has been resurfaced and is geologically young. Before Voyager 2 flew past it in the late 1980s, conventional models of the solar system predicted that these outer moons should have been geologically uninteresting rocks. Not worlds with wind, ice, geysers, and possibly subsurface oceans. (credit: NASA)

The other day I was having dinner with a prominent planetary scientist when I mentioned that I had a list of my five favorite moons. You do? He asked, surprised. Sure. Don’t you? He studies Venus, and Venus, like Vulcan, has no moon, so he didn’t have his own list of favorite moons but asked me to name mine.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4385/1

“Times are changing”: NASA looks to move beyond the traditional contract
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 16, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4386a.jpg)
NASA administrator Bill Nelson told Senate appropriators May 3 that traditional cost-plus contracts were a “plague” for the agency. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

When NASA administrator Bill Nelson appeared before Senate appropriators May 3 to discuss the agency’s fiscal year 2023 budget proposal, most expected him to explain and defend the agency’s request for nearly $26 billion released in late March. That request included nearly $1.5 billion for the Human Landing System program, days after the agency announced its intent to hold a competition to select a second company to develop a lander alongside the existing award to SpaceX (see “A second chance at the Moon”, The Space Review, April 18, 2022).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4386/1

Chinese military thinking on orbits beyond GEO
by Kristin Burke Monday, May 16, 2022

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Chinese literature on missions like Chang’e-5 helps reveal military thinking about activities beyond GEO. (credit: CNSA)

“We already regard space, out to at least GEO, as part of our legitimate military theater of operations. Strategic vision compels us to continually expand our perspective. We will soon need to consider all of cislunar space, and we should begin to think about operations throughout the inner solar system.[1]”
–The Fairchild Papers, USAF, 2002

“A base on the Moon can fulfil not only scientific and military tasks. Since science and physics are developing rapidly, new goals appear and we can only contemplate them today… a base can be used for constant monitoring of the Earth's surface.”[2]
–Russian Academician Boris Chertok, 2007
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4387/1

4/ V 2022

Review: Space Forces
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 23, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4388a.jpg)

Space Forces: A Critical History of Life in Outer Space
by Fred Scharmen
Verso, 2021
hardcover, 272 pp.
ISBN 978-1-78663
US$26.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1786637359/spaceviews

Later this week, space enthusiasts will gather in Crystal City, Virginia—a mystical name for a mundane neighborhood of commercial and residential high-rises near Washington’s Reagan National Airport—for the National Space Society’s International Space Development Conference (ISDC), the first in-person edition of the conference since 2019. As in past years, this year’s ISDC will have a track on space settlement, along with a student space settlement competition and a new “Rothblatt Space Settlement in Our Lifetime Prize Business Plan Competition.” (The conference also includes tracks on space elevators and space solar power, completing the holy trinity of unrealized but unwavering dreams of space advocates.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4388/1

How the India and France Space Strategic Dialogue can address multi-dimensional concerns in 2020s
by Harini Madhusudan Monday, May 23, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4389a.jpg)
French President Emmanuel Macron (left) and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi during their May 4 meeting in Paris. (credit: Indian Embassy to France)

On May 4, during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Paris, France and India decided to create a strategic dialogue to address challenges related to outer space. This dialogue aims to bring together experts from defense agencies, space agencies, specialized space ecosystems, and their respective administration to discuss political, economic, and security challenges; revisit principles and norms; and bring forth newer areas of cooperation applicable to outer space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4389/1

Barnstorming the Moon: the LEM Reconnaissance Module
by Philip Horzempa Monday, May 23, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4390aa.jpg)
Early in the Apollo program, NASA considered converting the Lunar Module into a reconnaissance spacecraft to scout landing sites. (credit: NASA)

The Recon LEM mission was designed to scout landing sites for Project Apollo. At that time, nothing was known of the small-scale characteristics of the Moon’s surface. We had no idea if there would be areas smooth enough to allow a landing by Apollo’s Lunar Module. Gaining that information was just as critical as building the machines that would land a pair of astronauts on the Moon. This was the first time that humanity needed to get serious about certifying landing zones on an alien world. But, how to do that?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4390/1

For Starliner, better late than never
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 23, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4391a.jpg)
ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti took this image of Starliner approaching the station just before its docking May 20. (credit: ESA/NASA)

Two and a half year ago, Boeing and NASA were excited about the first uncrewed test flight of the company’s CST-100 Starliner commercial crew vehicle. The company pulled out all the stops for the Orbital Flight Test (OFT) mission for media at the Kennedy Space Center, erecting a large tent at the press site for briefings and other events in the days leading up to the launch and even showing off its “AstroVan II” it developed with Airstream to transport astronauts to the launch pad for later crewed flights.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4391/1

Note: Because of the Memorial Day holiday, we will publish next week’s issue on Tuesday, May 31.

5/ V 2022

Boeing’s commercial crew vehicle is finally (almost) ready for crew
by Jeff FoustvTuesday, May 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4392a.jpg)
Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner descends under parachutes, its landing airbags inflated, just before touching down at White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico May 25. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

During a press conference a few hours after Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner touched down in the New Mexico desert Wednesday, a reporter asked Mark Nappi, Boeing’s commercial crew program manager, to rate the just-completed Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 mission on a scale of one to ten.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4392/1

How Ukraine could help Europe boost its space sector
by Viktor Serbin Tuesday, May 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4393a.jpg)
SETS, which makes electric propulsion systems, is among the Ukrainian space companies that could help support European space ambitions. (credit: SETS)

While Ukraine is paying a high price for its independence and recognition, Ukrainian industries, the space industry among them, are under a heavy toll. Many of the core space facilities and companies are in the areas that were or are still actively being bombed by the Russian air forces. But it seems the ongoing war in Ukraine can offer new opportunities for the space industry, especially considering the high chances for Ukraine of joining the EU.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4393/1

National Reconnaissance Program crisis photography concepts, part 1: A six-pack of Corona
by Joseph T. Page IIvTuesday, May 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4394a.jpg)
Six-Pack Corona Orbital Vehicle Concept. (credit: NRO)

In the latter half of the 20th Century, one of the most terrifying political crises brought the world to the brink of nuclear war in the span of 13 days. During the days of the Cuban Missile Crisis (October 15–28, 1962), however, the ability of National Reconnaissance Program (NRP) imagery satellites to pivot to a short-term (“crisis”) mode—with either a rapid launch or film return—was near zero.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4394/1

Cubesats to the Moon
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, May 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4395a.jpg)
CAPSTONE, a cubesat weighing 25 kilograms at launch, will test the stability of the near-rectilinear halo orbit NASA plans to use for Artemis missions, while also demonstrating autonomous positioning technologies. (credit: NASA/Daniel Rutter)

On the evening of Monday, June 13, in New Zealand, a Rocket Lab Electron rocket is scheduled to lift off from the company’s Launch Complex 1. That launch will look like many others by the company except for a prominent white NASA “worm” logo on the side of the booster, an indication that the launch is being performed for the space agency. (As this article was being prepared for publication, NASA announced the launch had slipped to June 13 from June 6 in order to provide more time for final readiness checks.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4395/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 07, 2022, 21:10
Pierwsze artykuły z czerwca.
Warto zapoznać się z recenzją książki o badaniach przyrodniczych prowadzonych w warunkach mikrograwitacji w okresie
1980-2004, również o tych które pozostały tylko w sferze planowania. Wg mnie marne są niestety perspektywy zainteresowania się książką polskiego wydawcy.
https://4kidsbooks.indielite.org/book/9781683402602

A co z Rosalind Franklin ? Może dopiero w 2028 łazik zostanie wyniesiony w kierunku Marsa.

1/VI 2022/47

Review: Life in Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 6, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4396a.jpg)

Life in Space: NASA Life Sciences Research during the Late Twentieth Century
by Maura Phillips Mackowski
Univ. of Florida Press, 2022
hardcover, 392 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-68340-260-2
US$35
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/168340260X/spaceviews

In an upcoming launch from the Kennedy Space Center, a Falcon 9 will send a cargo Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station. The spacecraft will be carrying its usual variety of research payloads, some of which the agency discussed at a briefing last week. They include experiments to study wound healing in microgravity, aging of the immune system and behavior of soil microbes.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4396/1

What the Voyager space probes can teach humanity about immortality and legacy
by James Edward Huchingson Monday, June 6, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4397a.jpg)
The Voyager spacecraft and their Golden Records might outlast humanity, providing us with a sense of immortality. (credit: NASA)

Voyager 1 is the farthest human-made object from Earth. After sweeping by Jupiter, Saturn, and the outer solar system, it is now almost 15 billion miles (24 billion kilometers) from Earth in interstellar space. Both Voyager 1 and its twin, Voyager 2, carry little pieces of humanity in the form of their Golden Records. These messages in a bottle include spoken greetings in 55 languages, sounds and images from nature, an album of recordings and images from numerous cultures, and a written message of welcome from Jimmy Carter, who was US president when the spacecraft left Earth in 1977.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4397/1

Our Mars rover mission was suspended because of the Ukraine war: here’s what we’re hoping for next
by Andrew Coates Monday, June 6, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4398a.jpg)
The Rosalind Franklin rover was weeks away from being shipped to the launch site when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led ESA to call off the launch. Its next chance to launch may not come until 2028. (credit: ESA)

Just a few months ago, we were confidently expecting to launch our rover, Rosalind Franklin, to Mars in September as part of the ExoMars mission, a collaboration between Europe and Russia. The landing was planned for June 2023. Everything was ready: the rover, the operations team, and the eager scientists.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4398/1

Will the economy deflect the trajectory of space startups?
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 6, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4399a.jpg)
SpaceX launched dozens of smallsat payloads on the Transporter-5 rideshare mission last month, heling further the growth of the space industry despite the potential for a downturn. (credit: SpaceX)

For the last few years, it had been something of a space industry parlor game to predict when there would be a shakeout among the growing number of startups. After all, there were far too many companies working on small launch vehicles, each needing to raise tens to hundreds of millions of dollars, than most reasonable forecasts of the market could support. Then there were the LEO constellations, needing in some cases billions of dollars, for demand that might be filled by only a couple such systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4399/1

2/VI 2022

Review: Far Side of the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 13, 2022

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Far Side of the Moon: Apollo 8 Commander Frank Borman and the Woman Who Gave Him Wings
by Liisa Jorgensen
Chicago Review Press, 2021
hardcover, 336 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-64160-606-6
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1641606061/spaceviews

The personal toll that the Apollo program had on the families of the astronauts went to the Moon, kept out of public view during the program itself, has increasingly come to light through memoirs and other accounts. As Liisa Jorgensen notes in the opening pages of her book Far Side of the Moon, of the 29 Apollo astronauts who flew, 19 of them had marriages than ended in divorce.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4400/1

The Russian space threat and a defense against it with guardian satellites
by Matthew Mowthorpe Monday, June 13, 2022

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A bodyguard satellite could detect potential attacks against the satellites its protecting and defend against them

Russia has a long history of developing space weapons. It has demonstrated a capability to kinetically intercept satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) from space and more recently from the ground in late 2021. Additionally, it can use ground-based lasers to dazzle satellites in LEO. Russia can conduct radiofrequency (RF) jamming from mobile platforms against communication satellites in LEO. This article examines Russia’s ASAT concepts and places them in the context of military space doctrine that threatens both US and NATO allies’ satellites. The increasing threat to satellites has led to the development of the concept of a bodyguard satellite.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4401/1

Learning to let go of space missions
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 13, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4402a.jpg)
Dust accumulating on InSight’s sollar arrays has drastically reduced the power they can produce, meaning the mission will likely end in a matter of months. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

The end of InSight is in sight.

At a press conference last month, NASA officials acknowledged what had long been feared: dust accumulating on the solar panels of the lander was diminishing their output to the point where, soon, the spacecraft will not generate enough power to operate its instruments. And, by late this year, the panels won’t generate enough power to keep the spacecraft alive at all.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4402/1

Dark Clouds: The secret meteorological satellite program (part 3)

The National Reconnaissance Office finally builds top secret weather satellites
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 13, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4403a.jpg)
Artist illustration of the top secret Program 35/Program 417 weather satellite. Smaller than NASA’s Tiros satellite, it had only one vidicon camera compared to Tiros’ two cameras. Visible near the bottom of the satellite are the wires holding de-spin weights used to reduce the satellite’s rotation rate upon reaching orbit. (credit: NRO)

On Vandenberg Space Force Base, a couple of kilometers up from the cragged coast of the Pacific Ocean along the dusty Delphy Road—named for a Navy destroyer that sank just offshore in 1923—is a flat patch of compressed ground. The buildings, infrastructure, and cabling are all gone, and there’s no longer any indication that this used to be Space Launch Complex 5, the site of several highly classified rocket launches. SLC-5—or “Slick-5” as it was called—used to be a Scout rocket launch site, and in the early 1960s, Air Force officers watched the long, skinny Scouts rise up from this location, arc out over the water, and far too often splash their top secret payloads into the Pacific Ocean. Some of the early rockets launched from that site carried highly classified weather satellites designed to support other equally secret reconnaissance satellites launched from locations just a few kilometers north of SLC-5. Putting the satellites in orbit proved to be difficult to accomplish in those early days, and the Air Force officers responsible for the Scout’s secret payloads cursed the NASA rocket they were forced to use, vowing to find a better alternative. But they also persevered in their mission to orbit weather satellites that they considered vital to collecting intelligence on the Soviet Union.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4403/1

3/VI 2022

Review: The Sky Is for Everyone
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 20, 2022

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The Sky Is for Everyone: Women Astronomers in Their Own Words
by Virginia Trimble and David A. Weintraub (eds.)
Princeton Univ. Press, 2022
hardcover, 504 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-691-20710-0
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691207100/spaceviews

Last week, the American Astronomical Society (AAS) held its first in-person meeting since January 2020. The organization, which holds conferences twice a year, had three meetings turned into virtual events because of the pandemic while the fourth, planned to be an in-person event in Salt Lake City in January of this year, was canceled on short notice because of the omicron surge of the COVID pandemic. (The bags and badge lanyards produced for that conference were instead used for last week’s conference, creating a bit of confusion and amusement.) While technically a hybrid event, with the ability to participate remotely, most registrants traveled to Pasadena, California, to be there in person.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4404/1

Gaia mission: five insights astronomers could glean from its latest data
by Adam McMaster and Andrew Norton Monday, June 20, 2022

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The latest release of data from ESA’s Gaia spacecraft could support research ranging from the expansion of the universe to the discovery of moons of asteroids. (credit: ESA)

The European Space Agency’s Gaia mission has just released new data. The Gaia satellite was launched in 2013, with the aim of measuring the precise positions of a billion stars. In addition to measuring the stars’ positions, speeds, and brightness, the satellite has collected data on a huge range of other objects.

There’s a lot to make astronomers excited. Here are five of our favorite insights that the data might provide.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4405/1

NASA to launch three rockets from Northern Territory in boost for Australian space efforts
by Melissa de Zwart Monday, June 20, 2022

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Australia’s Arnhem Space Centre will host three launches of NASA sounding rockets over the next month, a sign of the growth of the country’s space industry. (credit: ESA)

Over the next month, NASA will launch three rockets from the Arnhem Space Centre in the Northern Territory (NT) on the Dhupuma Plateau, near Nhulunbuy. The rockets are 13-meter sounding rockets that will not reach orbit but will take scientific observations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4406/1

A step closer for Starship
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 20, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4407a.jpg)
An FAA environmental review cleared launches of SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy vehicle from Boca Chica, but with dozens of mitigations, large and small, required. (credit: SpaceX)

For months, Starship advocates, opponents, and those simply interested in SpaceX’s heavy-lift launch vehicle have been circling dates on their calendars, only to cross them off.

Last fall, the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation projected it would complete the environmental assessment for Starship/Super Heavy launches from SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, test site—aka Starbase—by the end of the year. But in late December, the agency said it was moving the completion date to the end of February, citing work needed to review some 18,000 public comments and coordinate with other agencies.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4407/1

4/VI 2022

Every single contribution counts
by Timo Pesonen Monday, June 27, 2022

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The aerospace and defense industries in Europe are paying more attention to diversity in its workforce. (credit: Airbus)

We need more diversity in the aerospace and defense workforce.

The sector has a high percentage of highly skilled and specialized professionals but the gender gap is considerable: only around 20% of employees are women. This is similar to other tech sectors in Europe, whose talent pool consists mainly of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics graduates. It nevertheless causes shortages and mismatches, affecting the smooth functioning of its supply chains and its worldwide competitiveness.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4408/1

Why the space industry needs a space college
by Dylan Taylor and Keith Cowing Monday, June 27, 2022

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Attendees of the latest summer session of the International Space University. While that university has offered space-related programs for decades, it’s not sufficient to meet the growing demands of the space industry. (credit: ISU)

According to the Space Foundation's annual report, the global space economy netted $447 billion in 2020. Commercial space activity alone rose to nearly $357 billion, representing 80% of the total space economy. Launch attempts, which totaled 145, were the highest in history.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4409/1

Escaping Gravity and the struggle to reshape NASA
by Rand Simberg Monday, June 27, 2022

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Bill Nelson, at the time a US senator, and Lori Garver, at the time NASA’s deputy administrator, at a 2012 event for the Orion spacecraft. Garver recalls in her new book a difficult working relationship with Nelson, then a critic of commercial crew. (credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett)

On September 16, 2021, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket ascended into space with a crew capsule atop it, carrying four private citizens—two men and two women. It was the first orbital spaceflight in history without a government employee aboard. More recently, in April of 2022, another milestone was achieved, with the first fully private flight to the International Space Station, in which the four-man crew performed research there for more than two weeks before returning to Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4410/1

NASA rents the runway for its new spacesuits
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 27, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4411a.jpg)
An illustration of the spacesuit that Collins Aerospace plans to develop for NASA Artemis missions under a services contract NASA awarded nearly a month ago. (credit: Collins Aerospace)

On March 23, NASA astronaut Raja Chari and ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer conducted a spacewalk outside the International Space Station, spending nearly seven hours outside the station to conduct routine maintenance work. The two were able to complete all their major objectives, although some secondary tasks were put off for a future spacewalk.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4411/1

Dark Clouds: The secret meteorological satellite program (part 4)
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 27, 2022

The Air Force finally gets its weather satellite

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4412a.jpg)
The first Defense Meteorological Satellite Program Block 5D-1 satellite was launched in September 1976. It was far larger and more complex than its predecessor, and also two years behind schedule. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection

On the evening of July 14, 1980, a Thor-Burner rocket lifted off from its pad only a few hundred meters from the rocky Pacific coast at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. It arced out over the ocean, heading south. As it climbed, at least for awhile, all looked fine. Soon its first stage shut down and the second stage started to separate.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4412/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Czerwiec 28, 2022, 06:41
1/VII 2022/48

Rosja opracowuje naziemne systemy laserowe do oślepiania satelitów, co może mieć zastosowanie przeciwko wojskowym satelitom rozpoznawczym jak i komercyjnym satelitom obrazowania optycznego.

Review: The Elephant in the Universe
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, July 5, 2022

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The Elephant in the Universe: Our Hundred-Year Search for Dark Matter
by Govert Schilling
Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press, 2022
hardcover, 376 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-674-24899-1
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0674248996/spaceviews

Astronomy has made great strides in improving our understanding of the universe, particularly in the last century. We now know our galaxy of a few hundred billion stars is just one of billions of galaxies in a universe that started some 13.7 billion years ago in the Big Bang. It is a universe populated with exotica like pulsars and neutrons stars, but also countless planets, some of which might be hospitable to life, like Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4413/1

Boozy Chimps in Orbit and intoxicating Saturns: Where space pop meets Tiki culture
by Deana L. Weibel Tuesday, July 5, 2022

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“Sloshed in Space” by Thor (Tom Thordarson), an example of space-themed “Tiki” items. Photo used with permission of artist.

In July 2018, a year before the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 flight, I began looking for Tiki mugs that had some connection to astronauts, spaceflight, or the Moon. According to Tiki expert Sven Kirstin, Tikis—“idols of wood and stone” based on the Polynesian depiction of the first man, a “demigod named Tiki”—were a sensation in the United States of the 20th century and by the 1950s “became the pop-culture icon of this America yearning for an earthly paradise” (2014, 11). My husband and I were getting increasingly interested the kitschy appeal of the playful, nostalgic, and deeply unrealistic world of Tiki while I, at the same time, had begun focusing my anthropological research on religious aspects of space exploration. Glen and I both enjoyed space history (he is a former chief historian at the Johnson Space Center) and had a fondness for pop culture depictions of space from the 1950s, ’60s and ’70s. A space-themed Tiki mug seemed just the thing.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4414/1

The perils of planetary rideshares
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, July 5, 2022

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The Janus smallsat mission to study binary asteroids was to fly as a rideshare on the Falcon Heavy launching Psyche, but is now on hold after Psyche missed its launch window this year. (credit: Lockheed Martin)

Smallsat developers have long known the benefits and challenges of rideshare launch opportunities. Such opportunities can offer a much cheaper ride to space than a dedicated launch. However, it requires finding a suitable launch to hitch a ride on, and being subject to the whims of the primary payload that drives the launch schedule and other mission parameters.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4415/1

Kalina: a Russian ground-based laser to dazzle imaging satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Tuesday, July 5, 2022

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Kalina’s laser telescope. (Source)

There is strong evidence that a space surveillance complex in Russia’s northern Caucasus is being outfitted with a new laser system called Kalina that will target optical systems of foreign imaging satellites flying over Russian territory. Initiated in 2011, the project has suffered numerous delays, but recent Google Earth imagery shows that construction is now well underway. Kalina will complement a mobile laser dazzler known as Peresvet that has been operational since late 2019.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4416/1


2/VII 2022/

Review: Escaping Gravity
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 11, 2022

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Escaping Gravity: My Quest to Transform NASA and Launch a New Space Age
by Lori Garver
Diversion Books, 2022
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-63576-770-4
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1635767709/spaceviews

There is no shortage of memoirs and biographies about NASA astronauts. Many of them want to tell the story of their dreams to fly in space and how they realized them after years of effort while overcoming various setbacks along the way. There are far fewer such books, though, about the people who led the agency: administrators, deputy administrators, and other senior officials. These people, after all, helped shape the programs that allowed those astronauts to fly to space and decided who would on them.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4417/1

Space and America’s future
by Frank Slazer Monday, July 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4418a.jpg)
More funding for NASA could enable the agency to increase the rate of Artemis missions to the Moon, with benefits for both NASA and the country. (credit: NASA/Ben Smegelsky)

In about three years, NASA plans to land the first woman and first person of color on the Moon as part of its Artemis program. The agency is also exploring technologies that could eventually allow humans to travel to Mars, and beyond, in future missions.

These efforts are encouraging. But they could be too bold to accomplish, given NASA’s meager budget. Of the $6.6 trillion the federal government spent in 2020, just 0.3% went to NASA.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4418/1

An ICAO for the Moon: It’s time for an International Civil Lunar Organization
by Peter Garretson Monday, July 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4419a.jpg)
As more countries and companies lay out plans to go to the Moon, an ICAO-like organization would be best suited to establishing standards and best practices for enable such activities to continue safely. (credit: ESA)

The United States has an opportunity to lead in the responsible, peaceful, and sustainable exploration and use of outer space through the opportunity to lead centers around the projected increase in activity on and near the Moon. According to the State of the Space Industrial Base 2021, a variety of nations and their companies are planning more than 100 missions to the Moon in the next decade, and noted that more than 140 companies have “lunar” or “cislunar” in their business plans. More recently, Citigroup has estimated that by 2040, Moon mining could be worth $12 billion in annual sales. As noted by the recent World Economic Forum report, the space sector has reached an inflection point where commercialization is beginning to outpace governance.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4419/1

JWST and the future of large space telescopes
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 11, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4420a.jpg)
With JWST now operational, some astronomers want to push ahead with a new generation of large space telescopes that will one day succeed it. (credit: NASA/Adriana Manrique Gutierrez)

On Tuesday, NASA and its Canadian and European partners will unveil a set of images and data that represent the early release observations of the James Webb Space Telescope. While not the first images from the telescope—NASA has been releasing engineering images from the telescope and its various instruments over the last several months as part of the commissioning process—these represent the first science-quality observations from the telescope, demonstrating its various capabilities. (One of the images, it turns out, was released Monday at a White House event, a development announced late Sunday.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4420/1


3/VII 2022

Review: Apollo 11 Flight Plan: Relaunched
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4421a.jpg)

Apollo 11 Flight Plan: Relaunched
relaunch.space, 2022
hardcover, 400 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-6678-4082-6
US$59.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1667840827/spaceviews

This week marks the 53rd anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing. It is a milestone that is not particularly round (it’s prime, in fact) so it will not get much fanfare beyond some events linked with a new International Moon Day on and around July 20. It comes at the tail end of the celebrations of the overall 50th anniversary of the Apollo program, with that anniversary of the final Moon landing mission, Apollo 17, coming up in December.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4421/1

ASATs and space law: quo vadis?
by Leia-Maria Lupu and Maira Sophie Müller Monday, July 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4288a.jpg)
A simulation of the intercept of the Cosmos 1408 satellite by a Russian ASAT missile in the November 2021 test. (credit: COMSPOC)

On June 17, 2022, the International Space Station had to maneuver to avoid an imminent collision with space debris caused by an ASAT mission conducted by Russia in 2021. This calls attention to the overall safety of ASAT missions in light of the growing risk of space debris.

Antisatellite (ASAT) weapons are space weapons created to destroy other satellites such as through a shoot-down mechanism, with the explosion of the targeted satellite producing tons of space debris ranging from one millimeter to ten centimeters in size. Currently, there are two types of ASATs: co-orbital and direct-ascent. While the former is a weapon sent into orbit to destroy a target satellite in close proximity, the latter is a missile launched from the surface of the Earth targeting a satellite in orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4422/1

Not necessarily for the NRP: Final thoughts on the Casa Grande crosses
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, July 18, 2022

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Present-day Concrete Cross. Courtesy of Google Maps.

After the publication of the previous article on the Casa Grande concrete crosses (see “Candy CORN: analyzing the CORONA concrete crosses myth,” The Space Review, December 21, 2020), and the heap of TLDR (too long, didn’t read) comments on Reddit and other online forums that still insisted the Arizona concrete crosses were somehow linked to the Corona photo-reconnaissance satellites, I made one final push into the research realm for a definitive answer to either prove or refute any connection to the National Reconnaissance Program (NRP).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4423/1

The transformation of JWST
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 18, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4424a.jpg)
An image of the Carina Nebula taken by the James Webb Space Telescope, part of the early release observations published last week. (credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, and STScI)

For all the anticipation about the first images from the James Webb Space Telescope, and the expectation that those images would be both aesthetically and scientifically stunning, the last thing you think you would need to get people hyped about the release of those images is a pep rally.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4424/1


4/VII 2022

Will NASA rename the James Webb Space Telescope?
A space expert explains the Lavender Scare controversy
by Alice Gorman Monday, July 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4425a.jpg)
NASA Administrator James Webb with John F. Kennedy at Cape Canaveral in 1963. The agency’s decision two decades ago to name a space telescope after Webb is controversial today because of allegations he participated in the “Lavender Scare” in the 1950s. (credit: NASA)

The first images from the James Webb Space Telescope are astounding. With its deep infrared eyes, the telescope is illuminating regions of the Universe with never-before-possible clarity.

The telescope is a collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency and the Canadian Space Agency. More than 300 universities, companies, space agencies and organizations are involved.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4425/1

Advanced Gambit and VHR
by Philip Horzempa Monday, July 25, 2022

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Advanced Gambit Option A with 2 SRV capsules. (credit: NRO)

Newly declassified documents from the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) have revealed a previously unknown member of the Gambit reconnaissance satellite family. This was referred to as the Advanced Gambit-3 (AG3), though it is quite different from the standard Gambit-3 vehicles. It is so different from previous models that it could, and should, be referred to as Gambit-4. The AG3 included a camera that resembled the KH-10 from the Dorian Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4426/1

The rebirth of NASA
by Roger Handberg Monday, July 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4427a.jpg)
NASA is finally near the first flight of the Space Launch System, the rocket the agency says it needs to return humans to the Moon, but its development suggests NASA may be better off handing launch operations over to the private sector. (credit: NASA/Ben Smegelsky)

NASA is amid a rebirth: a return to the agency’s origins as a research and development agency rather than as an operator of systems. This change positions NASA to have a continuing impact on US and, by extension, global space programs. Two ongoing events herald this impending change: the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Space Launch System (SLS), both are at critical stages in the arc of their development and operation. Both struggled with delays and funding issues created by the slowness of progress toward operational status.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4427/1

Billionaires and backlash: suborbital spaceflight a year after Branson and Bezos
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 25, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4428a.jpg)
Blue Origin’s New Shepard lifts off on a June mission, just the fourth to carry people since company founder Jeff Bezos flew to space a year ago. (credit: Blue Origin)

A year ago, the space community watched a marathon end with a sprint. After many years of development, and many years of delays, both Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic finally flew their founders to space days apart. Richard Branson went on Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo nine days before Jeff Bezos went on the first crewed flight of Blue Origin’s New Shepard. It marked the end the lengthy development phase of commercial human suborbital spaceflight and the promise of a new era of operational flights that would give many more people a chance to briefly experience expansive views and microgravity (see “Will suborbital space tourism take a suborbital trajectory?”, The Space Review, July 26, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4428/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 06, 2022, 09:36
1/VIII 2022/49

Why the molten salt reactor should be our next big step for terrestrial and off-planet needs
by Ajay Kothari Monday, August 1, 2022

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A new type of nuclear reactor could help advance efforts to develop space nuclear propulsion and power systems (credit: NASA)

Addressing climate change, especially reducing carbon dioxide emissions while at the same time producing needed energy, is engaging humanity worldwide, and is apt to occupy the Biden Administration and its successors ever more so. While developing various technologies, one should also bear in mind another potential solution that is much simpler, cheaper, and faster to implement, while we wait for other solutions such as controlled fusion. Within the past year France and some countries in the EU announced their intention to pursue nuclear for their energy needs. China also prepared to test a thorium-fueled nuclear reactor in September 2021, although no test results information has been available since.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4429/1

What is space development?
by John K. Strickland Monday, August 1, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4252a.jpg)
NASA and others need to carefully define what is considered “space development” to enable efforts like bases on Mars. (credit: SpaceX)

The current NASA program of space “exploration” consists primarily of developing its own heavy-lift transport system, using commercial providers for its existing launch needs, operating a scientific space station in low Earth orbit, and designing, building and operating a large variety of robotic spacecraft throughout the solar system and beyond. It is planning to land payloads on the Moon in the near future, along with an occasional short human visit to cislunar space and the Moon. Eventually there are hopes (but no concrete plans) to establish a lunar base and visit Mars in the more distant future. Space development activities, though, can only occur at permanents bases and facilities. Current NASA plans would only start this phase sometime in the mid-2030’s.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4430/1

A review of Chinese counterspace activities
by Matthew Mowthorpe and Markos Trichas Monday, August 1, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4431f.jpg)
Maneuvers by China’s SJ-21 in GEO, including moving a Beidou satellite out of the belt, is just one of the many Chinese space activities with counterspace implications. (credit: ExoAnalytic Solutions)

China has a long history of developing space weapons. It has demonstrated a capability to kinetically intercept satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) from the ground. Earlier this year China demonstrated a new capability to hide in the “graveyard” beyond geostationary orbit (GEO) and re-emerge to grapple a satellite in GEO. Additionally, it has the ability to use ground-based lasers to dazzle satellites in LEO. China has the ability to conduct radiofrequency (RF) jamming from mobile platforms against communication satellites in LEO. This article examines China’s ASAT concepts and places them in the context of their respective military space doctrines which threatens both US and NATO allies’ satellites.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4431/1

ISS in the balance
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 1, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4432a.jpg)
NASA wants to keep the ISS operational to 2030 before shifting to commercial space stations, but those plans face several challenges. (credit: NASA)

Last Tuesday, hundreds of people gathered for the first International Space Station Research and Development Conference to take place in person in three years, having gone virtual in 2020 and 2021 because of the pandemic. But just as they were settling into their seats in a ballroom at the Omni Shoreham Hotel in Washington, coffee and pastries in hand for the opening plenary, came word that the ISS might soon be ending.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4432/1

Note: The Space Review is on a reduced publication schedule this month and will not publish the week of August 8. We will be back on Monday, August 15.


2/VIII 2022/49

Review: A History of Near-Earth Objects Research
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 15, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4433a.jpg)

A History of Near-Earth Objects Research
by Erik M. Conway, Donald K. Yeomans, and Meg Rosenburg
NASA, 2022
ebook, 394 pp., illus.
free
https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/history-of-neo-research.html

Six weeks from today, Earth strikes back against the asteroids. At 7:14 pm EDT on September 26, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft will collide with the small asteroid Dimorphos, which orbits a larger asteroid, Didymos. The impact will change the period of Dimorphos’ orbit as a test of one technique to deflect the trajectory of a potentially hazardous asteroid.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4433/1

Roe v. Wade: the space case
by Vanessa Farsadaki Monday, August 15, 2022

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Long-duration missions, like trips to Mars, present new challenges for reproductive rights. (credit: NASA)

Roe v. Wade was a landmark case that posited that it is a woman’s right to choose, as protected under the 14th Amendment of the US Constitution. With the recent overturn of that legal precedent by the US Supreme Court, the entire country is considering the implications for this controversial issue. As an expert in space medicine and a future astronaut, I find myself asking similar questions regarding the implications of this change to the future of human spaceflight. How should the law evolve once we leave the boundaries of Earth? How will nations manage a woman’s right to choose or what can and cannot happen with a woman’s body when that person is living and working in space? And how should the ethics be shaped when this issue surfaces in relation to mission assurance for space flights?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4434/1

Small launchers struggle to reach orbit
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 15, 2022

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India’s Small Satellite Launch Vehicle lifts off August 7 on its inaugural, but unsuccessful, flight. (credit: ISRO)

On the morning of August 7, a crowd gathered in the control room at India’s Satish Dhawan Space Centre, the country’s main launch site. They were there to see the long-awaited inaugural launch of the Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV), a rocket designed to place up to 500 kilograms into low Earth orbit. It was the newest of a dizzying array of new small launchers being developed worldwide to serve the burgeoning smallsat market.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4435/1

Chief communicator: How Star Trek’s Lieutenant Uhura helped NASA
by Glen E. Swanson Monday, August 15, 2022

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Nichelle Nichols is shown in NASA’s Mission Control at the Johnson Space Center in March 1977. (credit: NASA)

With the recent death of Nichelle Nichols, the number of surviving principal cast members of Gene Roddenberry’s original Star Trek television series shrank again. There now remain only three regular crew members of the Starship Enterprise: Ensign Chekov (Walter Koenig), Lieutenant Sulu (George Takei) and Captain Kirk (William Shatner) to help remind us of the pioneering television series that originally aired on NBC from 1966 to 1969.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4436/1


3/VIII 2022/49

Review: A Portrait of the Scientist as a Young Woman
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 22, 2022

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A Portrait of the Scientist as a Young Woman: A Memoir
by Lindy Elkins-Tanton
William Morrow, 2022
hardcover, 272 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-308690-6
US$29.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0063086905/spaceviews

Had everything gone according to plan, Lindy Elkins-Tanton would be celebrating a launch this month. Elkins-Tanton is principal investigator for NASA’s Psyche spacecraft, a Discovery-class mission to the metallic main-belt asteroid of the same name. By early May, the spacecraft was at Cape Canaveral for final preparations for a launch on a Falcon Heavy scheduled for early August that would have the spacecraft arrive at Psyche in 2026.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4437/1

War in Ukraine highlights the growing strategic importance of private satellite companies, especially in times of conflict
by Mariel Borowitz Monday, August 22, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4438a.jpg)
High-resolution imaging satellites, like the Skysat series operated by Planet, have had a major effect on the war in Ukraine. (credit: Maxar)

Satellites owned by private companies have played an unexpectedly important role in the war in Ukraine. For example, in early August 2022, images from the private satellite company Planet Labs showed that a recent attack on a Russian military base in Crimea caused more damage than Russia had suggested in public reports. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy highlighted the losses as evidence of Ukraine’s progress in the war.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4438/1

The time has finally come for Artemis 1
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 22, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4439a.jpg)
NASA’s Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft on the pad for the Artemis 1 launch, scheduled for the morning of August 29. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

For more than a decade, the Space Launch System has been in something of a liminal state. It was a very real program, with real hardware being built and tested around the country, and consuming more than $2 billion a year for much of that time. But, as a rocket itself, it was still theoretical, years behind schedule and yet to even attempt to lift off. Until it rolled out to the pad for the first time in March, NASA could only offer illustrations of the rocket, in liveries that changed over the years, and animations of it blasting off from Launch Complex 39B.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4439/1

The origins and evolution of the Defense Support Program (part 1)
Infrared for missile warning
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 22, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4440a.jpg)
The fourth Defense Support Program satellite on the cover of Aviation Week and Space Technology in 1985. This satellite was launched in 1973. Due to classification, few photos and illustrations of the spacecraft were released for the first two decades of operations.

In January 2020, American forces in the Middle East were on high alert, expecting an attack from Iran in response to an American attack that killed a senior Iranian general. Intelligence information indicated that a missile attack was likely, and so the United States Space Force used its Space Based Infrared Satellites (SBIRS) to monitor Iran’s missile launch sites. Staring sensors on the satellites in geosynchronous and highly elliptical orbits were focused on the launch locations, and when they spotted the infrared signatures of missiles, they were able to precisely track them and predict their targets, providing that information to American forces in Iraq with enough warning time for them to take cover.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4440/1

Note: The Space Review is on a reduced publication schedule this month and will not publish the week of August 29. We will be back on Tuesday, September 6, after the Labor Day weekend.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 02, 2022, 10:44
1/IX 2022/50

Review: The Milky Way
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 6, 2022

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The Milky Way: An Autobiography of Our Galaxy
by Moiya McTier
Grand Central Publishing, 2022
hardcover, 256 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5387-5415-3
US$27
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1538754150/spaceviews

If galaxies could talk, what would they say? It’s a strange question, to be certain. However, it’s also an interesting thought exercise, particularly as science writers try to find new ways to discuss topics, like astrophysics, to broader audiences. How would a galaxy tell its story of its birth, development, and eventual demise?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4441/1

Frank Drake has passed away but his equation for alien intelligence is more important than ever
by David Rothery Tuesday, September 6, 2022

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Frank Drake with the equation he developed to estimate the number of detectable civilizations in the galaxy. (credit: The SETI Institute)

How many intelligent civilizations should there be in our galaxy right now? In 1961, the US astrophysicist Frank Drake, who passed away on September 2 at the age of 92, came up with an equation to estimate this. The Drake equation, dating from a stage in his career when he was “too naive to be nervous” (as he later put it), has become famous and bears his name.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4442/1

The origins and evolution of the Defense Support Program (part 2)
DSP gets an upgrade
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, September 6, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4443a.jpg)
DSP Flight 5 was launched in December 1975 and was the first of the Phase II satellites with upgrades to be placed in orbit. “F-5”, as it was known, was actually the seventh satellite built. But a few days after reaching orbit it suffered a failure and spun out of control and was lost. (credit: USAF)

The first Defense Support Program (DSP) satellite was launched in 1971, and by June 30, 1973, the four barrel-shaped spinning DSP satellites in orbit had detected a total of 1,014 missile launches as their large infrared telescopes swept the face of the Earth every ten seconds.[1] They had proven quite successful in their mission and had relieved some of the tension that was always present during the Cold War by dramatically reducing the chances of a Soviet surprise attack. (See “The origins and evolution of the Defense Support Program (part 1): Infrared for missile warning”, The Space Review, August 22, 2022.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4443/1

Of hydrogen and humility
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 6, 2022

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The Space Launch System during its second attempt to launch on the Artemis 1 mission September 3, which was scrubbed by a liquid hydrogen leak. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

NASA went into the first attempts to launch the Space Launch System last week with a high level of confidence in the vehicle. One needed only to look at the preparations the agency made for that first launch attempt August 29. NASA’s televised coverage of the launch was to include celebrities like Jack Black and Chris Evans, with Josh Groban and Herbie Hancock performing the national anthem. Vice President Kamala Harris would fly in to watch the launch, then tour the Kennedy Space Center and give a speech on US leadership in space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4444/1


2/IX 2022/50

Unwinding a conflict of treaties
by Paul Costello Monday, September 12, 2022

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A legal precedent much older than the Outer Space Treaty could support property rights claims for future Moon and Mars settlements. (credit: SpaceX)

Contrary to long held beliefs misguidedly premised upon 1967’s Outer Space Treaty (OST), answers to questions like “who owns the Moon,” or, for that matter, Mars, will be decided under much older legal precedence, called Doctrines of Capture and Conquest. The latter, Doctrine of Conquest, is the focus of this essay.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4445/1

Lunar mining, Moon land claims, and avoiding conflict and damage to spacecraft
by Michelle L.D. Hanlon Monday, September 12, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4162a.jpg)
Future lunar landers, like SpaceX’s giant Starship, could kick up large amounts of dust that could post hazards to other operations on the lunar surface. (credit: SpaceX)

It’s been 50 years since humans last visited the Moon, and even robotic missions have been few and far between. But the Earth’s only natural satellite is about to get crowded.

At least six countries and a flurry of private companies have publicly announced more than 250 missions to the Moon to occur within the next decade. Many of these missions include plans for permanent lunar bases and are motivated in large part by ambitions to assess and begin utilizing the Moon’s natural resources. In the short term, resources would be used to support lunar missions, but in the long term, the Moon and its resources will be a critical gateway for missions to the broader riches of the solar system.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4446/1

A substantive National Space Council meeting
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 12, 2022

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Vice President Kamala Harris (center) chaired the September 9 National Space Council meeting, with participants that included Alondra Nelson (left) of OSTP and NASA administrator Bill Nelson. (credit: NASA)

Most meetings of the National Space Council since it was revived five years ago have paid at least some attention to optics and visuals. The first, in October 2017, was held at the National Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy Center, with the nose of the shuttle Discovery as the backdrop. (The council returned there nearly two years later, this time at the other end of the orbiter.) Many others have used space hardware of some kind as background, a visual reminder that this is the National Space Council.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4447/1

A darker shade of blue: The unknown Air Force manned space program
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, September 12, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4448a.jpg)
The Air Force was prohibited from having a man-in-space program competing with NASA’s Mercury program in the early 1960s. Air Force officials became interested in the Gemini spacecraft as a means of gaining early human spaceflight experience. (credit: NASA)

In 1958, before the creation of NASA and the start of the Mercury program, the Air Force sponsored a project named Man-In-Space-Soonest, or MISS. As part of MISS, aerospace contractor Lockheed proposed a spacecraft five feet (1.5 meters) diameter to carry a single astronaut into orbit. The proposed spacecraft was the same diameter as the Agena upper stage spacecraft. Lockheed’s manned spacecraft would have been smaller than Mercury and would have ridden atop an Atlas-Agena launch vehicle.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4448/1


3/IX 2022/50

Harpoons, robots, and lasers: how to capture defunct satellites and other space junk and bring it back to Earth
by Ralph Cooney Monday, September 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4449a.jpg)
A Swiss company, ClearSpace, will attempt to grapple and remove a launch vehicle payload adapter from orbit in 2025 on an ESA-funded mission. (credit: ClearSpace)

More than half of the thousands of satellites in orbit are now defunct, and this accumulation of floating space debris has been described as a “fatal problem” for current and future space missions and human space travel.

An estimated 130 million objects smaller than one centimeter and 34,000 larger than ten centinmeters are travelling in orbit at speeds of thousands of kilometers per hour, according to the European Space Agency (ESA). A report presented at this year’s European conference on space debris suggests the amount of space junk could increase fifty-fold by 2100.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4449/1

Return to panic: How two iconic NASA astronauts survived the 1970s and beyond
by Emily Carney Monday, September 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4450a.jpg)
Astronaut Fred W. Haise Jr., lunar module pilot of the Apollo 13 lunar landing mission, participates in water egress training in a water tank in Building 260 at the Manned Spacecraft Center (credit: NASA)

“Songs are as sad as the listener,” author Jonathan Safran Foer wrote in the novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. Indeed, perspective—and time—are things that color one’s thoughts, particularly when times get tough. Two NASA astronauts who perhaps had the most challenging times of all during the 1970s were Buzz Aldrin, Gemini 12 veteran and Apollo 11 moonwalker, and Fred Haise, who just missed the Moon during 1970’s Apollo 13. Within two years of triumphantly becoming one of the first humans ever to walk upon the lunar surface, Aldrin graduated from being feted by world leaders to being hospitalized for worsening clinical depression and alcoholism. Within three years of surviving Apollo 13’s oxygen tank explosion and tumultuous return, Haise was entangled in yet another fight for his life—this one somehow magnitudes worse than weathering numerous technical failures in deep space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4450/1

Europe seeks to stay in the space race
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 19, 2022

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A model of an Ariane 6 greets visitors to the International Astronautical Congress in Paris this week. Keeping that vehicle on track is one of the priorities of the upcoming ESA ministerial council meeting that will fund agency programs for the next three years. (credit: J. Foust)

The 73rd International Astronautical Congress (IAC) started in Paris not on a Monday, as is traditionally the case, but instead on Sunday. The shift was reportedly a scheduling issue: the pandemic that delayed the 2020 IAC in Dubai to 2021 also delayed the 2021 IAC in Paris to 2022, and the only dates available at the convention center that straddles the Boulevard Périphérique, several kilometers from the heart of Paris, required the event to start over the weekend.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4451/1


4/IX 2022/50

Review: First Dawn
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 26, 2022

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First Dawn: From the Big Bang to Our Future in Space
by Roberto Battiston, translated by Bonnie McClellan-Broussard
MIT Press, 2022
hardcover, 216 pp.
ISBN 978-0-262-04721-0
US$29.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262047217/spaceviews

In contrast to astronauts, many of whom have written memoirs, few space agency leaders write books about their time in office or other topics, like former NASA deputy administrator Lori Garver in Escaping Gravity. An exception to this is Roberto Battiston, a physicist who spent four years as the president of the Italian space agency ASI and has written numerous essays and books on space and science topics. The latest, First Dawn, is now available in English.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4452/1

An analysis of Chinese remote sensing satellites
by Henk H.F. Smid Monday, September 26, 2022

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A Long March 2D rocket launched a Yunhai-1 military weather satellite September 21. (credit: Xinhua)

As was to be expected, the answer from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) to the political visit of US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and a Democratic congressional delegation to Taiwan in August was in the form of threatening military operations and drills executed against Taiwan. The maneuvers took place in the waters and skies near Taiwan and included the live-firing of ballistic missiles in the Taiwan Strait. Undoubtedly, the use of the formidable Chinese satellite remote sensing assets made clear to the American military involved that the ability to deploy warships or aircraft with impunity, and even to operate safely from bases in the region, was no longer the case as it was during the mid-1990s. At that time a crisis erupted over Taiwan’s president visiting the US, prompting an angry reaction from Beijing. Reacting, the US Navy sent warships through the Taiwan Strait and there was nothing the PRC could do about it. Now, the USS Ronald Reagan aircraft carrier group just remained in the region to “monitor the situation.” The greatly improved Chinese satellite surveillance capabilities and inherent intelligence of the last two decades made the difference for the most part.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4453/1

Space for (mostly) all
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 26, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4454a.jpg)
Leaders of five space agencies—NASA, ESA, CSA, JAXA and ISRO—participate in a panel at the International Astronautical Congress in Paris September 18. Officials from China and Russia, previously announced to also be on the panel, were absent. (credit: IAF)

The theme of last week’s International Astronautical Congress (IAC) was “Space for All”, or, as written, “Space for @ll”, the at-sign an apparent nod to a digital component that was largely absent at a conference that required one to be there in person to see all of the major sessions. But plenty of people did show up in person: when the IAC closed on Thursday, the International Astronautical Federation said more than 9,300 people registered—a record—from 110 countries.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4454/1

Aiming too high: the Advent military communications satellite
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, September 26, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4455a.jpg)
Engineering test vehicle for the Advent communications satellite under construction at a General Electric facility, probably in early 1962. Advent was a large three-axis stabilized satellite intended for geosynchronous orbit. It fell behind schedule and went over budget before being canceled. It was not until 1974 that a three-axis stabilized geosynchronous communications satellite was demonstrated in space. (credit: San Diego Air and Space Museum)

Over the seven decades of the space age, a common theme has been spacecraft programs that are so ambitious that they fall victim to cost overruns, schedule delays, requirements creep, and often outright cancellation. There are numerous civilian and military examples, including current, ongoing efforts. But this phenomenon is in no ways new and has existed since the earliest days of the space program. An example is the long-forgotten US Army/Air Force Advent communications satellite, which experienced many of those problems before it was canceled in 1962. Although a victim of its own ambition, Advent also suffered from being a little too soon, locked into a technology that was quickly obsolete. Despite its name, Advent proved to be a dead-end in terms of technology, goals, and ambitions for military satellite communications.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4455/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 07, 2022, 13:05
1/X 2022/51

Review: The Whole Truth
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 3, 2022

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The Whole Truth: A Cosmologist’s Reflections on the Search for Objective Reality
by P. J. E. Peebles
Princeton University Press, 2022
Hardcover, 264 pp.
ISBN 978-0-691-23135-8
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691231354/spaceviews

Three years ago, cosmologist Jim Peebles won a share of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics for “theoretical discoveries in physical cosmology,” as the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences described it. Peebles spent his career working on models to explain the formation of the universe, from the cosmic microwave background to the roles played by dark matter and dark energy. His work, the announcement of the prize stated, “laid a foundation for the transformation of cosmology over the last fifty years, from speculation to science.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4456/1

Sputnik’s effect on Vanguard
by Richard Easton Monday, October 3, 2022

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A replica of the Vanguard satellite. The launch of Sputnik caused engineers working on Vanguard to turn their attention to tracking the satellite. (credit: National Air and Space Museum)

Sputnik 1 was launched on October 4, 1957. The strong reaction from the West showed Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev that space could contribute to soft power competition in the Cold War.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4457/1

NASA-SpaceX study opens final chapter for Hubble Space Telescope
by Christopher Gainor Monday, October 3, 2022

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The Hubble Space Telescope after release on the final shuttle servicing mission in 2009. NASA and SpaceX are studying the feasibility of sending a Crew Dragon mission to reboost the telescope. (credit: NASA)

This year the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has dominated astronomical news as it went through its commissioning process and then began producing its first images and other data from around the universe. In the eyes of many people the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), now in its 33rd year of operations, has moved into the shadow of JWST.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4458/1

Applied planetary science: DART’s bullseye
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 3, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4459a.jpg)
A illustration made before last week’s impact showing DART about to collide with Dimorphos, with the larger asteroid Didymos in the foreground. (credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL)

For a time last month it appeared NASA was going to have an unusual doubleheader. The agency was working towards a September 27 launch of the Space Launch System and Orion on the Artemis 1 mission, after a tanking test confirmed that they had resolved a hydrogen leak and after getting approval from the Eastern Range for the rocket’s flight termination system, which exceeded its 25-day certification earlier in the month.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4459/1


2/X 2022/51

Review: A Traveler’s Guide to the Stars
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 10, 2022

A Traveler’s Guide to the Stars
by Les Johnson Princeton Univ. Press, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4460a.jpg)

hardcover, 240 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-691-21237-1
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691212376/spaceviews

Tucked away on the inside of the adapter that connects the Orion spacecraft to the upper stage of the Space Launch System are ten cubesats, patiently awaiting launch on the Artemis 1 mission. One of those ten is Near Earth Asteroid (NEA) Scout, a NASA cubesat that will, after deployment, unfurl a solar sail and use that to send the spacecraft on a flyby of a near Earth asteroid in two years. NEA Scout was intended as a technology demonstrator for larger solar sails, explained Les Johnson, principal investigator for the solar sail part of the mission at NASA Marshall, during a talk at the Conference on Small Satellites in Utah in August.
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691212376/spaceviews

Making a modern military service

The US Space Force knows it needs to be fast, lean, and agile, but how?
by Coen Williams and Peter Garretson Monday, October 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4461a.jpg)
Gen. John W. “Jay” Raymond, the first chief of space operations of the Space Force, speaking at a conference in September. (credit: US Air Force photo by Eric Dietrich)

The Space Force needs new individual and organizational frameworks. Simply applying the tools of the last century will not be effective. This means recreating the space-minded joint warfighter as the Guardian-Designer, enabling increased freedoms to make changes to software, hardware, and operations. Advancing US Space Force (USSF) organizations through the OADE Loop is critical to the creation of the nation’s first 21st century military branch. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4461/1

Commercial space stations: labs or hotels?
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4462a.jpg)
Voyager Space used the IAC to announce research partnerships for its Starlab commercial space station, but also an agreement with Hilton to design accommodations for it. (credit: Voyager Space)

One of the more unusual side events associated with last month’s International Astronautical Congress (IAC) took place not at the Paris Convention Center but instead several kilometers away at the historic Paris Observatory. The purpose of the event was not related to astronomy—although one could look through telescopes there on the clear fall evening—but instead something quintessentially French: champagne.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4462/1

Arms control and satellites: early issues concerning national technical means
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 10, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4463a.jpg)
Richard Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev signing the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks Interim Agreement, or SALT I, and the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty in May 1972. The satellites operated by the National Reconnaissance Office were used to monitor the treaties. They were euphemistically known as “national technical means.” (credit: Richard Nixon Library, White House Photo Office Collection)

In 1972, the United States and Soviet Union signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the Interim Agreement, collectively known as SALT I. A phrase that appeared in the treaty is “national technical means of verification.” This was an agreement by the two parties that they would verify the treaty without on-site inspections, using their own assets. Both sides also agreed not to interfere with these “national technical means.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4463/1


3/X 2022/51

Review: Boldly Go
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 17, 2022

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Boldly Go: Reflections on a Life of Awe and Wonder
by William Shatner with Joshua Brandon
Atria Books, 2022
hardcover, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-1-6680-0732-7
US$28
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1668007320/spaceviews

One year ago, Blue Origin’s New Shepard performed its second crewed flight, taking four people just beyond the Kármán Line on a ten-minute suborbital flight. The most famous person on that flight was William Shatner, Captain Kirk from the Star Trek television series and subsequent movies. He had, as widely reported at the time, a very emotional reaction to the flight immediately after landing, comparing the Earth to life and the blackness of space to death (see “Black ugliness and the covering of blue: William Shatner’s suborbital flight to ‘death’”, The Space Review, October 18, 2021).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4464/1

#MeToo in space: We must address the potential for sexual harassment and assault away from Earth
by Maria Santaguida, Judith Lapierre, Simon Dubé, and Emily Apollonio Monday, October 17, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4465a.jpg)
For humankind to safely take its next steps into the universe, the culture of space exploration must change. (credit: CH W/Unsplash)

A new dawn of space exploration is upon us. NASA aims to land the first woman and person of color on the Moon by the end of 2025 and send a crew on a year-and-a-half-long mission to Mars in the 2030s.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4465/1

FOBS, MOBS, and the reality of the Article IV nuclear weapons prohibition
by Michael Listner Monday, October 17, 2022

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The Outer Space Treaty faced a challenge months after its 1967 signing when the Soviet Union tested a FOBS weapon. (credit: UN Photo)

Author Note: This essay is based on some of the research and analysis from a Special Issue of the author’s space law and policy briefing letter discussing the PRC FOBS test, which was distributed to subscribers October 21, 2021. Citations to documents and illustrations from the LBJ Library are from the digital collection of the Lyndon B. Johnson Library.

The Defense Policy Board held a classified meeting September 6 and 7 to discuss the development of fractional orbital bombardment systems (FOBS) by the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China as well as to consider options to a demonstrated FOBS capability. The meeting drew media attention and comes a year after Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall announced the test of FOBS with a hypersonic glide vehicle that could carry a nuclear warhead. The test of the FOBS reignited the question of whether such a test or deployed weapon system violates the Outer Space Treaty. This is a knee-jerk issue where contemporary interpretation of the Outer Space Treaty assumes Article IV prohibits the presence of nuclear weapons in general in outer space and even their very existence. This essay will discuss FOBS, multiple orbit bombardment systems (MOBS), and other nuclear weapons that could potentially intersect outer space and discuss the operational realities and realpolitik of the interpretation of Article IV and its effect on nuclear weapons in space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4466/1

Who wants to fly around the Moon?
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 17, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4467a.jpg)
A full Starship vehicle—Ship 24 and Booster 7—on the pad at Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, last week, for testing. At some point in the future, another Starship vehicle may launch Dennis and Akiko Tito, among others, on a flight around the Moon. (credit: SpaceX)

More than 20 years ago, Dennis Tito was a pioneer in commercial human spaceflight. Tito flew on a Soyuz spacecraft to the International Space Station in April 2021, becoming the first non-government astronaut to visit the station and the first self-funded individual to go to space (previous non-government astronauts had been sponsored by governments or corporations.) It opened the door for a new era of space tourism, although one that did not open as wide as first thought given the slow pace of visitors to the station and a long gap than only recently ended.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4467/1


4/X 2022/51

Screens and spaceships: inside the renovated National Air and Space Museum
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4468a.jpg)
The revamped main entrance to the National Air and Space Museum, featuring one of Robert Goddard’s early rockets. (credit: J. Foust)

When I moved to Washington, DC, more than 20 years ago, one of the things I looked forward to was to be able to visit the National Air and Space Museum regularly. I had been to the museum a few times before during trips to DC, but now it was just a Metro ride away. And indeed, in the years that followed I visited the museum many times, sometimes for special events other times just to kill time between meetings downtown.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4468/1

Recycling in the ultimate high ground
by Ben Ogden Monday, October 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4469a.jpg)
Satellite life-extension and servicing technologies being developed commercially by companies like Northrop Grumman open up new possibilites for the US military to support operations in Earth orbit and beyond. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

Eight months before the Soviet launch of Sputnik in 1957, Air Force Major General Bernard Schriever made an ominous prediction: “Several decades from now the important battles may not be sea battles or air battles, but space battles.” It took the United States 60 years to follow through on Schriever’s vision and declare space a separate warfighting domain. However, despite this acknowledgement, the Department of Defense (DoD) has not fully embraced Schriever’s idea. The dominant view remains that space technology is meant to revolutionize terrestrial conflict rather than for use in its own right on the orbital battlefield. Fortunately, the commercial space sector has presented a window of opportunity through the advent of reusable technology that the DoD can pursue to ensure victory in these inevitable battles.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4469/1

The space investment crunch
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4241b.jpg)
Astra’s Rocket 3.3 tips and begins to drift sideways seconds during a launch in August 2021. Astra’s share price has fallen by more than 95% from July 2021 and the company received a delisting warning from Nasdaq earlier this month. (credit: Astra/NASASpaceFlight.com)

First came the space industry stock listings as companies went public in the last two years. Soon may come the delistings.

Astra, a company best known for small launch vehicle development, announced that it received a delisting notice from the Nasdaq exchange, where the company’s stock had been traded since going public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) in mid-2021. Astra’s stock had closed below $1 per share for 30 consecutive business days, triggering the notice. The company now has six months to get the stock up above that $1 threshold for at least ten straight days or be taken off the exchange.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4470/1

Aiming for the Moon, crashing on Earth: The rise and fall of the 1989 Space Exploration Initiative (part 1)
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 24, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4471a.jpg)
President George H.W. Bush in July 1989 announcing a bold new plan to return humans to the Moon and send them on to Mars. It was not successful. (credit: NASA)

NASA is currently planning on returning humans to the Moon this decade. This is not the first time the agency has had this goal. In fact, it is the third. In 2004, President George W. Bush announced the Vision for Space Exploration, which ended by 2010 and a new administration. Before that, on July 20, 1989, while marking the 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing, President George H.W. Bush stood in front of a giant American flag at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, DC, and proposed a bold new program of human exploration of space. America should return to the Moon to stay and send humans to Mars, Bush said, citing destiny and America’s need to lead the free world.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4471/1


5/X 2022/51

ISRO’s LVM3-M2 mission: an expansion of India’s commercial activities
by Ajey Lele Monday, October 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4472a.jpg)
An Indian LVM3 rocket, also known as GSLV Mark III, lifts off October 23 carrying three dozen OneWeb satellites. The launch was the first commercial mission for that rocket, India’s largest. (credit: ISRO)

On October 23, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) launched 36 satellites on a mission called LVM3-M2 for a UK-based company, OneWeb. This company, in which the UK government is a minority shareholder, is partnering with India’s Bharti Group to provide broadband connectivity for government and commercial customers from space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4472/1

The debate about who should regulate new commercial space activities
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4473a.jpg)
Companies developing new space services, like satellite life extension, are seeking certainty about which government agency or agencies will regulate them. (credit: Astroscale)

A small step towards reducing the growth of debris in low Earth orbit could trigger a much bigger debate about who in the federal government regulates space activities.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4473/1

Aiming for the Moon, crashing on Earth: The rise and fall of the 1989 Space Exploration Initiative (part 2)
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 31, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4474a.jpg)
The cover of the July 1989 issue of Popular Science. At the time of the 20th anniversary of the Apollo 11 landing, there was public discussion that NASA needed an organizing mission to regain momentum and meaning.

In summer 1989, President George H.W. Bush announced a new initiative to return Americans to the Moon and eventually send them to Mars. NASA was charged with responding to this sudden new plan. NASA’s response was the “90-Day Study,” which came with a substantial price tag. Although the impetus for the new mission had largely come from the Space Council’s staff, some members of the National Space Council—in addition to the staff—were shocked by NASA’s response to Bush’s challenge.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4474/1

Russia and Iran expand space cooperation
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, October 31, 2022

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Hassan Salarieh, the head of the Iranian Space Agency, poses next to a model of the Russian-built Khayyam remote sensing satellite.

Russia and Iran are gradually expanding their cooperation in space, but doing so without much fanfare. Last August, a Russian-built remote sensing satellite for Iran was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome and three more are expected to follow in the coming years. There is also compelling evidence that a Russian company is building a communications satellite for Iran that will be placed into geostationary orbit in 2024. Russia’s efforts to keep the details of these projects under wraps, though, have been largely ineffective.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4475/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 04, 2022, 22:47
1/XI 2022/52

Review: Good Night Oppy
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4476a.jpg)

Good Night Oppy
directed by Ryan White
105 mins., not rated
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1668007320/spaceviews

On the surface of Mars, a spacecraft is dying. NASA’s InSight spacecraft is nearing the end of its extended mission as its power levels drop due to dust accumulating on its solar arrays. The agency has been warning for months that the spacecraft would soon see its power levels drop below the minimum needed to keep it operational. In a release last week, JPL said it would declare the mission over when the spacecraft misses two consecutive communications passes. “There will be no heroic measures to re-establish contact with InSight,” JPL said, adding that the mission will likely reach that end in the next few weeks.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4476/1

Does the Moon mean Mars is next?
by Roger Handberg Monday, November 7, 2022

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NASA has its sights set on the Moon with the Artemis program as part of a long-term effort to send humans to Mars, even though exactly when, and how, humans will get there remains highly uncertain. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

The American Artemis program and the Chinese lunar program embody the promise that, after reaching the lunar surface, the next logical step for human spaceflight will be proceeding onward to Mars. The time frame for that to occur is likely several decades, not immediate. The Cold War and the Apollo program, which drove space for several generations, are long dead except as historical icons and actual memories for a dwindling number of people. The suggestion here is that the time frame now may prove much longer than currently projected, never mind the dash to Mars by 2029 advocated by Elon Musk. This new date represents a delay from Musk’s earlier predictions, the last being 2026. Funding this Mars mission would in fact come from the government; building on the similar process through which SpaceX was able to develop and fly its Falcon 9 launch vehicle while relying on contracts from NASA.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4477/1

In the shadows of lunar landers
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 7, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4478a.jpg)
A Starship vehicle is lifted into place on top of its Super Heavy booster at Boca Chica, Texas, for testing ahead of a first orbital launch attempt as soon as December. SpaceX conducts such work out in the open, but shares few details about the testing activities or why it’s conducting them. (credit: SpaceX)

Near the point where the Rio Grande flows into the Gulf of Mexico, SpaceX is building what may be the future of spaceflight. The company released last week a promotional video for its Starbase site in Boca Chica, Texas, showing off not just the work being done on the Starship launch system but other aspects of the facility, from mission control to a coffee bar and even a sea turtle rescue effort. Company fans pored over the video, looking for hidden details and other clues about what SpaceX is up to.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4478/1

Buccaneers of the high frontier: Program 989 SIGINT satellites from the ABM hunt to the Falklands War to the space shuttle
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, November 7, 2022

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The Argentine aircraft carrier ARA Veinticinco de Mayo was a major target for British forces during the 1982 Falklands War. There is new evidence indicating that a British plan to attack the carrier may have included targeting data from an American satellite. (source: Wikipedia)

In May 1982, the Royal Air Force developed a rather ballsy plan: launch two Buccaneer strike aircraft from Ascension Island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, fly them 5,000 kilometers in the dark, refueling multiple times, and then approach the Argentine coast. They would launch anti-ship missiles at the aircraft carrier ARA Veinticinco de Mayo in Argentine territorial waters, sinking it or at least damaging it enough to remove it from Argentina’s ongoing effort to defend the Falkland Islands that they had seized from the United Kingdom in April. The Buccaneers would have received intelligence on the location of the Veinticinco de Mayo from a Royal Air Force Nimrod long-range patrol aircraft. The Nimrod crew would obtain an estimated search area from “collateral intelligence,” according to a declassified Royal Air Force document, which also stated that “It cannot be overstressed that location and identification by a third party is essential to the completion of the task successfully.”[1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4479/1

2/XI 2022/52

Review: Space Craze
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 14, 2022

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Space Craze: America’s Enduring Fascination with Real and Imagined Spaceflight
by Margaret A. Weitekamp
Smithsonian Books, 2022
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-58834-725-1
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1588347257/spaceviews

The reopened wing of the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum includes many artifacts from the real history of space exploration, but also imagined histories (see “Screens and spaceships: inside the renovated National Air and Space Museum”, The Space Review, October 24, 2022). The model of Star Trek’s Starship Enterprise remains in place near the main entrance, but now is joined by a full-size model of an X-wing fighter from one of the more recent Star Wars movies, handing from the ceiling near the planetarium and with a placard giving its technical specifications. In another gallery devoted to solar system exploration, there are a couple of smaller, but still well-known, sci-fi artifacts: Vulcan ears worn by Leonard Nimoy as Spock, and a tribble.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4480/1

Evaluating America’s green energy options including astroelectricity (part 1)
by Mike Snead Monday, November 14, 2022

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Space-based solar power can play a key role in the transition from fossil fuels to green energy sources. (credit: ESA/Andreas Treuer)

In 1959, American anthropologist Leslie White wrote “No culture can develop beyond the limits of its energy resources.” White based this observation on his studies of food energy production per person in ancient cultures. To grow and expand, the available food energy produced per unit of human effort had to be increased. The great Egyptian civilization created 4,000 years ago, exploiting the tremendous food producing potential of the Nile River, is a testimony to this truism.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4481/1

A pivot point for space startups
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 14, 2022

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In the fall of 2021, Terran Orbital announced it would build a giant satellite factory at the Kennedy Space Center. A year later, the company abandoned those plans to instead expand an existing California factory. (credit: Terran Orbital)

The concept of the pivot is almost as central to the folklore of startups as starting a company in a garage. Silicon Valley is replete with stories of companies that made significant changes in direction—new products and new markets—after their original plans suffered setbacks or the founders discovered new, more lucrative opportunities. All pivots are efforts to stay alive; not all succeed.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4482/1

A mystery, wrapped in an enigma, surrounding an explosion: US intelligence collection and the 1960 Nedelin disaster
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, November 14, 2022

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In October 1960, a new ICBM exploded on its launch pad in Kazakhstan, killing dozens of people, including the head of the Soviet Strategic Rocket Forces. Information on the explosion became public by December. Five years later the CIA produced a report summarizing what the agency knew about the event. (credit: Russian archival footage)

In October 1960, at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, a missile blew up. It was a spectacular explosion that killed dozens of men, including the commander of the Soviet Rocket Forces, Mitrofan Nedelin. Western intelligence forces learned of this disaster, but it took many years before they were able to assess its importance and impact on the Soviet Union’s missile programs. A recently declassified CIA report from 1965 provides a snapshot of what the US intelligence community believed happened, and why they thought it was important.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4483/1

3/XI 2022/52

Review: The Art of the Cosmos
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 21, 2022

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The Art of the Cosmos: Visions from the Frontier of Deep Space Exploration
by Jim Bell
Union Square & Co., 2022
hardcover, 224 pp., illus.
ISBN 9781-4549-4608-3
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1454946083/spaceviews

There’s no shortage of books published over the years that have illustrated the beauty of the universe. Often they’re large-format books with glossy pages and colorful images of galaxies, nebulae, planets, and moons, attracting the reader. The imagery is beautiful—like works of art—but they’re intended primarily to illustrate the science of the solar system or the universe.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4484/1

Evaluating America’s green energy options including astroelectricity (part 2)
by Mike Snead Monday, November 21, 2022

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Space-based solar power can play a key role in the transition from fossil fuels to green energy sources. (credit: ESA/Andreas Treuer)

Recognizing that fossil carbon fuels are non-sustainable, America will need to successfully transition to abundant, robust, affordable, environmentally acceptable, and sustainable energy—“green energy”—this century if our children and grandchildren are to remain free, at peace, energy secure, and prosperous. Obviously, this will be a demanding undertaking, requiring careful consideration and a well-organized plan. Unfortunately, at this time, the United States does not have a carefully developed national energy security strategy to guide America’s transition to green energy. As a consequence, for decades, America has been limping along, jumping from one ineffective transition “plan” to the next while substantially remaining dependent on fossil carbon fuels. The purpose of this four-part article is to evaluate America’s green energy options to determine what can practicably be used to meet America’s future energy needs. To move beyond just rhetorical handwaving, this article quantitatively delves into details to bring needed understandings to the forefront.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4485/1

Lessons from a university’s first cubesat
by Fergus Downey Monday, November 21, 2022

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Binar-1 was one of three cubesats deployed from the Internation Space Station last October. (credit: JAXA)

Last month marked a milestone for Western Australia’s Binar Space Program as its first satellite Binar-1 lived up to its name.

Binar is the word for “fireball” in the Noongar language spoken by the Aboriginal people of Perth. Binar-1 became a real “Binar” as it re-entered Earth’s atmosphere in early October. Although the chance of it being seen over Australia was low, with the right amount of luck it would have appeared as a shooting star in the night sky.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4486/1

SLS showed up, at last
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 21, 2022

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The Space Launch System lifts off early November 16 on the long-anticipated, and long-delayed, Artemis 1 mission. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

For a time as late Tuesday night became Wednesday morning, it appeared the hydrogen demon had returned to delay another Space Launch System launch attempt.

Ever since the second Artemis 1 launch attempt was scrubbed in early September because of hydrogen leaks during fueling of the core stage, NASA worked to find solutions to the problem (see “Of hydrogen and humility,” The Space Review, September 6, 2022). That ranged from replacing damaged seals in the hydrogen fuel lines to creating what officials called a “kinder, gentler” approach to fueling. In mid-September, NASA went through a tanking test, filling the core stage with liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen, this time without any leaks.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4487/1

4/XI 2022/52

Review: Back to the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 28, 2022

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Back to the Moon: The Next Giant Leap for Humankind
by Joseph Silk
Princeton University Press, 2022
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-691-21523-5
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0691215235/spaceviews

NASA is one small step closer to returning humans to the surface of the Moon with the successful launch of the Artemis 1 mission earlier this month (see “SLS showed up, at last”, The Space Review, November 21, 2022). Orion entered a distant retrograde orbit around the Moon after a brief maneuver Friday, where it will remain for several days before departing to swing by the Moon and return to Earth December 11. Orion, NASA officials say has been performing well other than a few minor glitches.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4488/1

Assembly lines in space

Enabling construction of rotating space settlements
by John K. Strickland, Jr. Monday, November 28, 2022

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The jig factory: a cutaway view of rail supply lines from docking area to ring trusses with robot workstations. (credit: Anna Nesterova)

To be able to efficiently and rapidly fabricate large rotating space settlements in microgravity and in a hard vacuum, we will need in-space assembly lines staffed with lots of assembly line robots. We do not want construction of one settlement to take a decade or more, since a shorter assembly period will make it easier to get funding for settlement construction.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4489/1

Evaluating America’s green energy options including astroelectricity (part 3)
by Mike Snead Monday, November 28, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4481l.jpg)
Space-based solar power can play a key role in the transition from fossil fuels to green energy sources. (credit: ESA/Andreas Treuer)

Many American political, financial, and social leaders are pushing America to rapidly “go green”. The result—through legislation, regulation, judicial decisions, and intense social obedience pressure—has been the adoption of a menagerie of efforts trying to rapidly reduce the use of non-sustainable fossil carbon fuels through the use of green energy technologies. However, little real progress has been made. From 1977 to 2020, US reliance on fossil carbon fuels has only declined from 91% to 79% with much of this decline due to the construction of now-obsolete nuclear power plants in the 1970s and 1980s.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4490/1

For ESA, a good enough budget
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 28, 2022

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Representatives of ESA’s 22 member states, along with associated states and other observers, attend the opening session of the 2022 ministerial meeting November 22 in Paris. (credit: ESA/P. Sebirot)

As officials arrived in Paris last week for the triennial ministerial council meeting of the European Space Agency, the agency’s leadership was confident despite the turmoil on the continent. Earlier in the fall, ESA put forward an ambitious plan calling for a 25% budget increase over the last ministerial in 2019 even amid challenges facing European nations that include high inflation, an energy crisis and the ongoing war in Ukraine (see “Europe seeks to stay in the space race,” The Space Review, September 19, 2022.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4491/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 08, 2022, 17:34
1/XII 2022/53

The growing importance of small satellites in modern warfare: what are the options for small countries?
by Donatas Palavenis Monday, December 5, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4492a.jpg)
A small satellite being assembled by Lithuanian company NanoAvionics, one of several in the country involved in smallsats in some way. (credit: NanoAvionics)

The very first satellites launched into orbit were small, such as Sputnik-1 (USSR) which was 58 centimeters in diameter and weighed 83 kilograms, and Vanguard-1 (US), 16 centimeters in diameter and weighing only 1.6 kilograms. The size of the first satellites was determined by the technical capacity of the available rockets and the desire to receive a radio signal from space, so they were not very complicated. Over time, systems improved, and user needs and expectations changed, so satellites grew and reached unprecedented sizes. Most of the large satellites were launched during the Cold War like the reconnaissance satellite Hexagon (US), whose length was 16.2 meters and mass was more than 13 tons.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4492/1

Europe selects new astronauts as it weighs its human spaceflight future
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 5, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4493a.jpg)
The new class of 17 ESA astronauts, including career and reserve astronauts and one “parastronaut” study participant, are revealed during an event in Paris November 23. (credit: ESA/S. Corvaja)

When European space officials gathered in Paris last month, it was for a two-fer. The business of the two-day meeting at the Grand Palais Éphémère was to set the budget for the European Space Agency for the next three years (see “For ESA, a good enough budget”, The Space Review, November 28, 2022). ESA member states ultimately approved 16.9 billion euros ($17.8 billion) for the agency, a 17% increase over the previous budget in 2019.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4493/1

Evaluating America’s green energy options including astroelectricity (part 4)
by Mike Snead Monday, December 5, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4481l.jpg)
Space-based solar power can play a key role in the transition from fossil fuels to green energy sources. (credit: ESA/Andreas Treuer)

Part 1 of this article opened with the following observation by American anthropologist Leslie A. White:

No culture can develop beyond the limits of its energy resources, and the cultures of primitive man would have been circumscribed by the boundary of human energy for ages without end had not some means been developed for augmenting energy resources for culture building by harnessing solar energy in a new way and in a new form. This was accomplished by the domestication of animals and by the cultivation of plants, especially the cereals. (Leslie A. White, The Evolution of Culture: The Development of Civilization to the Fall of Rome, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1959. Emphasis added.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4494/1

Analyzing the deployment of BlueWalker 3
by Brad Young Monday, December 5, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4495a.jpg)
The BlueWalker 3 satellite, with its array fully deployed, during ground testing. Now in orbit, the satellite’s brightness has alarmed astronomers. (credit: AST SpaceMobile)

I have the pleasure of being a member of the International Astronomical Union Center for the Protection of Dark and Quiet Skies (CPS). The main purpose of this group is to monitor and advise on the megaconstellations of satellites that are being launched by several entities. The concern in the astronomical community began with the launch of the Starlink satellites. With these and other launches, the number of satellites in low Earth orbit have increased dramatically over the past few years, with no sign of slowing.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4495/1

2/XII 2022/53

Review: Before The Big Bang
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 12, 2022

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Before The Big Bang: The Origin of the Universe and What Lies Beyond
by Laura Mersini-Houghton
Mariner Books, 2022
hardcover, 240 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-328-55711-7
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1328557111/spaceviews

Last week, NASA announced that astronomers, using spectroscopic data from the James Webb Space Telescope, had confirmed that some early galaxies the telescope had detected dated back to just 350 million years after the Big Bang. That makes the galaxies the oldest detected to date as astronomers seek to push back the curtain shrouding the early universe.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4496/1

The first photograph of the entire globe: 50 years on, Blue Marble still inspires
by Chari Larsson Monday, December 12, 2022

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The “Blue Marble” image from Apollo 17 is one of the most iconic images in history. (credit: NASA)

December 7 marked the 50th anniversary of the Blue Marble photograph. The crew of NASA’s Apollo 17 spacecraft—the last human mission to the Moon—took a photograph of Earth and changed the way we visualized our planet forever.

Taken with a Hasselblad film camera, it was the first photograph taken of the whole round Earth and is believed to be the most reproduced image of all time. Up until this point, our view of ourselves had been disconnected and fragmented: there was no way to visualize the planet in its entirety.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4497/1

Launching with cost-plus, landing with fixed-price: the financial underpinnings of a lunar return
by Tarak Makecha Monday, December 12, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4498a.jpg)
The Space Launch System , seen here before the Artemis 1 launch, used cost-plus contracts to fund its development, but such contracts may not be appropriate going forward. (credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett)

NASA’s attempt to return to its ambitious traditions and establish a long-term presence on the Moon kicked off on November 16 with the launch of the Space Launch System (SLS). That launch was the first step in NASA’s Artemis program that should ultimately set the stage for a human mission to Mars. It is not off to a good start.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4498/1

All’s well that finally begins well
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 12, 2022

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The Orion crew capsule descending under its parachutes just before splashdown December 11. (credit: NASA)

December 11, 1972, featured a landing that marked the beginning of an ending. The Apollo 17 Lunar Module, Challenger, touched down on the surface of the Moon in the Taurus-Littrow region, delivering astronauts Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt for the sixth and most ambitious—but also final—Apollo lunar landing mission. The astronauts would spend the next three days on the Moon, conducting three moonwalks that, to this day, mark the last time humans have walked on the lunar surface.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4499/1

3/XII 2022/53

Satellite bombs, gliders, or ICBMs? Krafft Ehricke and early thinking on long-range strategic weapons
by Hans Dolfing Monday, December 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4500a.jpg)
Kraft Ehricke posing with spacecraft models in 1957, the same year he wrote a memo about tradeoffs among missiles and other long-range weapons concepts. (credit: San Diego Air and Space Museum Archives)

During recent historical research at the National Air and Space Museum (NASM) Archives, I located a document as part of the Krafft Ehricke Papers titled “Basic Analysis of Global Weapon Systems & Space Weapon Systems” from 1957.[1] At that time, ICBMs were still under development and satellites had not yet flown. There were questions on how to achieve the best deterrence to protect the United States. There were even questions regarding whether and how to position nuclear bombs in orbit. This newly discovered memo provides an interesting perspective on these issues.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4500/1

Starship, Twitter, and Musk
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4501a.jpg)
A unique perspective on a SpaceX Starship static fire test last week in Boca Chica, Texas. While those tests continue, it’s not clear when SpaceX will finally be ready for its first orbital launch attempt. (credit: SpaceX)

By most accounts, 2022 has been an incredibly successful year for SpaceX. It has performed 59 launches so far in the year, nearly double the number it conducted last year, with one or two more launches planned before the end of the year. Those launches have ranged from commercial communications satellites to NASA science missions, from a private astronaut mission to the International Space station to a commercial Japanese lunar lander. More than a quarter of all Falcon 9 launches, dating back to the vehicle’s introduction in 2010, took place this year.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4501/1

The secret payloads of Russia’s Glonass navigation satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, December 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4502a.jpg)
The fourth-generation Glonass-K2 navigation satellites are expected to host two new military payloads. Source (https://www.ferra.ru/news/techlife/kogda-rossiya-zapustit-novyi-navigacionnyi-sputnik-glonass-k2-27-04-2022.htm)

Aside from their primary mission, Russia’s Glonass navigation satellites are being used for a number of little publicized secondary objectives. Instruments to detect nuclear explosions have been flown on Glonass satellites since early this century and two new payloads are expected to be introduced on the next generation of satellites in 2023. One will help locate and rescue military personnel in distress and the other likely is part of a signals intelligence system that will provide targeting data for sea-launched cruise missiles. Despite the secretive nature of these payloads, a significant amount of information on them can be gathered from publicly available sources.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4502/1

Apollo 21: Upgrading the Lunar Module for advanced missions
by Dwayne A. Day and Glen E. Swanson Monday, December 19, 2022

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4503a.jpg)
In the late 1960s, Grumman Aerospace studied various Lunar Module (LM) upgrades that could be flown for later Apollo missions, including dual-launch missions. Here a Taxi LM sets down near a Shelter LM.

On December 19, 1972, the Apollo 17 astronauts splashed down in the Pacific Ocean and were recovered aboard the aircraft carrier USS Ticonderoga. It has now been more than 50 years since Americans walked on the Moon. NASA had planned for three more lunar landing missions that were canceled. Those were the only missions actively considered by the space agency. If NASA had continued missions beyond Apollo 20, they undoubtedly would have added increased stay times on the lunar surface, longer traverses, and more scientific equipment.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4503/1

Note: Happy Holidays! The Space Review will not publish the week of December 26. We will be back on Tuesday, January 3, 2023.
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Grudzień 11, 2022, 10:43
1/I 2023 [1-4]

1) Space resilience and the importance of multiple orbits
by Matthew Mowthorpe Tuesday, January 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4504a.jpg)
The OneWeb constellation, an example of a proliferated LEO system.

A LEO constellation is hugely expensive to build and maintain, with much shorter lifespans than GEO satellites. While the US and EU have a scale that can potentially justify such sovereign constellations, most nations can’t justify this level of expense, which is likely to mean using one of the commercial providers, such as OneWeb or SpaceX. This puts a reliance in supporting the mission into the hands of a commercial operator, potentially reducing freedom of action. This is still of value to de-risk operations through diversification, but for resilience and to meet the threat requirement it still requires sovereign GEO satellites at the core.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4504/1

2) The critical importance of resiliency for US missile warning satellites
by Brian Chow Tuesday, January 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4505a.jpg)
As the US military shifts from existing SBIRS missile-warning satellites to a new architecture, it cannot overlook the importance of resilience amid growing ASAT threats. (credit: Lockheed Martin)

The first force design from the Space Warfighting Analysis Center (SWAC) includes a transition to a proliferated missile-warning (MW) & missile-tracking (MT) architecture. Thus far, announcements about the design have been focused on the promise of resilience in the new architecture, while little is known about the more urgent and important resilience during the transition to the new architecture. Let’s hope that the center will soon shed light on how to make the currently vulnerable MW constellation resilient during the transition, which will persist throughout this decade and likely into the 2030s. Otherwise, China, our pacing challenger, will have plenty of opportunities, including seizing Taiwan even without firing a shot well within this decade.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4505/1

3) M is for MONSTER ROCKET: the M-1 cryogenic engine
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, January 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4506a.jpg)
The M-1 was a powerful hydrogen/oxygen engine under development in the first half of the 1960s. Had it been pursued to flight test, the rockets it powered would have dwarfed the Saturn V. (credit: NASA)

By the mid-1960s NASA was on a roll. The agency was consuming nearly four and a half percent of the federal budget—compared to less than half a percent today—and going full-bore to build Apollo and its required infrastructure in time to meet President Kennedy’s deadline for landing men on the Moon by the end of the decade.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4506/1

4) After all, it’s rocket science (and bureaucracy)
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, January 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4507a.jpg)
The Vega C on the pad before its ill-fated launch December 20. (credit: ESA/CNES/Arianespace/Optique vidéo du CSG - JM Guillon)

Last year was the most active one ever for spaceflight, in terms of launch activity. There were 186 orbital launch attempts worldwide in 2022, of which 179 were successful. That’s more than double five years ago, when there were 86 successful launches out of 90 attempts. That increase is thanks primarily to China and SpaceX: the country went from 18 orbital launch attempts in 2017 to 64 in 2022, while the company went from 18 to 61 launches in the same span.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4507/1

2/I 2023 [5-8]

5) Review: A Brief History of Black Holes
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 9, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4508a.jpg)

A Brief History of Black Holes: And Why Nearly Everything You Know About Them Is Wrong
by Becky Smethurst
Macmillan, 2022
hardcover, 288 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-5290-8670-6
US$29.95

Black holes probably exist. That was the conclusion of a study publicized last week that examined whether the phenomena widely believed to be black holes might instead be an ultracompact object formed of exotic matter, dubbed a “boson star”. The analysis, though, concluded that such a boson star would last for only a fraction of a second before exploding into a less dense object or collapsing into—you guessed it—a black hole.
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1529086701/spaceviews

6) A COTS-like alternative for planetary exploration
by Louis Friedman Monday, January 9, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4509a.jpg)
Concepts like Rocket Lab’s private Venus mission might be a way to get around the budget pressures on NASA’s planetary science program. (credit: Rocket Lab)

The recent projection presented by Dr. Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s planetary science division, at the Fall Meeting of the AGU was sobering and should serve as both a warning and a call for action to the planetary science community. She projected a flat budget for planetary science to at least late this decade, despite the growing requirements for the two flagship missions, Mars Sample Return and Europa Clipper, and the broader infrastructure issues raised by the Psyche program delay and post-pandemic supply chain issues. Already we have delays initiated in the smaller, but still large, planetary programs in Discovery and New Frontiers.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4509/1

7) To go to Mars, do a backflip at Venus
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 9, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4510a.jpg)
While a human mission to fly by or orbit Venus would be designed to gain experience for a future human mission to Mars, there is also significant science it could do, such as teleoperating vehicles on the surface and in the atmosphere of the planet. (credit: JHUAPL/Caleb Heidel)

NASA has made clear its long-term human spaceflight aspirations in recent years. The agency’s Artemis campaign will fly a series of crewed missions to the Moon that will become increasingly ambitious: larger crews, longer stays, and more infrastructure. Those missions, along with experience built up on the International Space Station and commercial successors in Earth orbit and on the lunar Gateway orbiting the Moon, will enable human missions to Mars, perhaps as soon as the late 2030s. The schedule and the specifics have yet to be worked out, but the framework is in place.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4510/1

8 ) Moon denied: the 1993 Early Lunar Access proposal
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, January 9, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4511a.jpg)
In January 1993, General Dynamics unveiled its Early Lunar Access proposal for returning Americans to the Moon. The company hoped that a new presidential administration would embrace its cheaper method of returning humans to the Moon using existing launch vehicles. But the Clinton administration was already skeptical of NASA's space station program and wary of new civil space expenditures. General Dynamics' study demonstrated that it was difficult to repeat Apollo without much larger launch vehicles. (credit: General Dynamics)

Getting to the Moon is hard.

It has been more than half a century since the last humans walked on the lunar surface, or even ventured beyond low Earth orbit. Since that time there have been many proposals to do it again. In January 1993—30 years ago this week—there was a proposal known as Early Lunar Access, and it was an attempt to demonstrate that the Moon could be reached faster, and at less cost, than other proposals during that time period.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4511/1

3/I 2023 [9-12]

9) Review: Dinner on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 16, 2023

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Dinner on Mars: The Technologies That Will Feed the Red Planet and Transform Agriculture on Earth
by Lenore Newman and Evan D.G. Fraser
ECW Press, 2022
paperback, 232 pp.
ISBN 978-1-77041-662-8
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1770416625/spaceviews

Most of the focus on human exploration of Mars has been how to get people there and back: rocket engineers, after all, like to talk about rocket engineering. Far less has been said, though, about how people will live and work there, particularly as initial expeditions evolve into permanent settlements.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4512/1

10) China’s new space station opens for business in an increasingly competitive era of space activity
by Eytan Tepper and Scott Shackelford Monday, January 16, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4513a.jpg)
China’s space station serves as both a research outpost and a geopolitical symbol. (credit: China Manned Space Engineering Office)

The International Space Station is no longer the only place where humans can live in orbit.

On November 29, 2022, the Shenzhou 15 mission launched from China’s Gobi Desert carrying three taikonauts, the Chinese word for astronauts. Six hours later, they reached their destination, China’s recently completed space station, called Tiangong, which means “heavenly palace” in Mandarin. The three taikonauts replaced the existing crew that helped wrap up construction. With this successful mission, China has become just the third nation to operate a permanent space station.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4513/1

11) From the sand to the stars: Saddam Hussein’s failed space program
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, January 16, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4514a.jpg)
The Al-Ta’ir satellite built by Iraqi scientists and engineers between 1988 and 1990. The satellite would have conducted communications experiments. (credit: Sarmad D.S. Dawood)

During the 1980s, the government of Saddam Hussein sought to develop an indigenous space program and then ran head first into external political roadblocks that made this impossible. Although more than three decades have passed since the end of the Iraqi space program, and Saddam has been dead since 2006, there is still relatively little information available on the Iraqi space program. This article summarizes what is publicly known.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4514/1

12) Unlocking the next great observatories
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 16, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4308c.jpg)
The success of JWST, exceeding requirements in nearly every way, allows NASA to focus now on development of future large space telescopes. (credit: NASA GSFC/CIL/Adriana Manrique Gutierrez)

When astronomers gathered in Seattle last week for the 241st Meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS), one of the largest conferences of astronomers, there was a celebratory mood among many there. The meeting was the first by the AAS since the release last July of the first science images from the James Webb Space Telescope that marked the start of a new era in the field after years—decades, really—of anticipation.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4515/1


4/I 2023 [13-16]

13) Mawu and Artemis: Why the United States should make Africa a priority for space diplomacy
by Nico Wood Monday, January 23, 2023

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Officials from Rwanda and Nigeria sign the Artemis Accords during the US-Africa Leaders Summit in Washington in December. (credit: NASA)

The Artemis missions represent the most ambitious human spaceflight program in history, demanding international contributions and coordination. As a prerequisite for participation, member countries are obligated to sign the Artemis Accords, a broad-based set of principles and guidelines to advance peace, transparency, and responsibility in space. Representatives from Rwanda and Nigeria signed the Artemis Accords in December 2022, becoming the first African nations to join the international program. The economic, social, and geopolitical potentials of the African continent pose a major opportunity for US space diplomacy, yet the United States has not adequately engaged with African nations. This diplomatic vacuum stems from a general lack of US prioritization of Africa and leaves it open to competition by China and Russia. By pursuing more African nations as partners in the Artemis Accords, the United States can capitalize on Rwanda and Nigeria’s momentum, demonstrate a sustained presence on the continent, and inspire a new generation of Africans through space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4516/1

14) What the United States should do regarding space leadership?
by Namrata Goswami Monday, January 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4517a.jpg)
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Japanese Foreign Minister Yoshimasa Hayashi signed a space cooperation framework agreement January 13 at NASA Headquarters, but the two countries have offered different strategic visions for space. (credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

The domain of space is changing fast. Once the realm of elite astronauts and space scientists who had access based on state sponsorship or university-funded programs, today space is truly democratizing, being adopted by almost anyone with a passion and an inclination to do space, creating companies, networks, and investing in the development of space. Look no further than countries like India or Japan, long dominated by elite state-sponsored space institutions but now creating enabling structures, be it in regard to new organizations, regulations, and investment opportunities for private citizens to develop space capacities and collectively take their societies forward.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4517/1

15) Not-so ancient astronauts and Area 51: the Skylab Incident
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, January 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4518a.jpg)
This photo of the secretive Groom Lake facility in the Nevada desert was taken by the Skylab 4 astronauts—who were instructed to not photograph the facility. Its existence created a stir within the US Intelligence Community in 1974. (credit: NASA)

[Editor’s Note: This is an extensively revised and updated version of “Astronauts and Area 51: the Skylab Incident” from January 9, 2006.]

On April 19, 1974, someone in the CIA sent the Director of Central Intelligence, William Colby, a memorandum regarding a little problem.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4518/1

16) Persistent cooperation on the space station
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4519a.jpg)
A robotic arm inspects the Soyuz MS-22 spacecraft after the Soyuz suffered a coolant leak December 14. (credit: NASA TV)

Ever since Russia started an all-out invasion of Ukraine last February, the space community has wondered what it would mean for the future of the International Space Station. Russia is an essential partner on the station, but at the same time Russia and the West were rapidly unwinding cooperation elsewhere, from commercial launch to the Russian-European ExoMars mission.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4519/1

5/I 2023 [17-20]

17) Review: Apollo’s Creed
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 30, 2023

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Apollo's Creed: Lessons I Learned from My Astronaut Dad Richard F. Gordon, Jr.
by Traci Shoblom
G&D Media, 2023
paperback, 196 pp.
ISBN 978-1-7225-0640-7
US$19.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1722506407/spaceviews

Most astronaut biographies and memoirs follow a similar trajectory. Such accounts start with childhood and, perhaps, the first inklings of desire for traveling to space. That’s followed by pursuing a career in military, industry, or academia that sets the stage for applying to become an astronaut. Then there’s the astronaut selection and training process and the mission or missions they fly. At the end, perhaps, is a discussion of life after being an astronaut.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4520/1

18) Our solar system is filled with asteroids that are particularly hard to destroy
by Fred Jourdan and Nick Timms Monday, January 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4521a.jpg)
An image of the asteroid Dimorphos captured by NASA's DART mission minutes before impact last September, revealing it to be another “rubble pile” asteroid. (credit: NASA/JHUAPL)

A vast amount of rocks and other material are hurtling around our solar system as asteroids and comets. If one of these came towards us, could we successfully prevent the collision between an asteroid and Earth?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4521/1

19) Space-to-ground capabilities are the answer to deterring invasion of Taiwan
by Christopher Stone Monday, January 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4522a.jpg)
An illustration of a Chinese hypersonic glide vehicle. Such a vehicle, combined with a FOBS system, could pose a major threat to US forces in the Pacific and beyond. (credit: Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance)

In September 2022, the Defense Policy Board met for “classified deliberations” on how China’s “fractional orbital bombardment systems and space-to-ground weapons could impact U.S. deterrence and strategic stability.” These systems were demonstrated in August 2021 when China launched a hypersonic glide vehicle, designed to defeat US missile tracking and defense systems, into an orbital path and then de-orbited to hit a target at a test range in China. While the board considered US response options, one option likely not included was the rapid development and deployment of a superior US equivalent space-to-ground weapon as a means of deterrence. This response option should be the direction the Defense Department pursues if the US intends to keep its defense treaty commitments to friends and allies in the Indo-Pacific and, indeed, plan to keep air and sea force projection capabilities as options in an anti-access fight.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4522/1

20) Human spaceflight safety in a new commercial era
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4523a.jpg)
NASA administrator Bill Nelson lays a wreath during ceremonies last week at Arlington National Cemetery as part of NASA’s annual Day of Remembrance. (credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani)

Every year in late January, NASA reflects on its tragedies. The annual Day of Remembrance ceremonies across the agency commemorate the three human spaceflight fatal accidents that clustered in the same place in the calendar despite being spread out over decades.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4523/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 04, 2023, 18:32
6/II 2023 [21-24]

21) Review: The New Guys
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 6, 2023

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The New Guys: The Historic Class of Astronauts That Broke Barriers and Changed the Face of Space Travel
by Meredith Bagby
William Morrow, 2023
hardcover, 528 pp.
ISBN 978-0-06-314197-1
US$40
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0063141973/spaceviews

Other than perhaps the original Mercury Seven astronauts, no astronaut class was more influential than what NASA formally called Group 8, announced in 1978. Until that group, nearly all of NASA’s astronauts were pilots with military experience; all were white men. The 35 members of Group 8—dubbed TFNG for “Thirty-Five New Guys” (with a more explicit alternative)—included the first women and people of color, as well as many more researchers and doctors, as reflecting changing expectations for the spaceflight with the impending introduction of the shuttle as well as a desire, if not an imperative, to have the astronaut corps be more representative of society.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4524/1

22) Comparing the NASA Advisory Council and NASA’s external advisory bodies
by Joseph K. Alexander Monday, February 6, 2023

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Les Lyles, chairman of the NASA Advisory Council (left) and NASA administrator Bill Nelson meet virtually with members of the NASA Advisory Council last February. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

As one looks across NASA’s history, the roles and the operating styles of the agency’s internal and external advisory bodies have been distinctly different in some ways but alike in others. This article examines the principal internal advisory entity, the NASA Advisory Council (NAC) and its committees, versus a major external advisory body, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (the Academies)‚ to explore those differences, all from the historical perspective of advice on NASA’s science programs.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4525/1

23) National Reconnaissance Program crisis photography concepts, part 2: PINTO
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, February 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4526a.jpg)
PINTO camera configuration (courtesy of the NRO)

This is the second part in a series on early National Reconnaissance Program satellite concepts for crisis management.

On January 27, 1971, the National Reconnaissance Program (NRP) Executive Committee held a meeting at the Pentagon to discuss conceptual adjuncts or alternatives to the development of an Electro-Optical Imaging (EOI) system. The concepts discussed included both National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) funded conceptual studies (Film Read-Out Gambit, SPIN SCAN) and independently developed contractor ideas (PINTO, FASTBACK, AXUMITE) to bridge the capability gap between Corona and Gambit film-based satellites and the next generation digital (EOI) satellite program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4526/1

24) What is the environmental impact of a supercharged space industry?
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4527a.jpg)
A Falcon 9 heads to orbit. Launch emissions like carbon soot are a concern to some atmospheric scientists as launch rates increase. (credit: SpaceX)

There has been a surge in the number of launches, and of satellites launched, in the last several years, thanks to the rise of megaconstellations and less expensive launch options. Last year set a record for orbital launches, with 186 attempts worldwide. This year is on a similar pace, with 16 orbital launch attempts in January alone.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4527/1

7/II 2023 [25-28]

25) Galactic dissonance for the Space Force
by Matthew Jenkins Monday, February 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4528a.jpg)
The Space Force is studying new initiatives, like tracking objects in cislunar space, even as there are gaps in its existing capabilities. (credit: AFRL)

In the early days of airpower, foresighted theorists like Billy Mitchell petitioned hard to demonstrate the value that airpower could bring to the warfighting abilities of the United States. Ardently campaigning, Mitchell got permission from Congress to illustrate this capability when in July 1921, his airmen sank the captured German ship Ostfriesland. It was, without question, a defining moment in the infancy of airpower that would pave the way for the eventual creation of an independent Air Force.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4528/1

26) India’s space security policy, part 1: history’s second cut
by Pranav R. Satyanath Monday, February 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3686a.jpg)
India tested an aSAT in 2019 after decades of support for efforts to ban ASATs. (credit: DRDO)

How does India think about the international security of outer space? India has been a spacefaring nation for more than 40 years. Its ambitions and interests have reached beyond Earth orbit. More importantly, the country has developed counterspace capabilities to defend these growing interests. Understanding India’s space security policy, therefore, is critical to reaching a consensus on any outer space arms control and risk reduction measures negotiated in international fora.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4529/1

27) Trends in NASA authorization legislation
by Alex Eastman and Casey Dreier Monday, February 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4530a.jpg)
President Trump signs the NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017, the last standalone NASA bill enacted. A NASA authorization was included as part of the larger CHIPS and Science Act in 2022. (credit: NASA)

NASA authorization legislation has become less frequent and grown significantly longer since the early 1980s. This represents a marked departure from the first two decades of NASA’s history, in which Congress passed annual authorizations of consistent length. We suggest that this reflects increasing political polarization in Congress, which reduces the frequency of non-critical legislation. Other factors likely driving growth are the legislative response to disasters, such as the loss of Challenger and Columbia, and the growing scope of the space program itself.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4530/1

28) Too many or two few? The launch industry’s conundrum
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4531a.jpg)
ABL Space Systems launched its first RS1 rocket January 10. Seconds after liftoff, though, the vehicle lost power and crashed in an explosion that damaged its launch pad. (credit: ABL Space Systems)

After months of anticipation, the first orbital launch from UK soil took off from Spaceport Cornwall in southwestern England late in the evening of January 9. Virgin Orbit’s “Cosmic Girl” 747 aircraft, with a LauncherOne rocket slung under its left wing, headed out over the Atlantic for its mission. The event attracted a large crowd despite the late hour and the fact that there was little for them to see other than the airplane’s takeoff, since the release of the rocket and its climb to orbit would take place off the coast of southern Ireland, far out of view. (Attendees were entertained by other things, including a “silent disco” where they could dance away to tunes played on wireless headphones.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4531/1

8/II 2023 [29-33]

29) Review: Wild Ride
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4532a.jpg)

Wild Ride: A Memoir of I.V. Drips and Rocket Ships
by Hayley Arceneaux
Convergent Books, 2022
hardcover, 208 pp.
ISBN 978-0-593-44384-2
US$26.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0593443845/spaceviews

The future of commercial human spaceflight involves a lot of governments. A week ago, the Saudi government announced the two astronauts who will go to space as soon as May on Axiom Space’s Ax-2 mission, commanded by former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson with one commercial customer, John Shoffner, rounding out the crew. It was widely believed that Saudi Arabia would fly astronauts on that mission after signing an agreement with Axiom last September, although neither the company nor the country would confirm those plans until last week. Moreover, Axiom Space CEO Michael Suffredini said in a recent call with reporters that its next two missions after Ax-2 will primarily fly government astronauts from various countries, with perhaps a single private customer.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4532/1

30) Making something from the great balloon incident: space policy at the fringes
by Roger Handberg Monday, February 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4533a.jpg)
sailors recover the remnants of a Chinese balloon shot down off the South Carolina coast. Heightened awareness and tracking of balloons could provide data for use understanding unidentified aerial phenomenon. (credit: Petty Officer 1st Class Tyler Thompson)

The events around the shooting down of a Chinese surveillance balloon may prove to be boon for those who are searching for evidence of alien life coming to the planet Earth. UFOs, or unidentified flying objects—or, now, unidentified aerial phenomenon (UAP)—have been the subject of public interest mostly at the periphery of public attention due to the persistent lack of hard evidence. The US Air Force released a report (declassifying years of reports of unidentified objects) called the Project Blue Book covering the years 1947 to 1969 when that program was terminated. There were 12,618 sightings reported to Project Blue Book; 701 remained “unidentified.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4533/1

31) Will a five-year mission by COPUOS produce a new international governance instrument for outer space resources?
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, February 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3291a.jpg)
The UN Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space has started a five-year effort to develop an international regulatory framework for space resource utilization. (credit: United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs)

During its 2022 session, the Legal Subcommittee (LSC) of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) created a Working Group on the Legal Aspects of Space Resource Activity and gave it a five-year mandate to gather information, study the current legal framework, and “assess the benefits of further development of a framework for such activities, including by way of additional international governance instruments.” (emphasis added). A survey was sent to the LSC’s member states and official observers, with a response due by December 30.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4534/1

32) Trials and tribulations of planetary smallsats
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4415b.jpg)
Lunar Trailblazer is now scheduled to launch later this year after cost overruns prompted a NASA review last year. (credit: Lockheed Martin)

The growing adoption of smallsats is best known through constellations of communications and remote sensing satellites or the seemingly ubiquitous use of cubesats by schools and startups alike. But small satellites have been adopted in science as well, with cubesats and somewhat larger smallsats gaining use in Earth science and heliophysics in particular. Even in astronomy, where large telescopes would seem to be preferred, astronomers have developed small satellites for focused investigations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4535/1

33) India’s space security policy, part 2: getting space security right
by Pranav R. Satyanath Monday, February 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4536a.jpg)
India’s space policy should account for the capabilities of small satellites and responsive launch, and not just anti-satellite weapons, when considering space security. (credit: ISRO)

How should India shape its space security in the near future? The first part of the essay provided an overview of India’s existing policy on space security. Further, it also analyzed how the current policy shaped India’s decision to abstain from voting on the United Nations (UN) resolution to ban debris-creating direct-ascent anti-satellite (DA-ASAT) testing. This essay asks a different question: how should India’s decision-makers think about their nation’s space security?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4536/1

9/II 2023 [34-37]

34) Assessing NASA advisory activities: What makes advice effective
by Joseph K. Alexander Monday, February 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4537a.jpg)
Effective outside advice played a role in both developing the Hubble Space Telescope and conducting a final servicing mission of it decades later. (credit: NASA)

NASA inherited a culture of inviting outside advice from its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), and that culture has persisted to this day. The long history of interactions between NASA and its scientific advisory bodies provides a rich experience base from which to examine how and why some advisory efforts have been successful and why others have flopped. This article draws on a review of more than 50 case studies[1] of advisory activities that were conducted by both standing and ad-hoc panels created by NASA or by entities that were formally established under the auspices of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (the Academies). We ask what common attributes or recurring themes can one discern that help distinguish between effective efforts and run-of-the-mill communications?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4537/1

35) Three rules for peace in orbit in the new space era
by Brian G. Chow and Brandon W. Kelley Monday, February 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3926a.jpg)
An increasingly congested space environment is driving interest in space traffic management regimes, but those proposals need to ensure they don’t undermine space security for nations who participate. (credit: ESA)

The United States and its partners clearly recognize the need for a space traffic management (STM) regime capable of managing 21st-century space security challenges. Expectations are high ahead of the United Nations Summit of the Future in September 2024. Policymakers and diplomats are hard at work preparing the ground, partly via unilateral policy changes but also through sessions of the Open-Ended Working Group (OEWG) and the upcoming preparatory ministerial meeting this September.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4538/1

36) New rockets spring to life
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4539a.jpg)
Relativity Space has scheduled a March 8 launch for its first Terran 1 rocket. (credit: Relativity Space/Trevor Mahlmann)

Spring is approaching in the Northern Hemisphere, bringing with it the promise of new life and renewal. That traditionally involves plants and animals (and, perhaps, baseball) but this year it extends to launch vehicles.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4539/1

37) Journey to a cold and curious moon
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, February 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4540a.jpg)
A view of Triton and Neptune taken by Voyager 2. The Trident mission could have observed Triton both in sunlight and bathed in “Neptuneshine”. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Jason Major)

Four hours and six seconds after they had been taken at Neptune, the images from Voyager 2 reached Earth in August 1989, and they showed something weird. Triton, a large moon that orbits Neptune backwards, opposite the direction that most of the other moons in the solar system do, had some dark splotches on its cold icy surface. Planetary scientists enhanced them and processed them and saw what looked like plumes of gas geysering up from the moon and then bending at a 90-degree angle as they hit upper-level winds. Triton, which by all means should have been a cold, dead icy rock at the edge of the solar system, was active; way more active than anybody would have ever thought.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4540/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 07, 2023, 19:16
10/III 2023 [38-41]

38) Review: Original Sin
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4541a.jpg)

Original Sin: Power, Technology and War in Outer Space
by Bleddyn E. Bowen
Oxford Univ. Press, 2023
hardcover, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-0-19-767731-5
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0197677312/spaceviews

Last week, Air Vice-Marshal Catherine Roberts, the head of Australia’s year-old Defence Space Command, told reporters that the country was pursuing an anti-satellite capability of sorts: a “soft-kill” system intended to disable satellites without creating debris, like a kinetic ASAT would. “I think it’s a really important part of where we're going to is just looking at how we can have that electronic warfare capability to allow us to deter attacks, or certainly interfere,” she said.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4541/1

39) The Falcon 9 achieves the shuttle’s dreams
by Francis Castanos Monday, March 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4542a.jpg)
A Falcon 9 lifts of on its most recent launch March 3. SpaceX has already performed 15 launches this year as it seeks to fly up to 100 times in 2023. (credit: SpaceX)

One fascinating way of looking at Falcon 9 is to compare it to the late Space Shuttle. While completely different from a technical standpoint, they nonetheless have three basic objectives in common:

partially reusable: check
places up to 23 tons into orbit: check
launches once a week: check.
The last point is worth closer examination.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4542/1

40) Managing ocean sustainability from above: leveraging space capabilities to combat illegal fishing
by Cody Knipfer Monday, March 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4543a.jpg)
Satellite data, such as synthetic aperture radar imagery provided by satellites like Radarsat-2, can help identify illegal fishing. (credit: CSA)

The oceans are integral to our global ecosystem. As a source of nutrition and livelihood for much of the world’s population,[1] ocean health is critical for UN development goals.[2] Activities that jeopardize the sustainability of marine resources, particularly illegal, unreported, and unregulated (IUU) fishing,[3] are therefore a major international issue. Fortunately, space capabilities such as satellite radar[4] and multispectral imaging[5] are making it easier for the international community to track, characterize, and combat illegal fishing.[6]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4543/1

41) Suborbital spaceflight’s next chapter
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4544a.jpg)
VMS Eve, the carrier aircraft for Virgin Galactic's suborbital spaceplane, returned to Spaceport America in New Mexico last week as the company prepared to begin commercial operations in the second quarter. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

The last time the suborbital research field gathered in the Denver suburbs for the Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference (NSRC) three years ago, the field seemed to be on the verge of a new era amid ominous shadows of the looming pandemic. At the meeting, officials with both Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic said they were preparing to soon start flying people after years of anticipation, which meant that, soon, researchers could fly with their experiments: a goal of conference organizers since the first such meet a decade earlier (see “What is the future for commercial suborbital spaceflight?”, The Space Review, April 6, 2020).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4544/1


11/III 2023 [42-45]

42) Suborbital spaceflight and the Overview Effect
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 13, 2023

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Sara Sabry, who became the first Egyptian in space on a New Shepard flight in August 2022, said the flight showed her the interconnectedness of Earth and space. (credit: Blue Origin)

One of the selling points for commercial human suborbital spaceflight over the last two decades has been the opportunity to experience what’s known as the Overview Effect: the change in perspective that comes from seeing the Earth in space that many professional astronauts have reported after going into orbit or to the Moon. The question, though, has been whether the brief flight, going no more than about 100 kilometers high, would be enough to trigger it.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4545/1

43) Building a catalog to track the trash around the Moon
by Vishnu Reddy Monday, March 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4546a.jpg)
The Orion spacecraft spent only a few weeks in cislunar space on last year’s Artemis 1 mission, but debris from other missions could linger in this region for decades. (credit: NASA)

Scientists and government agencies have been worried about the space junk surrounding Earth for decades. But humanity’s starry ambitions are farther reaching than the space just around Earth. Ever since the 1960s with the launch of the Apollo program and the emergence of the space race between the US and Soviet Union, people have been leaving trash around the Moon, too.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4546/1

44) Searching for life and grappling with uncertainty
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4547a.jpg)
As astronomers discovery more potentially habitable exoplanets, like TOI 700 e (illustrated above), other scientists see a growing pool of worlds to test hypotheses about the development of life. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Robert Hurt)

One of the biggest developments of the last few decades in astronomy has been the explosion of exoplanet discoveries. The first planet orbiting a Sun-like star was discovered only in 1995 (a few had been found earlier orbiting pulsars). Today, the number of known exoplanets exceeds 5,000, with many more potential worlds awaiting confirmation.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4547/1

45) Russia returns to the Moon (maybe)
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, March 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4548a.jpg)
Russia has been preparing its Luna-25 mission for over seven years. Luna-24 was launched in the 1970s and was the culmination of a series of impressive lunar missions. However, Soviet and Russian planetary science missions have had a poor track record for decades. (credit: Lavochkin)

The Russian space agency Roscosmos recently announced that it plans to launch its long-delayed Luna-25 mission to the Moon in July of this year. Maybe, just maybe, they will launch the robotic spacecraft this summer, but it seems doubtful that the mission will succeed at its ambitious goal of landing at the Moon’s south pole.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4548/1


12/III 2023 [46-49]

46) Review: NACA to NASA to Now
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 20, 2023

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NACA to NASA to Now: The Frontiers of Air and Space in the American Century
by Roger Launius
NASA, 2023
ebook, 292 pp., illus.
free
https://www.nasa.gov/connect/ebooks/naca-to-nasa-to-now.html

There is no shortage of histories of NASA. Some are high-level overviews of NASA’s activities since the start of the Space Age in the 1950s, while others dive deep into specific programs, missions, or careers. Do we really need another overview of the agency?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4549/1

47) A solution to the growing problem of satellite interference with radio astronomy
by Christopher Gordon De Pree, Christopher R. Anderson, and Mariya Zheleva Monday, March 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4550a.jpg)
While the Green Bank Observatory is located in a radio quiet zone to shield it from terrestrial interference, it and other radio telescopes facing growing interference from satellites. (credit: Green Bank Observatory/Jee Seymour)

Visible light is just one part of the electromagnetic spectrum that astronomers use to study the universe. The James Webb Space Telescope was built to see infrared light, other space telescopes capture X-ray images, and observatories like the Green Bank Telescope, the Very Large Array, the Atacama Large Millimeter Array and dozens of other observatories around the world work at radio wavelengths.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4550/1

48) Space storm rising
by Joseph Horvath and Christopher Allen Monday, March 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4551b.jpg)
As SpaceX and other companies in the industry continue to grow, companies struggle to hire and retain workers. (credit: SpaceX)

There is a storm coming for the space industry. The workforce is not large enough to support the needs of the current commercial and government landscape. Without quality talent entering the space workforce quickly, the near vertical trajectory of economic growth will drastically miss estimates. In fact, the storm is already here, as most organizations are consistently competing for the same talent, rather than investing in new professional development models capable of creating sustainable talent pipelines. Stuck in an outdated paradigm for learning and professional development, the space industry must grow out from under this to solve this problem.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4551/1

49) The hard truths of NASA’s planetary program
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 20, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4189b.jpg)
NASA postponed the launch of the VERITAS mission to orbit Venus by at least three years because of budget pressures and institutional problems, rather than anything with the mission itself. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

One of the biggest scientific findings from last week’s Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference (LPSC) came from decades-old data.

Scientists announced at the conference that they had found the most compelling evidence yet of recent volcanic activity on Venus based on observations by NASA’S Magellan orbiter in the early 1990s. Two radar images of a region, taken eight months apart, showed changes in a volcanic vent consistent with an eruption.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4552/1


13/III 2023 [50-53]

50) Review: Comet Madness
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 27, 2023

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Comet Madness: How the 1910 Return of Halley’s Comet (Almost) Destroyed Civilization
by Richard J. Goodrich
Prometheus, 2023
hardcover, 282 pp.
ISBN 978-1-63388-856-2
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1633888568/spaceviews

There is a steady stream of stories, in at least some parts of the media, about asteroid close calls and potential impacts. Over the weekend, for example, an asteroid called 2023 DZ2 passed less than half the distance of the Moon from the Earth. NASA noted the asteroid posed no impact threat. A few weeks earlier, a similarly designated asteroid, 2023 DW, was found to have a very small chance of hitting the Earth on Valentine’s Day 2046.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4553/1

51) Space policy: why a step-by-step plan matters
by Namrata Goswami Monday, March 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4554a.jpg)
A US National Space Council meeting in December 2021. While the processes countries follow to develop space policy differ, they follow a similar series of steps. (credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky)

We want to go to space! Escape Earth’s gravity, get to orbit, and then travel to cislunar space, establish a presence on the Moon, and utilize the Moon as our eighth continent before we venture out into our solar system. It appears as a dark void, and yet the unknown does call to us. Earth itself is a spaceship, which for now, is the only habitable planet in our solar system. We may discover Earth-like planets that might sustain life in other solar systems, but even if we do, we might not be able to ever know or visit them given the enormous distances.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4554/1

52) Europe contemplates a space revolution
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4555a.jpg)
An independent committee commissioned by ESA says Europe should develop an ambitious human spaceflight program, one with a goal of an ”independent and sustainable” European human lunar landing in a decade. (credit: ESA/Olivier Pâques)

The current head of the European Space Agency has made clear his interest in giving Europe an independent human spaceflight capability, rather than relying on partners like the United States. “I’m restarting the debate on whether Europe should have such a capability,” Josef Aschabcher said shortly after ESA’s ministerial meeting last November where the agency also unveiled its new class of astronauts (see “Europe selects new astronauts as it weighs its human spaceflight future”, The Space Review, December 5, 2022.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4555/1

53) Indian ASAT: Mission Shakti should be a comma, not a full stop
by Ajey Lele Monday, March 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/3686a.jpg)
Four years after India tested a direct-ascent ASAT, questions remain about India’s space deterrence strategy and what other ASAT capabilities the country’s military may be developing. (credit: DRDO)

On March 27, 2019, India tested an anti-satellite weapon (ASAT) during an operation codenamed Mission Shakti. Now four years have passed since India emerged as the fourth state in the world to achieve such capabilities after the US, Russia, and China. This could be an opportune time to do some kind of audit about India’s effort towards evolving a space deterrence mechanism. On the face of it, no significant activity has been observed by India to take any next steps towards developing an effective space deterrence mechanism since the test. Here, it is important to give some margin to the scientific community and policymakers since not only India but the entire world had faced unforeseen challenges owing to Covid-19 crisis, which ended up delaying various programs, including in India.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4556/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 07, 2023, 15:26
14/IV 2023 [54-57]

54) Review: Reclaiming Space
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4557a.jpg)

Reclaiming Space: Progressive and Multicultural Visions of Space Exploration
edited by James S.J. Schwartz, Linda Billings, and Erika Nesvold
Oxford University Press, 2023
hardcover, 392 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-19-760479-3
US$49.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/019760479X/spaceviews

The rise of commercial space ventures, and the people running them, has been remarkably divisive. Some see those companies and their founders as leaders opening a new era of opportunity to explore space and harness its resources; other see them as profiteers despoiling the cosmos, be it through filling the sky with satellites or mining the Moon, while exacerbating inequalities on Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4557/1

55) Exploitation beyond our planet: the risks of forced labor in space mining
by Julia Muraszkiewicz Monday, April 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4074a.jpg)
Future plans to mine resources from the Moon or asteroids raises questions about who will do that work. (credit: ESA)

I work in two subjects: human trafficking (or modern slavery, as that increasingly seems to be the preferred term) and space law (here, last time I checked it is still called space law). Currently, they are dominated by two issues that link the two fields together: forced labor and mining.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4558/1

56) Sustainability lessons from Artemis: How SLS and Orion succeeded
by Frank Slazer Monday, April 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4559a.jpg)
SLS and Orion had to survive a variety of political changes to make it to the launch of Artemis 1 last November. (credit: NASA/Isaac Watson)

In the wake of NASA’s November 2022 Artemis 1 mission success, it’s worth examining how its two major elements, the Orion and Space Launch System programs, have endured despite two changes in the White House, several changes in party control of the House and Senate, and efforts by the Obama Administration to cancel them. If any NASA program is a study in sustainability, it’s Artemis, and in our politically divided time, its lessons of stability are needed now more than ever.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4559/1

57) Robotic Mars exploration after sample return
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4560a.jpg)
New missions are needed not just for science but also to maintain relay capabilities as spacecraft like Mars Odyssey, launched in 2001, near the end of their missions. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

For the Mars science community, all eyes are on Mars Sample Return (MSR), the campaign of missions by NASA and ESA to collect Martian rock samples to be returned to Earth in the early 2030s. At last month’s Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference (LPSC) outside Houston, scientists celebrated the recent completion of a sample cache by the Perseverance rover as the rover headed up the delta in Jezero Crater to collect more samples.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4560/1


15/IV 2023 [58-61]

58) Review: Off-Earth
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4561a.jpg)

Off-Earth: Ethical Questions and Quandaries for Living in Outer Space
by Erika Nesvold
MIT Press, 2023
hardcover, 304 pp.
ISBN 978-0-262-04754-8
US$27.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262047543/spaceviews

A session at last month’s annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) was devoted to the ethics of space. One person on the hour-long panel examined the ethics of exploration, while a second focused on planetary defense issues, such as the ethics of using a weapon of mass destruction—a nuclear weapon, whose use in space is prohibited by the Outer Space Treaty—to deflect an incoming asteroid.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4561/1

59) How satellites and space junk may make dark night skies brighter
by Jessica Heim Monday, April 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4562a.jpg)
An increase in satellites and debris in orbit could add more than $20 million to the cost of one survey at the Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile. (credit: Todd Mason, Mason Productions Inc. / LSST Corporation)

Since time immemorial, humans around the world have gazed up in wonder at the night sky. The starry night sky has not only inspired countless works of music, art, and poetry, but has also played an important role in timekeeping, navigation, and agricultural practices in many traditions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4562/1

60) The spaceport bottleneck
by Tom Marotta Monday, April 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4563a.jpg)
Two Falcon 9 rockets on neighboring pads in Florida for launches last year. The growing pace of launches and limitations of current spaceport infrastructure is becoming a bottleneck. (credit: SpaceX)

Why does the United States have so many unused spaceports?

Interstate 95 in Northern Virginia is regularly congested with traffic. The source of the problem is a short section of the highway that abruptly narrows from five lanes to three. Fast-moving highway traffic slows to a crawl resulting in snarled commutes, missed deliveries, and ruined vacations.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4563/1

61) First four
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4564a.jpg)
The Artemis 2 crew of (from left) Jeremy Hansen, Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman, and Christina Koch on stage at Ellington Airport in Houston April 3 after being named as the crew of Artemis 2. (credit: NASA/James Blair)

There were two big events in Houston last Monday, and both involved the number four.

Over the weekend, Houston’s NRG Stadium hosted the Final Four, the conclusion of the NCAA men’s college basketball playoff. Monday night was the final, pitting the University of Connecticut against San Diego State University to wrap up a tournament that lived up to its “March Madness” moniker.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4564/1


16/IV 2023 [62-65]

62) Review: The Space Economy
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4565a.jpg)

The Space Economy: Capitalize on the Greatest Business Opportunity of Our Lifetime
by Chad Anderson
Wiley, 2023
hardcover, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-1-119-90372-7
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1119903726/spaceviews

It is far from the best of times for the entrepreneurial space field. Earlier this month, Virgin Orbit filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after running out of money, a situation exacerbated, but not directly caused, by its launch failure in January (see “Go big or go home”, The Space Review, this issue). It, like many other space companies that went public in the last two years through mergers with special-purpose acquisition companies (SPACs), raised far less money than expected and saw their share prices plummet. Another launch company, Astra, said last week it won a 180-day extension from Nasdaq to get its share price above $1 or else be delisted from the exchange; as of the end of last week, it was trading at 38.6 cents per share.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4565/1

63) Internet of Things: the China perspective
by Henk H.F. Smid Monday, April 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4566a.jpg)
China could start launching later this year a satellite constellation that would support its efforts to be a world leader in Internet of Things technologies. (credit: CNSA)

The interconnection of physical and virtual things through information and communication technologies, the Internet of Things (IoT), is emerging as the next front in global network infrastructure, impacting a wide range of applications and services. Due to its potential application in virtually all economic sectors, analysts expect the IoT to grow exponentially in the coming years, eventually involving billions of connected devices and dozens or more verticals around the world. However, pressing questions about the operation, safety, and security of the IoT have yet to be answered. Which international standards will guide the development of IoT technologies and supporting infrastructure, such as 5G networks and the necessary satellite networks? How secure is the IoT and what are the risks of the vulnerabilities? How is consumer data used and protected?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4566/1

64) Go big or go home?
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4567a.jpg)
Virgin Orbit’s last launch was from Spaceport Cornwall in England in January; its failure exacerbated existing financial problems. (credit: Virgin Orbit)

In the end, the air-launch company ran out of runway.

In the early morning hours of April 4, Virgin Orbit announced it was filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in federal court in Delaware. The company, which days earlier had laid off 85% of its staff, said the filing would help expedite a sale of the company after months of efforts to raise money failed.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4567/1

65) The truth is up there: American spy balloons during the Cold War
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, April 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4568a.jpg)
The Chinese reconnaissance balloon designated Killeen-23 by the US intelligence community, photographed from a U-2 aircraft in early February. Balloons, high-altitude reconnaissance aircraft like the U-2, and satellites, all collected intelligence during the Cold War, and developed technology that was shared among them. (credit: US Department of Defense)

In early February, the US military tracked a Chinese intelligence collecting balloon that it had designated Killeen-23, named after a notorious murderer, before eventually shooting it down off the East Coast. An early assessment by the US intelligence community indicated that the balloon’s payload was sophisticated and may have included a radar, among other intelligence collecting systems, and sent its data back to China via a satellite link. Balloons, aircraft, and satellites have long been used by the United States for intelligence collection. But they have also been intertwined when it came to technology development, with balloons perfecting technology that was later adopted for both aircraft and satellite intelligence use, and occasionally being promoted as a means to cover gaps in American satellite intelligence collection.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4568/1


17/IV 2023 [66-69]

66) Review: The Space Law Stalemate
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4569a.jpg)

The Space Law Stalemate: Legal Mechanisms for Developing New Norms
by Anja Nakarada Pečujlić
Routledge, 2023
paperback, 244 pp.
ISBN 978-1-032-30072-6
US$48.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1032300728/spaceviews

A recent essay published by Foreign Policy made a provocative claim: China was attempting to do an end-run around the Outer Space Treaty. The basis of that argument was an announcement earlier this year that a Chinese company, Hong Kong Aerospace Technology Group, had signed an agreement to build a spaceport in the African nation of Djibouti for launches of Chinese vehicles. Because Djibouti is not a signatory to the Outer Space Treaty and related accords, the essay argued, “China may see this new partnership as an opportunity to enable a potentially rogue actor and reshape global expectations of responsible behavior in space.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4569/1

67) Is the US in a space race against China?
by Svetla Ben-Itzhak Monday, April 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4023a.jpg)
A Chinese concept for a lunar base. Despite extensive rhetoric, any race to the Moon between China and the US is a one-sided race. (credit: CAST)

Headlines proclaiming the rise of a new “space race” between the United States and China have become common in news coverage following many of the exciting launches in recent years. Experts have pointed to China’s rapid advancements in space as evidence of an emerging landscape where China is directly competing with the US for supremacy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4570/1

68) India’s space policy and national security posture: what can we expect?
by Namrata Goswami Monday, April 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4571a.jpg)
An Indian PSLV launch of two satellites for Singapore April 22, days after the release of a new national space policy that encourages commercialization. (credit: ISRO)

India is a major space power in Asia. With its independent launch systems, satellites, spaceport, and long-standing space agency called the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), India has launched hundreds of Indian and foreign satellites since 1975, and sent missions to the Moon and Mars. India’s space program has long been a state-funded and state-led enterprise led by ISRO not only in research and development (R&D) but also in manufacturing of space systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4571/1

69) Grading on a suborbital curve
by Jeff Foust Monday, April 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4572a.jpg)
SpaceX’s first integrated Starship vehicle lifts off April 20 from Boca Chica, Texas, on a brief test flight. (credit: SpaceX)

For most launches, determining success or failure is fairly straightforward. If the rocket places its payload (or payloads) into its desired orbit (or orbits), then the launch is a success. If the rocket fails to reach orbit, it’s a failure. The only shades of gray emerge in those occasional cases where the rocket places a payload into something other than a desired orbit. There, the degree of partial success depends on how the payload can be salvaged and the effects on it on its mission, a debate that involves the launch provider, customers, insurers, and their lawyers, among others.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4572/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Kwiecień 06, 2023, 21:15
18/V 2023 [70-73]

70) Review: The Possibility of Life
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 1, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4573a.jpg)

The Possibility of Life: Science, Imagination, and Our Quest for Kinship in the Cosmos
by Jaime Green
Hanover Square Press, 2023
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-335-46354-8
US$32.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1335463542/spaceviews

Prospects for life beyond Earth have varied wildly between two extremes. On the one hand, discoveries ranging from the thousands of exoplanets in our galaxy to extremophile life on Earth make it seem, for many, that life may be commonplace in the universe provided the right combination of ingredients—organic compounds, water, and energy—is present. On the other hand, we have yet to find any evidence of extraterrestrial life, including decades of searches for radio signals and other technosignatures of intelligent life.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4573/1

71) Starship after the dust settles
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 1, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4574a.jpg)
The first integrated Starship launch “was roughly sort of what I expected,” Elon Musk said, despite its early end and the mess it made of the pad and surrounding landscape. (credit: SpaceX)

In the days after SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy vehicle finally took flight for the first time on an abbreviated launch (see “Grading on a suborbital curve”, The Space Review, April 24, 2023), there were celebrations by the company’s fans and debate among others about how successful this launch was. There was far less information, though, about exactly what happened on that April 20 launch from Boca Chica, Texas, including the issues that ultimately doomed the rocket.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4574/1

72) Building telescopes on the Moon could transform astronomy, and it’s becoming an achievable goal
by Ian Crawford Monday, May 1, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4575a.jpg)
The LuSEE-Night mission to the far side of the Moon is one example of the astronomy enabled by lunar exploration. (credit: NASA)

Lunar exploration is undergoing a renaissance. Dozens of missions, organised by multiple space agencies—and increasingly by commercial companies—are set to visit the Moon by the end of this decade. Most of these will involve small robotic spacecraft, but NASA’s ambitious Artemis program aims to return humans to the lunar surface by the middle of the decade.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4575/1

73) The Moon is harsh on missteps
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 1, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4576a.jpg)
Executives with Japanese company ispace watch an animation of the company’s first attempt at an ultimately unsuccessful landing on the Moon last week. (credit: ispace webcast)

The scene was both familiar and disappointing. A crowd had gathered in the middle of the night at a Tokyo museum to watch HAKUTO-R M1, the first spacecraft by Japanese company ispace, attempt a soft landing on the Moon. The lander, launched in December, had entered orbit around the Moon in March after following a low-energy trajectory, and was now making its descent towards Atlas Crater.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4576/1


19/V 2023 [74-77]

74) Review: Photographing America’s First Astronauts
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 8, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4577a.jpg)

Photographing America’s First Astronauts: Project Mercury Through the Lens of Bill Taub
by J.L. Pickering and John Bisney
Purdue Univ. Press, 2023
hardcover, 340 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-61249-856-0
US$44.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1612498566/spaceviews

Last Friday marked the 62nd anniversary of Alan Shepard’s suborbital spaceflight that made him the first American in space, a milestone that went largely unnoticed. Over the years there have been halfhearted attempts to make May 5 a holiday of sorts, but the fact there’s no agreement on even what to call the day—National Space Day, International Space Day, and National Astronaut Day have all been proposed—shows the limited success of those efforts. For most Americans, May 5 is Cinco de Mayo, an excuse to eat tacos and drink Corona.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4577/1

75) How government and industry should reshape the business of space
by Adam Routh and Brett Loubert Monday, May 8, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4578a.jpg)
Development of satellite servicing and other advanced services in space requires improved coordination between government and industry. (credit: Northrop Grumman)

America’s space industry continues to reach new heights. The public and private sectors are making significant investments in space, and technological innovations are pushing the boundaries of what’s possible. But despite recent optimism and momentum, the space industry cannot count solely on new technology to guarantee a bright future. To grow the space industry, government and industry stakeholders must also catalyze the business of the space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4578/1

76) Strategizing planetary defense
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 8, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4579a.jpg)
Both the White House and NASA planetary defense strategies support efforts to improve the rate of discoveries of near Earth objects (NEOs) through missions like NEO Surveyor. (credit: NASA/JPL)

It can seem like planetary defense—protecting Earth from asteroid impacts—is now a solved problem. NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission successfully collided with a moon orbiting a near Earth asteroid last September (see “Applied planetary science: DART’s bullseye”, The Space Review, October 3, 2022) and in the months since, planetary scientists have concluded that the impact was even more effective than expected in altering the moon’s orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4579/1

77) Stonehouse: Deep space listening in the high desert
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 8, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4580a.jpg)
The STONEHOUSE National Security Agency listening post in Ethiopia (now Eritrea) was operational from 1965 to 1975 and intercepted signals from Soviet lunar, planetary, and communications spacecraft. It also had a secondary role of communicating with US intelligence spacecraft, probably intelligence collection spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit. (credit: NSA via Cryptologic Quarterly)

During the Cold War it became common for the United States’ National Security Agency (NSA) to establish listening posts around the world to listen in on the communications of America’s adversaries. When the Soviet Union began launching satellites into space, the NSA sought to intercept their signals, building antennas that pointed up rather than across a border. These stations had to be located in spots where they were most likely to intercept signals coming down from Soviet missiles, rockets, and satellites, and one of the most specialized and unique of these stations was designated STONEHOUSE.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4580/1


20/V 2023 [78-81]

78) Review: When the Heavens Went on Sale
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 15, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4581a.jpg)

When the Heavens Went on Sale: The Misfits and Geniuses Racing to Put Space Within Reach
by Ashlee Vance
Ecco, 2023
hardcover, 528 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-06-299887-3
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0062998870/spaceviews

Many in the public perceive the space industry as being filled with, well, boring people. Engineers and scientists have reputations for being introverted nerds, after all. Anyone who has spent some in the industry, though, or has gone to conferences or other events knows that caricature doesn’t hold up. The field is full of characters, much like any other, with unconventional backgrounds and quirks that are sometimes beneficial and other times destructive.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4581/1

79) Falcon Heavy to the rescue
by Ajay Kothari
Monday, May 15, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4582a.jpg)
A Falcon Heavy lifts off last month. The vehicle could serve as a stopgap for NASA’s lunar exploration plans while SpaceX works on Starship. (credit: spaceX)

It may take SpaceX some time to surmount all the legal challenges involving its Starship vehicle as well as proving that it is satisfactorily reliable. It will happen, eventually, but it may take a while. But all is not lost.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4582/1

80) Congress must reject the Defense Department’s hope-based strategy in space
by Christopher Stone Monday, May 15, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4583a.jpg)
Pentagon officials like John Plumb (above), assistant secretary of defense for space policy, have discussed the threat posed by China, but there are disagreements about how to deal with it. (credit: Space Foundation)

In the last few years, the Space Force has established itself as a separate military service made from separate and longstanding parts of the Department of Defense (DoD). Having its own command structures and budget demonstrate that the service is moving toward the vision Congress had for it upon establishment in late 2019.[1] Unfortunately, the service continues to be fettered by the policy and strategic frameworks instituted decades ago. More troubling is the current administration’s misguided understanding of China’s strategy in space, as well as DoD’s continuing, inaccurate understanding of what makes a space deterrent credible. As a result, the Space Force is stuck implementing a deterrent strategy based on “hope” and not on warfighting capabilities.[2] If not corrected by Congress soon, this threat will continue to imperil our nation’s critical space infrastructure and vital national interests.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4583/1

81) A vastly different approach to space stations
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 15, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4584a.jpg)
A Crew Dragon spacecraft approaching Haven-1, the space station Vast said last week it could launch as soon as August 2025. (credit: Vast)

Fifty years ago Sunday, NASA launched its first space station, Skylab. In a single Saturn V launch, it placed into orbit a full-fledged space station with everything needed to support three missions by three-man crews, lasting from a month to nearly three months each. No assembly required—or, at least, none intended; damage Skylab suffered during its launch necessitated emergency repairs by the first crew to visit it.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4584/1


21/V 2023 [82-85]

82) Review: Destination Cosmos
by Jeff Foust
Monday, May 22, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4585a.jpg)
“Destination Cosmos” can at times make it looks you’re on, or near, the Sun. (credit: J. Foust)

Destination Cosmos
at Hall des Lumières, New York
through June 4
$25 per adult
https://www.halldeslumieres.com/

There has been a wave of “immersive” experiences related to space in recent years that have gone on display in museums and other locations. They’ve even showed up on smaller scales. At last September’s International Astronautical Congress in Paris, a portion of the large NASA exhibit was a room where images from the James Webb Space Telescope were projected on the walls: “a moment of zen,” one person staffing the exhibit said. It was indeed a welcome respite from the exhibit hall crowds.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4585/1

83) The dawn of the age of DART
by Daniel Deudney Monday, May 22, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4459a.jpg)
A illustration showing DART about to collide with Dimorphos last September. Demonstration of the ability to redirect asteroids opens new possibilites for humanity, both good and bad. (credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL)

Within the cascade of wondrous–sometimes astounding–space discoveries and activities, the recent successful NASA DART mission can plausibly make claim to marking a new threshold of epochal historical magnitude, not just for the often painfully slow human movement into outer space, but to the larger prospects for the survival of the human species.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4586/1

84) A lunar lander makeover
by Jeff Foust Monday, May 22, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4587a.jpg)
Blue Origin won a $3.4 billion NASA award to develop this new version of its Blue Moon lunar lander to carry astronauts to the lunar surface, starting on Artemis 5 at the end of the decade. (credit: Blue Origin)

Two years ago, NASA surprised many in the space industry when it selected SpaceX, and only SpaceX, for its Human Landing System (HLS) program, awarding the company $2.9 billion to develop a lunar lander version of its Starship vehicle to carry astronauts to the lunar surface on Artemis 3 (see “All in on Starship”, The Space Review, April 19, 2021). That prompted the two losing bidders, teams led by Blue Origin and Dynetics, to file a protest with the Government Accountability Office (GAO). When the GAO rejected the protest three months later, Blue Origin then went to federal court, only to have the Court of Federal Claims rule against the company that November (see “Resetting Artemis”, The Space Review, November 15, 2021.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4587/1

85) Saving Skylab the top secret way
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, May 22, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4588a.jpg)
The Skylab orbital work shop, photographed by the crew that came to repair it. One of the two main solar panels was completely torn away, and the other was partially deployed, as seen here. A top secret reconnaissance satellite photographed the station shortly before the launch of the rescue mission, confirming the damage. (credit: NASA)

On May 14, 1973—50 years ago last week—NASA launched Skylab atop its last Saturn V. During liftoff, the workshop’s meteoroid shield broke loose and ripped off one of its two main solar panels. Problems were immediately apparent to NASA technicians monitoring the launch.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4588/1

Note: Because of the Memorial Day holiday, next week’s issue will be published on Tuesday, May 30.


22/V 2023 [86-90]

86) China’s spaceplane returns: is this a new weapon in their counterspace arsenal?
by Ajey Lele Tuesday, May 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4589a.jpg)
Many Western observers speculate that China’s spaceplane is similar in both design and its use to the Space Force’s X-37B, sene here after its latest flight. (credit: US Space Force/Staff Sgt. Adam Shanks)

On May 8, China’s reusable spaceplane touched down at the Lop Nor military base. It was a flight lasting 276 days, launching last August from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. The vehicle is known to have released an object in space in late October, which possibly could be a small satellite. This was the second spaceplane launch by China, after a brief flight in September 2020. Chinese sources had revealed that this system is known as Chongfu Shiyong Shiyan Hangtian Qi, which means a Repeat-Use Test Spacecraft.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4589/1

87) Navigating space bioethics
by Vanessa Farsadaki Tuesday, May 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4590a.jpg)
Human spaceflight, including extended exposure to microgravity and other aspects of the space environment, poses biomedical and ethical issues. (credit: NASA)

The topic of space medicine acquires utmost relevance as humanity continues to push the bounds of exploration and journeys further into space. The fascinating nexus between bioethics and space travel raises interesting issues and concerns. In this opinion piece, I wish to investigate the ethical issues that occur in this uncharted territory and dig into the complex web of bioethics surrounding space medicine.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4590/1

88) The case for space ethics
by Magdalena T. Bogacz Tuesday, May 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4591a.jpg)
The Defense Department has released its list of tenets for responsible behavior in space, without defining the ethical basis for being “responsible”. [larger version] (credit: Defense Department)

While conceiving of space as human destiny, space settlement advocates often use rhetoric on behalf of all life on Earth. Space enthusiasts provide multiple reasons why we must categorically expand our civilization into space, ranging from the biological—to ensure the survival of the species in the event of a natural catastrophe or scarcity of resources—to the ethical or otherwise spiritual: to achieve our destiny.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4591/1

89) Red planet reality
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, May 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4592a.jpg)
“Stars on Mars” was filmed in the Australian desert. A group of celebrities lived in this habitat and each week they voted somebody out the airlock. (credit: Fox)

Here we go. All over again.

On June 5, Fox premieres a new reality show called “Stars on Mars.” The premise is that a group of C-list celebrities are stuck together in a simulated Mars habitat and go on various missions in fake spacesuits to compete for prizes. William Shatner—Captain Kirk himself—is back in “mission control,” overseeing the entire effort. This is the latest in a long list of space-themed reality shows, most of which never blasted off.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4592/1

90) Death of a launch company
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, May 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4593a.jpg)
Virgin Orbit hoped a bankruptcy auction would bring in a new investor to rescue LauncherOne. Instead, its assets were bought by several companies. (credit: Virgin Orbit)

LauncherOne made its public debut, like so many other things associated with Richard Branson, in a blaze of publicity. Branson and Virgin Galactic used the Farnborough International Airshow in England in July 2012 to announce the company’s plans to develop a small launch vehicle that would use the same WhiteKnightTwo plane developed for its SpaceShipTwo suborbital space tourism vehicle. (It switched a couple years later to a Boeing 747.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4593/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Maj 02, 2023, 22:18
23/VI 2023 [91-95]

91) Review: For the Love of Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4594a.jpg)

For the Love of Mars: A Human History of the Red Planet
by Matthew Shindell
University of Chicago Press, 2023
hardcover, 248 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-226-82189-4
US$27.50
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0226821897/spaceviews

It should be little surprise that humanity’s perceptions of Mars have changed over the years, centuries, and millennia. Our knowledge of the planet has changed, from a wandering red star in the night sky to a world with its own geological history and potential for life. At the same time, humanity’s knowledge of the broader universe, and the place of Mars within it, has changed.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4594/1

92) A review of Japan’s space policy after the H3 launch vehicle failure
by Junji Miyazawa Monday, June 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4595a.jpg)
The first H3 lifts off March 7 on its ill-fated mission. (credit: JAXA)

On March 7, 2023, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) tried and failed to launch the first H3 launch vehicle. The H3 is Japan’s first new major rocket in 12 years and is expected to replace the current H-2A launch vehicle in terms of high-cost performance and flexibility. The main reason for its failure was that the second-stage engine did not ignite due to electrical problems. JAXA is working to determine the problem’s cause and resolve it immediately. However, the next launch date has yet to be set. This article discusses the losses suffered by Japan due to this failure and some of the contributing causes of these losses. Finally, a mechanism for ensuring a better balance of costs and risks for all Japanese space stakeholders is discussed for a positive way ahead.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4595/1

93) Cultural considerations in space exploration: Insights for NASA’s Artemis 2 mission
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, June 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4596c.jpg)
The Artemis 2 astronauts will see things through their own eyes that no human has since the last Apollo mission to the Moon. (credit: NASA/James Blair)

NASA missions tend to be thought of as celebrations of hardware and technology but those missions that include crews also, and unavoidably, contain a human element. As a cultural anthropologist who has spent many years studying the human aspects of space exploration, including religion, socialization, and other astronaut perspectives and experiences, I have a few suggestions for things that NASA personnel and the people journeying to the Moon for the first time in more than 50 years should keep in mind.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4596/1

94) Whither Starliner?
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4597a.jpg)
Boeing said Thursday it was delaying its first crewed flight of Starliner, which had been scheduled for July 21, because of parachute and wire harness tape problems. (credit: Boeing/John Grant)

The gaping chasm between the two companies NASA selected nearly nine years ago to develop commercial crew vehicles was clearly illustrated last week.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4597/1

95) Barbarian in space: the secret space-laser battle station of the Cold War
by Dwayne A. Day and Robert Kennedy Monday, June 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4598a.jpg)
The Skif-DM experimental weapons system was launched from Baikonur in May 1987. The large black cylinder attached to the Energia rocket contained a system for pointing and controlling a laser weapon. This spacecraft did not carry the laser, but was equipped with pressurized tanks to test the system that would eventually power the laser with CO2. Although the rocket performed as planned, the Skif-DM did not reach orbit. “Mir-2” was painted on its side. “Mir” means “peace” in Russian, and there were future plans to use Energia to launch a follow-on Mir space station. (credit: buranarchive.space)

The night skies over Kazakhstan lit up on May 15, 1987 as a powerful rocket roared off its pad at the Soviet launch complex at Baikonur. The Energia launch vehicle consisted of a core stage with four engines and four liquid-fueled strap-on booster rockets. A long cylinder mounted on the side of the rocket contained the payload, a massive spacecraft with “Polyus,” or “pole”—as in north or south pole—painted in Russian on its side, and “Mir-2” painted on its front. “Mir” means “peace” in Russian, a name that was possibly advertising, a cover story, or an ironic joke.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4598/1

24/VI 2023 [96-99]

96) Review: After Apollo
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 12, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4599a.jpg)

After Apollo: Cultural Legacies of the Race to the Moon
by J. Bret Bennington and Rodney F. Hill (editors)
University Press of Florida, 2023
hardcover, 210 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-68340-357-9
US$90.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1683403576/spaceviews

The 50th anniversary of the Apollo landings on the Moon was an opportunity for historical reflection and reassessment as well as thinking about the future. But surely, six months after the golden anniversary of the last Apollo landing, Apollo 17, that opportunity has passed.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4599/1

97) A case for space in the Caribbean: a historic and strategic perspective
by Kaylon J. Paterson Monday, June 12, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4600a.jpg)
A view of part of the Caribbean taken from the International Space Station. (credit: NASA)

The dawn of the new space economy has brought with it ample opportunity for the private sector to participate in what was originally a government-dominated race for space supremacy. Where large nations—mainly the US, Russia, and the European Union—dominated the industry for decades, we find that the new space age has made room for emerging powers like China, India, and middle powers like Japan, Canada, and North and South Korea to take front stage. With this, even nations with little to no previous space ties have found their footing in the industry, including the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Kenya, and various other nations across the African and Asian continents.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4600/1

98) Mars 2033: can we do this?
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 12, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4601a.jpg)
An earlier Boeing concept for a Mars transport. Even with time running out, some Mars advocates still think a 2033 crewed mission to orbit or fly by Mars is feasible. (credit: Boeing)

It’s a slogan that not only could fit on a bumper sticker, it was a bumper sticker.

For several years, Ed Perlmutter, a congressman who served on the House Science Committee, pushed NASA and others to accelerate plans for a human mission to Mars. At many hearings, the Colorado Democrat would brandish a bumper sticker with an image of Mars and the words “2033: We Can Do This,” the “this” being a human mission to Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4601/1

99) Why laws and norms matter in space
by Senjuti Mallick Monday, June 12, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4602a.jpg)
Growing numbers of satellites and debris illustrate the need for laws and norms to ensure safe space operations. (credit: ESA)

Space may be the final frontier and at times may feel like the untamed Wild West, but it is not outside the purview of the law. Consider that, at the outset of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian-state actors launched a cyberattack against ViaSat’s KA-SAT commercial satellite network, disabling thousands of modems across Ukraine and Europe. Subsequently, SpaceX stepped up to provide Starlink services to Ukraine, which was instrumental in the Ukrainian military’s ability to defend itself. Failing in their attempts to jam Starlink, intelligence indicates that Russia planned to target Starlink through kinetic means. This gives rise to the question as to whether Russia could legally use this clandestine weapon to target Starlink. The brief answer is no.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4602/1

25/VI 2023 [100-103]

100) Review: From the Earth to Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 19, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4603a.jpg)

From the Earth to Mars: The Surprising History of the Rocket Pioneers Who Launched Humanity Into Space
by Jeffrey Manber
Multiverse Media, 2023
paperback, 106 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-960119-67-4
US$23.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1960119672/spaceviews

The Space Age is conventionally defined as starting with the launch of Sputnik in 1957. There was, of course, an extensive history leading up to that launch, with some preferring to define the era as starting with the first successful suborbital V-2 launch almost exactly 15 years earlier. But even before that there had been decades of development and dreaming about rockets for space travel.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4603/1

101) The implications of the UK’s National Space Strategy on special operations
by Jack Sharpe, Fotios Moustakis, Markos Trichas, and Damian Terrill Monday, June 19, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4604a.jpg)
The United Kingdom is focusing more on both civil and military space, including establishing a UK Space Command. (credit: UK Space Command)

Space capabilities have become an integral part of our daily lives, yet their significance often goes unnoticed by many. While space has captivated generations and driven nations to push technological boundaries, it remains an unsung enabler of modern life. The National Space Strategy (NSS) of the British Government is a testament to the criticality and potential opportunities presented by space. This document positions Great Britain as a pioneering force within the international spacefaring community, showcasing the UK government’s commitment to space exploration, technology, and research. However, the NSS falls short in terms of signaling increased capital expenditure, setting concrete milestones, and establishing realistic outcomes. This article will discuss the NSS, its potential impacts for UK special operations, and why UK Defence must integrate space with special operations planning and activity.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4604/1

102) A chaotic trajectory for NASA’s budget
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 19, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4605a.jpg)
NASA administrator Bill Nelson made his case for the agency’s 2024 budget proposal to House appropriators in April, who are now considering significant cuts in their spending bills. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The federal appropriations process is never easy, but some years are more difficult than others. This year appears to be shaping up to be one of the more difficult ones, particularly for NASA.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4605/1

103) From the sky to the mud: TENCAP and adapting national reconnaissance systems to tactical operations
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, June 19, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4606a.jpg)
The Tactical User Terminal was used to process electronic intelligence data from Program 989 satellites during the 1980s. This was part of the larger Tactical Exploitation of National CAPabilities (TENCAP) program. (credit: US Army)

Throughout the 1960s, the United States invested billions of dollars in developing various intelligence satellites to collect imagery and signals data on the Soviet Union and its allies. From the start, this data was intended to serve “national” level leaders, starting with the president, his senior advisors, the Central Intelligence Agency, and other parts of the intelligence community. It was also intended for the National Command Authority and strategic forces by providing images, maps, and electronic data for bomber and submarine crews to increase their ability to perform their missions. The US Air Force’s Strategic Air Command was a major customer for the signals intelligence as well as imagery produced by these national-level systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4606/1

26/VI 2023 [104-107]

104) Review: Under Alien Skies
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 26, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4607a.jpg)

Under Alien Skies: A Sightseer’s Guide to the Universe
By Phil Plait
W. W. Norton & Company, 2023
hardcover, 336 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-393-86730-5
US$30.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0393867307/spaceviews

Astronomers provided a bit of disappointing news last week about an exoplanet. Observations of TRAPPIST-1 c, one of seven planets known to orbit a red dwarf star, led astronomers to conclude the Earth-sized planet either has a tenuous atmosphere of carbon dioxide or no atmosphere at all. Before the James Webb Space Telescope observations, astronomers suspected the planet, while unlikely to be habitable, might have a dense Venus-like atmosphere. That could mean more distant planets could also lack atmospheres, if they formed in the same environment.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4607/1

105) How artificial photosynthesis may be key to sustained life beyond Earth
by Katharina Brinkert Monday, June 26, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4608a.jpg)
Artificial photosynthesis could be an alternative to traditional environmental control and life support system (ECLSS) technologies like this hardware. (credit: NASA)

Life on Earth owes its existence to photosynthesis, a process that is 2.3 billion years old. This immensely fascinating (and still not fully understood) reaction enables plants and other organisms to harvest sunlight, water, and carbon dioxide while converting them into oxygen and energy in the form of sugar.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4608/1

106) A veteran astronaut adjusts to a new era of private spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, June 26, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4609a.jpg)
Peggy Whitson spent 665 days in space on three long-duration ISS missions before a much shorter visit in May commanding the Ax-2 private astronaut mission. (credit: Axiom Space)

Peggy Whitson is America’s most experienced astronaut, having spent 665 days in space on three long-duration missions to the International Space Station in 2002, 2008, and 2016–2017. But returning to the station as a private astronaut, commanding Axiom Space’s Ax-2 mission in May, still required some adjustments.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4609/1

107) India joins the Artemis Accords
by Ajey Lele Monday, June 26, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4610a.jpg)
Taranjit Sandhu (second from right), India’s ambassador to the US, signs the Artemis Accords June 21 as NASA Administrator Bill Nelson looks on. Also participating are Nancy Jackson, deputy assistant secretary of state for India, and Krunal Joshi, ISRO space counsellor. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

Collaboration in space between India and the United States has some six decades of history. It is often mentioned as collaboration between two powers who share values like vibrant democracies and open society. The Indian space program was born in 1963 with the launch of Nike-Apache sounding rockets from the India’s first spaceport, the Thumba Equatorial Rocket Launching Station. In the first few years this relationship was thriving, with joint collaborations between NASA and ISRO like the Satellite Instrumental Television Experiment (SITE). Under this program, satellites beamed educational content to television sets for more than 2,000 remote Indian villages.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4610/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Lipiec 04, 2023, 10:53
27/VII 2023 [108-111]

Nie tylko LIGO, ale i martwe gwiazdy mogą służyć do detekcji fal grawitacyjnych

108) A subtle symphony of ripples in spacetime
by Chris Impey Monday, July 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4611a.jpg)
Gravitational waves create ripples in spacetime that alter the precise timing of pulsars that are then detected by astronomers. (credit: Aurore Simonnet for the NANOGrav Collaboration)

Astronomers use dead stars to measure gravitational waves produced by ancient black holes

An international team of astronomers has detected a faint signal of gravitational waves reverberating through the universe. By using dead stars as a giant network of gravitational wave detectors, the collaboration, called NANOGrav, was able to measure a low-frequency hum from a chorus of ripples of spacetime.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4611/1

109) What does the People’s Republic of China’s space program mean for Great Britain and the West?
by Jack Sharpe, Fotios Moustakis, Markos Trichas, and Damian Terrill Monday, July 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4612a.jpg)
Growing Chinese military and civil space capabilities create challenges and opportunities for the West. (credit: Xinhua)

Despite its relative infancy operating in space, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) has become increasingly successful in launching satellites and has become the only country to successfully launch a space vehicle to the far side of the Moon (Jones, 2021). These achievements have consolidated the PRC’s reputation as a spacefaring nation. Speaking in 2021, President Xi Jinping stated “to explore the vast cosmos, develop the space industry and build China into a space power is our eternal dream” (China’s Space Programme: A 2021 Perspective, 2022).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4612/1

110) Regulating a maturing commercial spaceflight industry
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4613a.jpg)
VSS Unity glides overhead on its way back to Spaceport America during the Galactic 01 flight June 29. (credit: J. Foust)

For a change, the significance of the flight was bigger than the spectacle.

Compared to nearly two years ago, when Virgin Galactic founder Richard Branson got his long-awaited suborbital spaceflight just days before rival Jeff Bezos (see “The suborbital spaceflight race isn’t over”, The Space Review, July 11, 2021), the atmosphere at Spaceport America last week was relatively subdued. There were no huge crowds of media or invited gusts, no celebrities or musical performances. Even Branson himself appeared to be absent, at least not making any public appearances at the spaceport.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4613/1

111) Spinning towards the future: crisis response from space
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 3, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4614a.jpg)
SPIN SCAN was a satellite studied from 1967-1970 and intended to provide imagery to the ground within 24 hours. The satellite would spin edge toward the ground while imaging, and then edge-on while recharging its batteries. SPIN SCAN was rejected in spring 1971, and it was not until late 1976 and the advent of the KH-11 KENNEN satellite that the United States acquired a near-real-time reconnaissance capability. (credit: NRO)

In the early morning of June 5, 1967, hundreds of Israeli aircraft took off from their bases and headed out over the Mediterranean and the Red Sea before turning toward Egypt. They attacked multiple Egyptian airbases, and soon more than 300 Egyptian aircraft were smoking wrecks with their airfields torn to shreds. Shortly thereafter, the Six-Day War was over.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4614/1

28/VII 2023 [112-115]

112) Review: Matariki: The Star of the Year
by Joseph T. Page II Monday, July 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4615a.jpg)
Matariki: The Star of the Year
by Rangi Matamua
Huia Publishers, 2017
paperback, 128 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-77550-325-5
US$36.50
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1775503259/spaceviews

Since the Northern Hemisphere contains the largest portion of Earth’s human population, general astronomical texts tend to focus on the stars viewable by these peoples. One focus area that does not receive much attention outside of hard-core astronomy books are those star groupings viewable from the Southern Hemisphere, and the mythologies surrounding them.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4615/1

113) Reality is underrated: Fox’s “Stars on Mars” takes off
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4616a.jpg)
The summer space-themed reality show “Stars on Mars” sends its participants on missions inspired by the 2015 movie The Martian. The show is more clever and watchable than you would expect. It airs Monday nights on Fox and streams on Hulu. (credit: Fox Television)

I was wrong.

Five weeks ago, I wrote about the Fox space-themed “reality” TV show “Stars on Mars” and predicted that it would be awful. I based that assessment on the commercials and the advertising, and my biases against reality television, most of which is—to borrow a trope from one of the more notorious examples—garbage. I expected to hate-watch the show.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4616/1

114) Don’t jeopardize national security in the name of competition
by Jonathan Ward Monday, July 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4617a.jpg)
While the Space force is looking to provide opportunities for new launch providers, like Blue Origin and its New Glenn rocket, a Senate proposal to accelerate that process could create national security risks. (credit: Blue Origin)

The establishment of the US Space Force marked a significant milestone in America's commitment to maintaining its dominance in space. As the guardians of the final frontier, it is imperative that the Space Force maintains the highest standards when it comes to the launch of mission-critical satellites. The Senate Armed Services Committee’s recent proposed changes to the launch services procurement process, however, risk undermining the Space Force’s ability to deploy our most crucial space-based defense assets.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4617/1

115) A crisis and an opportunity for European space access
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 10, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4618a.jpg)
An Ariane 5 lifts off for the 117th and final time July 5 from French Guiana. (credit: ESA-CNES-Arianespace/Optique video du CSG/P. Piron)

Two launches this month illustrated the current state of European access to space.

Last Wednesday, an Ariane 5 lifted off from Kourou, French Guiana. It was, in many respects, a typical Ariane 5 launch, carrying two communications satellites bound for geostationary orbit. One, Heinrich-Hertz-Satellit, was built by German company OHB for the German government to test advanced communications technologies. The other, Syracuse 4B, was built by a consortium of Airbus Defence and Space and Thales Alenia Space to provide communications for the French military.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4618/1

29/VII 2023 [116-119]

116) Could a 500-year-old treaty hold the key to peace in space?
by Daniel Duchaine Monday, July 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4619a.jpg)
As more countries pursue exploration of the Moon and Mars, it creates increasing opportunities for geopolitical conflict in space. (credit: CNSA)

Space is changing again. Much has been made about the “Second Space Age” where launch costs are cheaper and more countries have access. This is all correct, of course and we are right to think about it. We are not there yet, but the discourse around space is changing from merely a support system for Earth to providing value by itself.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4619/1

117) The Chandrayaan-3 mission to the Moon is underway
by Ajey Lele Monday, July 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4620a.jpg)
An LVM3 rocket successfully launched India’s Chandrayaan-3 lunar lander mission July 14. (credit: ISRO)

On July 14, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) started its latest mission to the Moon. For India, this is an important mission because an earlier mission Chandrayaan-2, launched four years earlier, was only a partial success. That mission had two elements: an orbiter and a lander and rover system. ISRO was successful with the orbiter, but the lander crashed attemping a soft landing in September 2019.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4620/1

118) For Mars Sample Return, more serious repercussions
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4621a.jpg)
A conceptual illustration of NASA’s current plans to implement the Mars Sample Return program in cooperation with ESA. NASA is facing new pressure to get the costs of the program down. (credit: NASA)

An event in Washington last Thursday evening marked the first anniversary of the release of the first science images from the James Webb Space Telescope, a declaration that the nearly $10 billion telescope was ready to deliver on the promises made over its decades of development (see “The transformation of JWST”, The Space Review, July 18, 2022.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4621/1

119) Smashing satellites as part of the Delta 180 Strategic Defense Initiative mission
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, July 17, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4622d.jpg)
Declassified photo of the Delta 180 spacecraft launched in September 1986 as part of the Strategic Defense Initiative. This was the first in-space test for SDI and it was successful, possibly bolstering the resolve of President Reagan one month before the Reykjavik Summit. The mission was classified until after it was successful, and was clearly intended to impact public perception of the prospects of the “Star Wars” anti-ballistic missile program. (credit: SDIO)

In September 1986, two American satellites smashed into each other high in the skies over the Pacific Ocean, creating a spectacular shower of sparks and streaks, and making a powerful statement. This was no accident, but a deliberate test as part of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI)—nicknamed “Star Wars” by opponents and the media—and one of the most impressive examples of rapid spacecraft development of the Cold War.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4622/1

30/VII 2023 [120-123]

120) Access to Venus
by John Strickland Monday, July 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4623a.jpg)
Images of the surface of Venus taken from the Venera 13 mission. (credit: NASA)

Venus is the opposite of Mars in regard to terraforming. In fact, you would practically have to terraform Venus before you could land humans on it. It has a planetary surface almost as large as the Earth’s. However, removing the 90 atmospheres of carbon dioxide, even at the very high volatile transfer rates proposed for terraforming Mars, would probably take many millennia and an enormous amount of energy. A low energy, faster alternative would be to build a 15,000-kilometer-wide sunshade for Venus which would cause the carbon dioxide atmosphere to collapse into a liquid carbon dioxide ocean or frozen dry ice layer, at Antarctic-like temperatures.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4623/1

121) Another technique to identify “unknown” satellites
by Charles Phillips Monday, July 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4624e.jpg)
The three CERES satellites, seen here before launch, are among those whose orbital elements are not included in public catalogs. (credit: Airbus)

A long-time interest of mine has been to look at satellite catalogs and see what is in them—and what is not.

The (default world official) satellite catalog is maintained by the US Space Force. They assign numbers to each known satellite and they assign the “COSPAR” designator (see below for a little more about that), which is one way that the international community labels satellites. They normally do an adequate job; the satellite catalog is at Space Track and many organizations and people use it.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4624/1

122) The value of public interest in spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4487a.jpg)
Despite the success of, and attention surrounding, the Artemis 1 mission, only a small percentage of those polled thought returning humans to the Moon was a top priority for NASA. (credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls)

The space community has long had an interest, bordering on an obsession, with public opinion of space initiatives. That interest can be healthy and necessary: publicly funded space projects, like those of NASA, do require some degree of public support to continue. But it also at times can become a mania: if only more people knew what NASA was doing and supported it, advocates argue, NASA could get the budget increases it needs to carry out those ambitions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4625/1

123) The new era of heavy launch
by Gary Oleson Monday, July 24, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4626a.jpg)
SpaceX’s next Super Heavy booster on the pad last week for tests ahead of a launch later this year. Vehicles like Starship/Super Heavy have the potential to reshape the industry based on their price and performance. (credit: SpaceX)

Three new commercial heavy launch vehicles with test launches scheduled during the next year may usher in a new age of space, depending on which succeed. The new heavy launchers are the Vulcan by United Launch Alliance (ULA), New Glenn by Blue Origin, and Starship-Super Heavy by SpaceX.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4626/1

31/VII 2023 [124-128]

124) Review: Unknown: Cosmic Time Machine
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4627a.jpg)

Unknown: Cosmic Time Machine
directed by Shai Gal
Netflix, 2023
64 minutes, TV-14
https://www.netflix.com/pl/title/81473680

It’s been more than a year since the release of the first science images from the James Webb Space Telescope, demonstrating that the $10 billion spacecraft has met, if not exceeded, the expectations of astronomers who waited decades to use it. The 12 months that followed have only reinforced those conclusions as the telescope has trained its mirror on the distance universe and worlds in our solar system, generating a cascade of discoveries with only a few minor technical glitches.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4627/1

125) Is China’s rise in space over? Indexing space power for the next space age
by Daniel Duchaine Monday, July 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4628a.jpg)
China has emerged as a major space power in part because of its rapidly increasing launch rate, but will the country cotinue to rise at the expense of other nations? (credit: Xinhua)

We will soon enter an age where space is not merely a domain to support Earth but another region, with regional great power competition. As space becomes a true region, international relations tools will become increasingly more enlightening. In this paper, I seek to introduce a way to track “Space Power” by creating an index showing which countries are great powers in space, which countries hold the greatest share of this power in space, and tracking this over time and into the future. Understanding these dynamics is vital for understanding the most likely sources and periods of conflict and cooperation.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4628/1

126) Should the loss of the Titan submersible impact space tourism?
by Dale Skran Monday, July 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4629a.jpg)
The loss of a submersible with five people on board has drawn parallels to commercial spaceflight and the risks people flying on such vehicles face. (credit: Blue Origin)

With the recent loss of the Titan submersible on a voyage to visit the Titanic, voices have been raised suggesting that the nascent space tourism industry requires immediate regulation. Before jumping on this bandwagon, let’s take a minute to compare the space tourist “industry” with the usage of submersibles and submarines for tourist voyages.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4629/1

127) The highs and lows of extreme tourism: The Titan accident and commercial expeditions to space and the deep sea
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, July 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4630a.jpg)
The loss of the Titan submersible with five people on board has triggered discussions about the differences between deep-sea and space travel, and between tourism and research. (credit: OceanGate)

On June 18, 2023, the OceanGate submersible Titan imploded in the midst of an expedition to view the remains of the Titanic, the famous ocean liner that sank after striking an iceberg on April 15, 1912. Between the Titan’s demise and the discovery of the submersible’s debris on June 22, speculation spread far and wide about the fate of the five participants. They were OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, Action Aviation chair and recent Blue Origin astronaut Hamish Harding, Pakistani business executive and SETI Institute trustee Shahzada Dawood, and Dawood’s 19-year-old son, university student Suleman Dawood. Conversations proliferated across news stations and social media about whether the five might be stuck in the submersible with a dwindling oxygen supply or whether some or all had of the passengers had already died.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4630/1

128) Nuclear space gets hot
by Jeff Foust Monday, July 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4631a.jpg)
Lockheed Martin and BWXT will develop a nuclear thermal propulsion demonstration spacecraft for NASA/DARPA’s DRACO program. (credit: Lockheed Martin)

Many in the space community had long recognized the value that nuclear power provides, particularly for missions beyond Earth orbit. It can generate electricity regardless of the distance from, or visibility of, the Sun, useful for both missions to the distance solar system or the Moon and its two-week lunar night. Nuclear propulsion, either thermal or electric, offers much higher efficiencies than chemical systems, and nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) in particular can significantly shorten travel times for crewed Mars missions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4631/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Sierpień 09, 2023, 08:12
32/VIII 2023 [129-133]

Książka o publicznym wizerunku kosmonautów.

129) Review: Cosmonaut: A Cultural History
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4632a.jpg)

Cosmonaut: A Cultural History
by Cathleen S. Lewis
University of Florida Press, 2023
hardcover, 324 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-68340-370-8
US$38.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1683403703/spaceviews

The impact of American astronauts on society has been documented since the announcement of the Mercury 7 astronauts nearly 65 years ago, as some rose to prominence while others carried out their spaceflight careers out of the limelight. What is less well known, though, is the cultural impact of their Russian counterparts. Yuri Gagarin rose to international prominence, as did, to a lesser extent, Valentina Tereshkova, but how were they perceived by the Soviet public and used by the Soviet government?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4632/1

130) Meanwhile, on Mars…
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, August 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4633a.jpg)
“Stars on Mars” requires the celebronauts to work together to solve problems loosely (very loosely) analogous to those that astronauts would encounter on Mars. The problem-solving aspects of the show are its greatest strength. (credit: Fox)

We’re in the waning days of the long, hot summer of 2023. The Hollywood writers and actors are on strike, movie debuts are being delayed and, while some new shows are still debuting on streaming services, there will not be much of a fall television season other than game shows and maybe some new cartoons. But “Stars on Mars” is still chugging along.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4633/1

131) Effect of upgrades to Starlink Generation 2 satellites on visual brightness
by Brad Young and Jay Respler Monday, August 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4634a.jpg)
A recent Falcon 9 launch of Starlink satellites. Astronomers have been tracking how effective SpaceX has been in reducing the brightness of those satellites. (credit: SpaceX)

The rise of large constellations of small communication satellites in low Earth orbit (LEO) over the last four years has, with it, led to concerns about the effect on space situational awareness, ground-based visual and radio astronomy, and the effect on the health and well-being of the natural world, including humans. Several studies have published the measurable effects of these concerns, and several more studies are ongoing. The issue has brought efforts, including new laws, to retool the licensing process for LEO in a new era of hundreds of thousands of small satellites instead of hundreds of large objects.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4634/1

132) Debate and hopes for consensus at UN space resource meetings
by Dennis O’Brien Monday, August 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4635a.jpg)
Themeeting hall in Vienna that has hosted UN COPUOS meetings, including on space resources. (credit: UN)

The United Nations’ Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) recently hosted closed meetings of the Legal Subcommittee’s Working Group on Space Resource Activity at its headquarters in Vienna. The Working Group has just completed the first year of its five-year mandate to review the regulation of such activity, including possible “additional international governance instruments.” Although it had planned to meet only during the Legal Subcommittee’s annual two-week session earlier this year, the Working Group failed at that time to agree on even a preliminary statement.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4635/1

133) Minding the space station gap
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4636a.jpg)
A Cygnus cargo spacecraft arrives at the International Space Station August 4. As the ISS hits its stride in research, concerns about its retirement and transition to commercial stations ar eon the minds of government and industry. (credit: NASA)

Attendees at last week’s International Space Station Research and Development Conference in Seattle got a small goodie bag of trinkets: pens, stickers, and notepads. It also included a small tape measure designed to fit on a keychain, one emblazoned with a logo representing plans to operate the ISS through 2030.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4636/1

Note: The Space Review is on a reduced schedule this month and will not publish an issue the week of August 14. Our next issue will be August 21.

33/VIII 2023 [134-138]

134) Review: How Space Physics Really Works
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 21, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4637a.jpg)

How Space Physics Really Works: Lessons from Well-Constructed Science Fiction
by Andrew May
Springer, 2023
paperback, 157 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-3031339493
US$24.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/3031339495/spaceviews

Scientists, engineers, and others in the space community usually have one of two reactions when they see bad science or engineering in a sci-fi movie or TV show. One is to simply let it go: it’s entertainment, after all, not a documentary. The other, of course, is to loudly complain about it on social media. When the movie 65 made its way to Netflix recently after a brief flyby of movie theaters, curious people tuned in—space and dinosaurs, after all—only to quickly complain that the movie was messing up its portrayal of spaceflight or asteroids (never mind aliens that, 65 million years ago, looked and acted just like humans.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4637/1

135) 1569 and 2023
by Bob Werb Monday, August 21, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4638a.jpg)
Just as Mercator’s map ushered in a new era of geography, society is ready for a new understanding and appreciation of space. (credit: Peter Thorpe)

The NewSpace community loves to use historical analogies and, as a charter member of that community, I’ve compared opening the space frontier to the European conquest and settlement of the Americas, Lewis and Clark’s travels, Roman road building, and probably others I don’t remember. Now, approaching my twilight years, I’m ready to admit that while these may well have been rhetorically useful, all are pretty weak analogies. There is, however, one historical analogy that I think is quite strong and compelling, as well as useful.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4638/1

136) The fault in our Mars settlement plans
by Isabella Cisneros Monday, August 21, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4639a.jpg)
Popular visions of humans living on Mars often overlook serious technical and social challenges. (credit: SpaceX)

Think about the first human settlement on Mars. A constellation of images from science fiction, NASA, or SpaceX likely spring to mind: white cylindrical habitation units dotting a rusted desert landscape; an astronaut donning a futuristic skintight spacesuit to perform an EVA; inside, a botanist tending to a Martian greenhouse teeming with fruit and vegetables. But what aren’t we thinking of? Even with all our plans for Mars there are problems we’re stubbornly avoiding, like the dangers of radiation, the ethics and perils of reproduction in space, and handling of settlement resources. We imagine things working out because there are parts of the challenge we haven’t considered. We’re long overdue for a Red Planet reality check. In 1967, following the fatal Apollo 1 fire, NASA astronaut Frank Borman blamed the tragedy on “a failure of imagination.” NASA hadn’t fully considered the possible problems with their new spacecraft and paid a heavy price. Today, when it comes to Mars, our imaginations appear to be failing us again.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4639/1

137) For smallsats, two ways to orbit
by Jeff Foust Monday, August 21, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4640a.jpg)
A Falcon 9 launches a Transporter rideshare mission in 2022. Such launches have become a leading way for companies and organizations to get smallsats into orbit. (credit: SpaceX)

This month’s annual Small Satellite Conference was the biggest yet. Nearly 4,000 people descended on the Utah State University campus for the event, packing the student center, field house, and various other buildings for nearly a week of presentations, meetings, and exhibits about the state of the field. It showed that the smallsat industry was as vibrant as ever, from increasingly ambitious student cubesat projects to new developments in larger commercial and government missions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4640/1

138) Despite the Luna-25 failure, Russia is not a declining space power
by Daniel Duchaine Monday, August 21, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4641a.jpg)
An image returned from the Luna-25 spacecraft days before a malfunction caused it to crash on the Moon. (credit: Roscosmos)

In the aftermath of the Luna-25 failure, a cacophony of voices from major news outlets and space pundits have been quick to paint Russia as a great power in decline. This viewpoint, while emotionally satisfying given Russia’s abhorrent actions in Ukraine, is not based in reality. But it is vital, both for understanding and for strategy, that we refrain from making sweeping conclusions based on isolated events. In the last decade, Russia has rebuilt and reinvested in its military space capabilities and has stabilized its share of space power.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4641/1

Note: The Space Review is on a reduced schedule this month and will not publish an issue the week of August 28. We will return to our regular weekly schedule on Tuesday, September 5.

34/IX 2023 [139-143]

139) The international community is not prepared for a future in space
by Austin Albin Tuesday, September 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4635a.jpg)
Mechanisms like the United Nations and its space-related committees can’t keep up with the growing challenges of spaceflight. (credit: UN)

International politics is undergoing a seismic shift. China is challenging the United States for global leadership, Russia is haphazardly asserting itself through reawakened imperial ambition, and states like India seek to go from regional to world powers. This competition is progressively spreading into space, as governments and their citizens increasingly depend on space for vital services such as telecommunications, navigation, and banking. Space has become foundational to modern society and will be key to future prosperity. As such, states and ambitious corporations are jostling for access to space and pushing outwards to distant celestial bodies like the Moon and Mars.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4642/1

140) It’s not easy being a Martian
by Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, September 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4643a.jpg)
The 2015 movie The Martian has led to a number of television shows about humans living on Mars. Many of them have been grim, but the recently-concluded “Stars on Mars” was more fun. Even so, the show had some interesting lessons about the difficulties of sending humans to the Red Planet. (credit: Twentieth Century Fox)

For years, Popular Science magazine compiled its list of the worst jobs in science. Many of them involved the collection and analysis of disgusting samples. But one of the surprises on their list was astronaut. Yes, being weightless seems like a dream, and the ability to stare out the window at the blue Earth sounds romantic. But there are severe drawbacks to the job, from the inherent danger, intense training, separation from family, deleterious effects on the body and, of course, hygiene (the most common question people ask astronauts is how they go to the bathroom in space, and the answer is never pleasant.) It’s not easy being a spaceperson. That has been a theme of Fox’s recently concluded reality TV show “Stars on Mars”. You can stream it on Hulu, or watch it online. What looked like the kind of show that would cause space enthusiasts to roll their eyes has turned out to be entertaining, visually interesting, and provides some useful lessons about what it could be like living on the Red Planet.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4643/1

141) The opportunities and challenges for science at NASA and ESA
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, September 5, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4644a.jpg)
Nicola Fox, named NASA associate administrator for science in February, says she is working to lower the boundaries to science at NASA while also dealing with budgetary challenges. (credit: NASA/Keegan Barber)

Earlier this year, two women from the United Kingdom took over as leaders of the science divisions of the two largest Western civil space agencies just days apart. In late February, NASA announced it selected Nicola Fox as associate administrator for science after serving for several years as director of the agency’s heliophysics division. She took the post just days before Carole Mundell started on the job at the European Space Agency as its new director of science. She had been a professor of astrophysics at the University of Bath and chief scientific adviser for the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4644/1

142) India is on the Moon, but needs to avoid the “Moon Race” trap
by Ajey Lele Tuesday, September 5, 2023

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The Vikram lander of India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission on the surface of the Moon, as seen by its Pragyan rover. (credit: ISRO)

The North–South divide in a global context is well-known. The Global South gets viewed as a grouping of states that are classified by low income, inadequate infrastructure, and large populations. This grouping is known to constitute the developing countries in the world. But today, one of them has reached the Moon!
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4645/1

143) Soviet television reconnaissance satellites
by Bart Hendrickx Tuesday, September 5, 2023

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A television reconnaissance satellite studied by the Chelomei design bureau in the 1960s. (Source)

Starting in the early 1960s, the Soviet Union launched hundreds of photoreconnaissance satellites that returned exposed film back to Earth in capsules. It was not until 1982 that the country orbited its first electro-optical reconnaissance satellite, capable of sending imagery back to Earth in near real time. As a stopgap measure, proposals were tabled in the 1960s and 1970s for achieving the same goal by using reconnaissance satellites carrying television cameras. Such cameras were ultimately flown on two uncrewed versions of the Almaz military space station in the late 1980s/early 1990s, but by that time the technology was already outdated. While some information on these projects has emerged in the past 20 years or so, the details remain sketchy.[1]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4646/1

35/IX 2023 [144-147]

144) Review: Interstellar
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 11, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4647a.jpg)

Interstellar: The Search for Extraterrestrial Life and Our Future in the Stars
by Avi Loeb
Mariner Books, 2023
hardcover, 256 pp.
ISBN 978-0-06-325087-1
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/006325087X/spaceviews

Some authors mark the release of a new book with a book tour or magazine profile to gain publicity. Avi Loeb published a scientific paper. The Harvard astrophysicist led a team that published a preprint August 29 summarizing efforts to find pieces of a potential interstellar meteor that fell into the Pacific Ocean in 2014. That work, which involved dredging a portion of the ocean floor off the coast from Papua New Guinea, yielded five spherules whose composition, they concluded, was so different from terrestrial materials that it could be best explained if they were from an object, designated IM1, that came from outside the solar system based on its high atmospheric entry speed.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4647/1

145) Key issues for the Japanese government regarding exploration and development of space resources
by Akira Saito Monday, September 11, 2023

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LUPEX, a joint mission of India and Japan, will send a rover to the Moon to look for water ice deposits. (credit: JAXA)

In June 2021, Japan enacted the “Act on the Promotion of Business Activities for the Exploration and Development of Space Resources (Space Resources Act).” This act includes provisions on the ownership of space resources. Japan is the fourth country to have a space resources act, following the United States, Luxembourg, and the United Arab Emirates, which have similar acts.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4648/1

146) Putting the private into private spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 11, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4649a.jpg)
Virgin Galactic waited until after its VSS Unity spaceplane landed on the Galactic 03 mission to annouce the three customers who had been on board. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

After years of waiting, Virgin Galactic has finally gotten into a rhythm of suborbital spaceflights. The company’s latest flight of its VSS Unity spaceplane, Galactic 03, took place September 8, and was the third flight in a little more than two months, after the inaugural commercial flight, Galactic 01, June 29 (see “Regulating a maturing commercial spaceflight industry”, The Space Review, July 3, 2023) and Galactic 02 August 10. The company had vowed to conduct monthly flights of its SpaceShipTwo vehicle and, so far, it is sticking to that cadence, with the next tentatively scheduled for early October.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4649/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Wrzesień 13, 2023, 09:29
O nadużyciu art. V Traktatu o przestrzeni kosmicznej przez Chiny w odniesieniu do satelitów Starlink.

147) China, Article V, Starlink, and hybrid warfare: An assessment of a lawfare operation
by Michael J. Listner Monday, September 11, 2023

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How China responded to alleged close approaches of Starlink satellites to the Tiangong space station may be more telling that the incident itself. (credit: CMSA)

“To fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence; supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance without fighting.”[1]

An odd event occurred on December 6, 2021 when the People’s Republic of China (PRC) filed a notification with UN Secretary General under Article V of the Outer Space Treaty. Specifically, the PRC complained on two occasions Starlink satellites, belonging to the non-geostationary satellite orbit system being deployed by SpaceX, allegedly nearly collided with the PRC’s space station. The notification was unprecedented in that such a notification had never been previously invoked and curious given the PRC used Article V to address its concern to the Secretary General directly instead of engaging with the authorizing state directly.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4650/1

36/IX 2023 [148-151]

148) Review: The Six
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 18, 2023

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The Six: The Untold Story of America's First Women Astronauts
by Loren Grush
Scribner, 2023
hardcover, 432 pp.
ISBN 978-1-9821-7280-0
US$32.50
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1982172800/spaceviews

More than 45 years ago, NASA announced a new class of astronauts, the first chosen for the shuttle era. Those 35 people included, famously, NASA’s first six women selected to the astronaut corps, who became instant celebrities as they made history, subject to countless articles, news stories, and other accounts over the decades since their selection. Is there more to add to that historical account?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4651/1

149) How to land a space gig
by Daniel Duchaine Monday, September 18, 2023

My “lessons learned” from more than 60 informational interviews

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Those looking for non-technical careers in the space field often involve working on Capitol Hill or in government affairs for companies or organizations. (credit: J. Foust)

Over the last three months, I met with more than 60 leaders, doers, thinkers, experts, and newcomers in the space community. I interviewed space policy think-tank researchers and civil space bureaucrats. I connected with prime contractor space business strategists. I sat down with “new space” visionaries.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4652/1

150) SpaceX launches a debate on monopolies
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 18, 2023

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As SpaceX continues to launch its own Starlink constellation, such as this launch late Friday, it says it remains willing to launch satellites for competing companies. (credit: SpaceX)

Last week, a store window in Smith & Son, an English-language bookstore in the heart of Paris, featured copies of Walter Isaacson’s new biography of Elon Musk. Some showed the front cover and others the back, which displayed a Starship vehicle on the pad at Boca Chica, Texas. The store also printed an enlarged copy of the front cover, a photo of a pensive Musk, along with perhaps the question of our time: “Genius or Jerk?”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4653/1

151) Live, from orbit: the Manned Orbiting Laboratory’s top-secret film-readout system
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, September 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4654a.jpg)
MOL carried a high-resolution camera whose film could be returned to Earth on the attached Gemini, but the NRO also studied ways to transmit images using film-readout systems. (credit: NRO)

What good is warning of enemy attack that arrives after the attack has occurred? That was one of the dilemmas facing the operators of American intelligence satellites during the 1960s. The satellites used film, which had to be returned to Earth, processed, and analyzed, which could often be a week or more after the photograph was taken. Some members of the satellite reconnaissance community sought to reduce that time, to get the images to the ground faster. This was the subject of a subsystem for the expensive and complicated Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) of the 1960s, but this aspect of the program has been overlooked since MOL was declassified eight years ago.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4654/1

37/IX 2023 [152-155]

152) Security dimensions of space economics and finance
by Jana Robinson Monday, September 25, 2023

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Chinese and Russian space efforts may be supported by private equity and other financing from Western sources, particularly Europe.

As of May 2023, there were more than 5,400 active satellites on orbit, and almost 3,000 of those are commercial. Some experts predict over 100,000 active satellites by 2030.[1] This, together with a significantly greater number of public and private actors in space, will lead to much greater pressure to keep the space environment viable and safe for commercial, civilian, and military activities.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4655/1

153) Hiding in plain sight: Is China’s spaceplane a co-orbital ASAT in disguise?
by Carlos Alatorre Monday, September 25, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4656a.jpg)
Little is known publicly about China’s spaceplane development, but its activities in orbit suggest it is testing capabilities that could be used as a co-orbital ASAT.

On August 4, 2022, a Chinese reusable autonomous spaceplane was launched into orbit from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on a Long March 2F (CZ-2F/T) rocket. Several weeks later, on August 26, a second spaceplane launched on a suborbital flight. Although the suborbital flight was relatively short, the orbital spaceplane flew a mission that lasted 276 days before returning to Earth on May 8, 2023. During its flight, the spaceplane, known as Shenlong, released an object that moved in coordination with its orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4656/1

154) Honoring and dishonoring the dead in outer space
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, September 25, 2023

How a Virgin Galactic spaceflight sparked a scandal in anthropology

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Customers on a Virgin Galactic flight float in the cabin. Among them is Timothy Nash, who brought with him hominid fossils. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

On September 8, Timothy Nash, a South African billionaire, flew to the edge of space in a Virgin Galactic suborbital spacecraft, the VSS Unity. Virgin Galactic began operating tourist flights in earnest this past summer and Nash participated in the company’s most recent excursion. Nash’s flight was not without scandal, however.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4657/1

155) A capsule’s fall marks the start of Asteroid Autumn
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 25, 2023

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The OSIRIS-REx capsule and its parachute shortly after landing at the Utah Test and Training Range on Sunday. (credit: NASA/Keegan Barber)

Most scientists leading planetary science missions attend the launch of their spacecraft, seeing them off on journeys across the solar system. Few scientists, though, are present for those missions’ landings.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4658/1

38/X 2023 [156-160]

156) Review: Elon Musk
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 2, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4659a.jpg)

Elon Musk
by Walter Isaacson
Simon & Schuster, 2023
hardcover, 688 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-9821-8128-4
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1982181281/spaceviews

It’s hard to imagine, at this point in time, anyone not having an opinion of Elon Musk. That is, in part, because of his growing profile, from SpaceX and Tesla to last year’s acquisition of the social media network Twitter (which Musk has since renamed X.) It is also because Musk can be polarizing in his words and deeds: some see him as nothing short of a savior of the planet and humanity, using electric vehicles to combat climate change and space to make humans multiplanetary, while others are repelled by how he runs his companies and his public statements. Just this weekend, for example, Musk tweeted (er, posted) memes critical of the Covid vaccine, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy, and the media. Excitement guaranteed, as Musk would say.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4659/1

157) How orbital refueling will unlock humanity’s potential in space
by Manny Shar Monday, October 2, 2023

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In-space refueling of satellites can extend spacecraft lifetimes and enable new capabilities. (credit: Orbit Fab)

The last half century has witnessed unprecedented growth in our understanding of space, both as a frontier and a domain of endless opportunities. Yet, as with any frontier, there are challenges and barriers that must be overcome. One such challenge is the current limitation of space vehicle endurance and mobility. The solution? In-space refueling.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4660/1

158) An ambitious decadal survey for research in space
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 2, 2023

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NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O’Hara work on the Cold Atom Lab research payload on the ISS, one of the key facilities there for supporting physical science research in space. (credit: NASA)

In other space-related scientific disciplines, the decadal surveys used to guide planning for research and investment have often recommended ambitious missions. Past astrophysics decadals backed what would become the James Webb Space Telescope, which is now delivering on that promise after extensive delays and cost overruns. Planetary science decadals recommended Mars Sample Return, which is facing its own cost and schedule challenges even as scientists continue to advocate for its importance.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4661/1

159) Secrets of ExoMars
by Brian Harvey Monday, October 2, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4662a.jpg)
ESA decided to cancel cooperation with Roscosmos on ExoMars just days after the invasion of the Ukraine, and weeks before the Rosalind Franklin rover was due to ship to Russia for launch. (credit: ESA)

When we think of the secrets of Mars, we think of life there, possibly hidden below its surface. A European-Russian rover, ExoMars, was built to go there. It was due to land on June 10, 2023, and might even have found signs of life there by now. Instead, its secrets remain locked up—but on Earth.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4662/1

160) Crisis in space: The 1973 Yom Kippur War and “crisis reconnaissance”
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 2, 2023

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A burning ammunition storage site photographed by an SR-71 Blackbird during the 1973 Yom Kippur War. This was some of the very limited reconnaissance the United States had during the conflict. This is a poor photocopy of the original photograph, which has not been released. (credit: CIA)

On October 6, 1973, tanks from Syria and Egypt rolled on Israeli-occupied territory as artillery bombarded Israeli military targets. At the same time, aircraft from these countries launched multiple strikes. The attack came during the Yom Kippur holiday, catching the Israelis—and America’s political leaders—by surprise.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4663/1

39/X 2023 [161-164]

161) Review: A Million Miles Away
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 9, 2023

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A Million Miles Away
directed by Alejandra Márquez Abella
Amazon Prime Video, 2023
121 minutes, rated PG
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21940010/?ref_=tt_mv_close

We are used to a steady, if low volume, stream of astronaut memoirs. People who became NASA (or sometimes ESA or CSA) astronauts describe their journeys to space, recounting the paths they took to realize dreams, often dating from childhood, about becoming astronauts. The individual stories are unique even if they share common traits and characteristics, like perseverance and persistence.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4664/1

162) With a tweet, America has joined the race to develop astroelectricity—hopefully!
by Mike Snead
Monday, October 9, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4665a.jpg)
As the European Space Agency and other governments fund space solar power initiatives, the US government may be showing renewed interest. (credit: ESA)

In a September 21 tweet, US Department of Energy (DOE) Secretary Jennifer Granholm suggested that space(-based) solar power (SSP) was now a part of the clean energy mix DOE is pursuing. This off-the-cuff announcement followed preliminary work begun last year by NASA—for the third time—to study SSP. While this announcement has not yet been characterized as an admission by DOE that their decades-long quest for practicable terrestrial sustainable energy has failed, this is exactly what the formal expansion of DOE’s clean energy mandate to include SSP really is. The world is now entering the “Age of Astroelectricity” where SSP-generated astroelectricity will not only substantially power the world (and America) with abundant clean energy, but it will, as Gerard O’Neill forecast a half-century ago, necessitate the permanent human settlement of the central solar system.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4665/1

163) NASA’s Mars rovers could inspire a more ethical future for AI
by Janet Vertesi Monday, October 9, 2023

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Mars rovers like Perseverance show how artificial intelligence can augment, not replace, human capabilities. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Since ChatGPT’s release in late 2022, many news outlets have reported on the ethical threats posed by artificial intelligence. Tech pundits have issued warnings of killer robots bent on human extinction, while the World Economic Forum predicted that machines will take away jobs.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4666/1

Trwa tworzenie systemu koordynacji ruchu w przestrzeni kosmicznej TraCSS (Traffic Coordination System for Space).
TraCSS będzie w porównaniu z obecnym systemem skanował niebo w celu identyfikacji bliskich podejść satelitów lub potencjalnych kolizji dwa razy częściej (co 2 godziny) niż obecnie.
System będzie składał się z 3. elementów (OASIS, SKYLINE, HORIZON).


164) Getting a new civil space traffic management system on track
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 9, 2023

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The growth in both active satellites and debris emphasizes the need for improved space traffic management systems. (credit: ESA)

More than five years ago, the White House released Space Policy Directive 3, which established a national policy for space traffic management (see “Managing space traffic expectations”, The Space Review, June 25, 2018). One key element of the policy was direction that the Commerce Department take over the responsibility for providing civil space traffic management (STM) services, like warning satellite operators of potential close approaches, or conjunctions, with other objects.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4667/1

40/X 2023 [165-168]

165) Maybe space shouldn’t be for all
by A.J. Mackenzie Monday, October 16, 2023

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The International Astronautical Federation held its annual conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, this month despite concerns about the situation in Nagorno-Karabakh. (credit: IAF)

Space advocates have for decades been trying to expand the audience for their broad vision of a bold a future for humanity in space or for specific programs and projects. At one level, it’s a laudable effort. Getting more people interested in space helps build support for programs, particularly when trying to get funding. Broadening support also helps expand the pool of potential scientists, engineers, and others who seek to work on them.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4668/1

166) The brave new world of space
by Aditya Chaturvedi Monday, October 16, 2023

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The increase in space access enabled by SpaceX and others is reshaping views of what can be done in space, and also how it should be regulated. (credit: SpaceX)

“Who controls low Earth orbit, controls near Earth space. Who controls near-Earth space dominates Terra. Who dominates Terra, determines the destiny of humankind.”

— Everett Dolman, Author of Astropolitik: Classic Geopolitik in the Space Age, and Professor, Strategy, US Air Force War College
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4669/1

167) Commercial lunar landers prepare for liftoff
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 16, 2023

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Intuitive Machines showed off its IM-1 lunar lander at its new Houston headquarters before shipping it to Florida for launch as soon as mid-November. (credit: J. Foust)

Houston Spaceport is not a spaceport in the traditional sense of the term. While the spaceport, located at the city’s Ellington Airport, has an FAA spaceport license, it has yet to host a launch or landing, and no companies have announced firm plans to carry out launches from its modest runways in the suburbs not far from NASA’s Johnson Space Center. Instead, the focus has been on turning the airport into an aerospace business hub, including a new business park that’s home to companies like Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4670/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Październik 10, 2023, 07:40
168) Roads not taken in satellite photo-reconnaissance: Part 1, the 1960s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 16, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4671a.jpg)
An Atlas-Agena launch in the 1960s carrying a KH-7 GAMBIT reconnaissance satellite. During the decade there were numerous proposals for reconnaissance satellites that were never built, including some that would have used GAMBIT hardware. (credit: USAF)

Today digital cameras are everywhere and most people under 30 will have no concept of what a film camera was. But film was a powerful storage medium for more than a century, and from the late 1950s to the mid-1980s American reconnaissance satellites depended upon it. During this period, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), which oversaw the procurement and operation of American reconnaissance satellites, studied numerous alternative reconnaissance satellite designs to meet new requirements.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4671/1

41/X 2023 [169-174]

169) Phil Pressel
Monday, October 23, 2023

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Phil Pressel, one of the designers of the HEXAGON reconnaissance camera, standing next to the engineering mockup of the satellite in 2011. (credit: Roger Guillemette)

Philip Pressel passed away on October 18 at the age of 86. Phil was among the designers of the reconnaissance cameras carried aboard the HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite from 1971 to 1986. In addition, he worked on other national security programs during his long career at Perkin-Elmer Corporation. He was an immigrant and Holocaust survivor.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4672/1

170) ISRO prepares for human spaceflight
by Gurbir Singh Monday, October 23, 2023

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Liftoff of the TV-D1 mission October 21 to demonstrate the crew escape system for the Gaganyaan spacecraft. (credit: ISRO)

In 2025, India is planning its first crewed spaceflight, carrying astronauts on an Indian launch vehicle, launched from India. On October 21, ISRO conducted an uncrewed in-flight abort test. One minute into the flight, the Crew Escape System fired for just over two seconds, pulling the crew module away from the launch vehicle. The momentum took the crew module to an altitude of 17 kilometers, where the Crew Escape System itself separated from the crew module. Neither the launch vehicle nor the Crew Escape System were recovered. The crew module descended to a safe splashdown ten kilometers downrange, first using a pair of drogue parachutes and then three main parachutes. About nine minutes after launch the mission concluded having met all the mission objectives successfully.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4673/1

171) ISRO develops its agenda for the future
by Ajey Lele Monday, October 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4674a.jpg)
The Gaganyaan capsule prototype used in the abort test is recovered from the ocean after splashdown. (credit: ISRO)

On October 21, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully tested the Crew Escape System (CES), part of its progress on the human space travel program called Gaganyaan. ISRO will be analyzing the data generated during the entire mission and is expected to undertake three more such tests to validate various technologies required to ensure the crew safety.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4674/1

172) My suborbital life, part 1: Childhood’s end, perseverance pays
by Alan Stern Monday, October 23, 2023

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Virgin Galactic’s SpaceShipTwo on ascent to space. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

Late next week, I’m scheduled to launch aboard Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity on a suborbital spaceflight. I’m not flying as a private astronaut, though, as most Virgin Galactic customers are, but as a researcher, headed to work in space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4675/1

173) My suborbital life, part 2: Objectives, timeline, training
by Alan Stern Monday, October 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4676a.jpg)
Inside the VG VSS Unity cabin in flight, where my work will take place. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

Late next week I’ll be undertaking my first spaceflight, flying a training and “risk reduction” mission funded by my employer, the Southwest research Institute (SwRI). This flight is in preparation for a NASA-SwRI suborbital research mission that is coming up for me as well, hopefully next year. That research flight will feature two experiments: one to assess the efficacy of the spacecraft for doing suborbital astronomy, and one to take physiological data on an experimenter undergoing suborbital spaceflight.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4676/1

174) The launch industry strains launch licensing
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 23, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4677a.jpg)
SpaceX is continuing pad tests of its second integrated Starship/Super Heavy vehicle as it awaits an updated FAA launch license. (credit: SpaceX)

There is always some degree of tension between companies and regulators in almost any industry. That tension can be healthy as both companies and government agencies seek the right balance between ensuring safety and allowing progress.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4677/1

42/X 2023 [175-180]

175) My suborbital life, part 3: The suborbital revolution is here
by Alan Stern Friday, October 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4678a.jpg)
A Virgin Galactic suborbital spaceship at release from its carrier aircraft for ascent to space. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

As I write this blog, I’m about to leave on a business trip to Boston, to lead a science team meeting of the NASA New Horizons mission, which I serve as Principal Investigator (PI) for. The meeting is a typical business trip, one of over a thousand that I’ve made in my career.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4678/1

176) My suborbital life, part 4: My research spaceflight training countdown to launch
by Alan Stern Saturday, October 28, 2023

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The central hub of Spaceport America in New Mexico. (credit: Spaceport America)

It’s just T-5 days to launch on my first space mission, which is set for liftoff on Thursday, November 2, from Spaceport America in southern New Mexico. Spaceport America is Virgin Galactic’s operations base for commercial suborbital missions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4679/1

177) Review: Deep Sky
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 30, 2023

Deep Sky
directed by Nathaniel Kahn
IMAX, 2023
40 minutes, unrated
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt28370567/

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4680a.jpg)

It was inevitable, perhaps, that a very big space telescope would end up on a very big screen. Once it was clear that the James Webb Space Telescope was both a technical and scientific success, putting its dramatic images on an IMAX screen was something close to a no-brainer. “It has to be on an IMAX screen because only that giant screen is making you fully immersed in these worlds,” said Nathaniel Kahn at a National Academies event in July.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4680/1

178) Shaking up the commercial space station industry
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4681a.jpg)
Northrop Grumman is joining forces with Voyager Space on the Starlab space station (above), dropping plans to develop its own. (credit: Voyager Space)

The early years of a new industry can be a bit chaotic. A wave of new entrants rush in, far more than can be reasonably supported by demand. The companies compete vigorously for customers and investment, while also forming—and breaking up—partnerships with one another. Ultimately, only a few will survive, with the rest subsumed by the winners or disappearing entirely.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4681/1

179) Roads not taken in satellite photo-reconnaissance: Part 2, the 1970s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 30, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4682aa.jpg)
The HEXAGON program lasted from 1971 until the loss of the last vehicle in April 1986. Throughout the life of the program there were various proposals to launch and/or retrieve it using the Space Shuttle. (credit: NRO)

Throughout the 1960s, American aerospace companies proposed and/or studied various reconnaissance satellites that were never put into development. These were intended to fulfill various requirements, often not very well-defined, to improve ground resolution, area coverage, or timeliness. (See part 1 here.) That continued into the 1970s. The early part of the decade included numerous proposals for satellites to produce imagery on a much quicker basis—a day or less—than existing systems.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4682/1

43/X/XI 2023 [180-185]

180) My suborbital life, part 5: Hi Five!
by Alan Stern Tuesday, October 31, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4683a.jpg)
Virgin Galactic’s patch for the upcoming Galactic 05 mission. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

Virgin Galactic’s Galactic 05 suborbital mission I am flying on, still set for November 2, is the fifth commercial suborbital revenue mission for Virgin Galactic.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4683/1

181)My suborbital life, part 6: Anticipation
by Alan Stern Wednesday, November 1, 2023

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Spaceship Unity on a recent Virgin Galactic flight. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

My rookie spaceflight is so close now that it’s hard to believe that its time is really here. We plan to fly on Thursday, launching aboard Virgin Galactic’s Unity spacecraft. As the flight nears, I’m hearing from a lot of friends and colleagues, with both questions and good wishes for the mission, which I really love.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4684/1

182) My suborbital life, part 7: Of risk and reward
by Alan Stern Thursday, November 2, 2023

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The Earth from space. (credit: NASA)

My reflections for today, launch day, are on risk and reward.

In my view, both are integral parts of what it means to be human. Risk and reward are also sides of a single coin comes up in so many ways across the days of our lives.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4685/1

183) My suborbital life, part 8: Welcome to space!
by Alan Stern Saturday, November 4, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4686a.jpg)
Virgin Galactic 05, nicknamed “High 5,” initiating the climb uphill to space on November 2. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

On Thursday I flew to space, and what a ride it was!

From the hurtling ascent, to the jam-packed three minutes of otherworldly microgravity to get our real work done, to the washboard deceleration of entry, and then the steep glide to a greased landing, it was simultaneously thrilling, fulfilling, and enchanting. And, there’s no contest, it was the single best work day I have ever had!
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4686/1

184) The FCC’s authority in regulating orbital debris
by Leighton Brown and Paul Stimers Monday, November 6, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4687a.jpg)
The FCC fined DISH for failing to move a satellite at least 300 kilometers above the geostationary belt as outlined in the company's orbital debris mitigation plan. (credit: ESA/ID&Sense/ONiRiXEL)

In a first for space debris enforcement, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) recently announced that it had entered into a negotiated Consent Decree with DISH Operating LLC (DISH) to resolve an investigation into whether DISH had failed to properly deorbit its direct broadcast satellite service EchoStar-7 geostationary orbit satellite. During the course of that investigation, the FCC determined that DISH had violated the Communications Act, the FCC’s rules, and the terms of DISH’s license by relocating the EchoStar-7 satellite at its end of mission to a disposal orbit below the elevation specified in its orbital debris mitigation plan and required by the terms of its license.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4687/1

Problematyczne staje się użycie SLS do dużych misji naukowych.
Mimo rozważania użycia SLS do wyniesienia sondy Europa Clipper to ostatecznie zostanie zastosowana FH.
Na razie nie odrzuca się opcji użycia tej rakiety do MSR.

185) Big rockets for big science?
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 6, 2023

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Scientists working on future large missions are turning to vehicles like SpaceX’s Starship to provide more capability at lower costs. (credit: SpaceX)

For the last few years, a handful of scientists have asked their colleagues to consider designing missions to take advantage of a new generation of very large launch vehicles. Those vehicles offer greater mass and volume at potentially lower per-kilogram prices, opening up opportunities for things like large space telescopes or missions to the outer regions of the solar system.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4688/1

44/XI 2023 [186-189]

186) My suborbital life, part 9: Anticipation, revealed
by Alan Stern Tuesday, November 7, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4689a.jpg)
Left: Myself and Kellie Gerardi on flight day, just before boarding spaceship Unity. Right: Myself during pre-flight parachute donning a few minutes later. (credits: Virgin Galactic)

This is the ninth and next to last essay I’ll write surrounding my inaugural spaceflight, which took place as a research and training mission that flew last week on Virgin Galactic.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4689/1

187) Review: A City on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 13, 2023

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A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought This Through?
by Kelly and Zach Weinersmith

Penguin Press, 2023
hardcover, 448 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-9848-8172-4
US$32.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1984881728/spaceviews

Perhaps the first sign that A City on Mars would not be the typical spaceflight book was its dedication page. Rather than brief comments thanking spouses, parents, or other friends and family, Kelly and Zach Weinersmith thanked the “space settlement community,” but with a disclaimer: “We worry that many of you will be disappointed by some of our conclusions, but where we have diverged from your views, we haven’t diverged from your vision of a glorious human future.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4690/1

188) A small step forward for space-based solar power technology
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4691a.jpg)
An image from Caltech’s SSPD-1 mission, showing arrays for transmitting (right) and receiving wireless power mounted on the Vigoride-5 bus. (credit: Caltech SSPP)

Space-based solar power (SBSP) is one of those concepts endlessly debated without little obvious progress or resolution of those debates. For more than half a century, advocates have described SBSP as a solution to growing energy demands while also serving as a source of green energy in an era of growing alarm about climate change. Critics describe the severe technological challenges and costs that make large-scale SBSP unrealistic to them.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4691/1

189) Something goes boom in the night: the explosion of a Cold War secret
by Dwayne A. Day and Asif Siddiqi Monday, November 13, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4692a.jpg)
The famous launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome that was the launch site for Sputnik and Yuri Gagarin. It was the site of a fiery on-pad explosion in 1983 that nearly killed two cosmonauts. American satellites spotted the rocket on the pad and later the damage from the explosion. It was photographed over two decades earlier by a U-2 reconnaissance plane. (credit: CIA)

In the fall of 1983 American reconnaissance satellites spotted preparations for a space launch at the sprawling Soviet missile and space launch range known as the Baikonur Cosmodrome, then popularly called “Tyuratam.” The satellites photographed activity at what the CIA labeled “Launch Site A1.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4692/1

45/XI 2023 [190-193]

190) My suborbital life, part 10: Looking Up, WAY Up
by Alan Stern Tuesday, November 14, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4693a.jpg)
Burt Rutan and Richard Branson unveiling the initial design for Virgin Galactic’s suborbital spaceship, 2008. (credit: Virgin Galactic)

Years ago, whenever I got an email from Burt Rutan, the legendary airplane designer and the mastermind behind the foundational spaceship designs at Virgin Galactic, Burt would always close with, “Looking up, WAY up!” Today, having finally flown to space myself just under two weeks ago in a spaceship that Rutan first conceived, I find myself thinking a lot about “Looking up, WAY up.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4693/1

191) Why you should care about life beyond Earth
by Tyler Bender Monday, November 20, 2023

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Space settlements could ensure a future for life beyond Earth in the event of natural or human-made catastrophes. (credit: Blue Origin)

Life on Earth has faced five mass extinctions over the past 500 million years. Ensuring the long-term survival of life as we know it will require humanity learning how to migrate the myriad species of Earth off their home planet, because, as its long history shows, this planet can sometimes be a very dangerous place for life to be.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4694/1

192) Starship flies again
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 20, 2023

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SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy vehicle lifts off on its second test flight November 18. (credit: SpaceX)

The plume had not yet dispersed from Saturday’s launch of SpaceX’s Starship/Super Heavy vehicle on its second test flight when the debates began about how to grade the outcome. Many hailed the launch as a success, demonstrating advances over the first flight seven months ago.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4695/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Listopad 08, 2023, 05:50
193) Olimp and Yenisei-2: Russia’s secretive eavesdropping satellites (part 1)
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, November 20, 2023

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A Proton-M rocket stands poised to launch the Luch/Olimp satellite from Baikonur in September 2014. (credit: Roscosmos)

On March 12 this year, a Proton-M rocket blasted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, punching its way through a dense layer of fog that only thickened the veil of secrecy surrounding the launch. Although Baikonur is now a civilian launch site that is no longer used for military launches, Roscosmos did not stream the launch live and afterwards reported only that a satellite named Luch-5X had been placed into orbit to test “advanced relay and communication technology.”
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4696/1

46/XI 2023 [194-197]

194) Oxygen for Mars
by John K. Strickland Monday, November 27, 2023

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Terraformed Mars being greened with a nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere. (credit: Kevin Gill)

There is a lot of attention in our community on creating a backup location for humanity and, along with pressurized in-space settlements, Mars is one of the best locations for that. But along with the human race and its civilization, we should also include the important requirement that we need a backup for life itself.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4697/1

195) Searching for the ice hidden on the Moon
by Paul Hayne Monday, November 27, 2023

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India’s Chandrayaan-3 lander detected sulfur at its landing site, which could provide clues for the origins of water ice at the lunar poles. (credit: ISRO)

Building a space station on the Moon might seem like something out of a science fiction movie, but each new lunar mission is bringing that idea closer to reality. Scientists are homing in on potential lunar ice reservoirs in permanently shadowed regions, or PSRs. These are key to setting up any sort of sustainable lunar infrastructure.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4698/1

196) Olimp and Yenisei-2: Russia’s secretive eavesdropping satellites (part 2)
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, November 27, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4699a.jpg)
The FSB’s Military Unit 51952 near Chekhov may be part of the ground infrastructure for Olimp and Yenisei-2. (Google Earth, September 2018)

As outlined in part 1, Russia is operating two satellites in geostationary orbit that have been parked close to various non-Russian commercial communications satellites with the apparent goal of eavesdropping on them. They were launched in September 2014 and March 2023 under the official names Luch and Luch-5X.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4699/1

197) Europe turns to competition to improve its launch industry’s competitiveness
by Jeff Foust Monday, November 27, 2023

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An Ariane 6 test model during a static-fire test November 23. ESA member states agreed earlier in the month to support that rocket while opening the door to future competition. (credit: ESA/M. Pedoussaut)

European officials have acknowledged for months that the continent is in a “launcher crisis” caused by problems with new rockets like the Ariane 6 and Vega C (see “A crisis and an opportunity for European space access”, The Space Review July 10, 2023). But sometimes it seems like any mode of transportation in Europe is fraught with difficulty.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4700/1

47/XII 2023 [198-201]

198) Review: Dreamland
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, December 4, 2023

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Dreamland: The Secret History of Area 51
by Peter W. Merlin
Schiffer Military History, 2023
hardcover, 560 pages, illus.
ISBN 978-0-7643-6709-0
US$75.00

Area 51 has been a mythological place for decades now. It is a remote, secure, government-owned area in the Nevada desert that includes Groom Lake, a dry lakebed that has since the 1950s been the site of classified aircraft research.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4701/1

199) Enter India, the fifth great space power
by Daniel Duchaine Monday, December 4, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4702a.jpg)
Even as ISRO continues development of a human spaceflight program, like this abort test in October, its achievements at the Moon have vaulted it into the league of great space powers. (credit: ISRO)

With the successful landing of Chandrayaan-3, India cements its status as the fifth-ever great space power. This seismic shift will disrupt the very foundation of the global space order. The fate of the domain depends on whether policymakers can adapt to this evolving international order.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4702/1

200) All-UK astronaut mission shows that private enterprise is vital to the future of space exploration
by Simonetta Di Pippo Monday, December 4, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4703a.jpg)
Tim Peake has retired from ESA’s astronaut corps after a single mission to the ISS, but could return to space on an all-UK private astronaut mission. (credit: NASA)

The UK Space Agency signed an agreement in October with a US company called Axiom Space to develop a space mission carrying four astronauts from the UK. The flight would most likely use the SpaceX Crew Dragon vehicle and travel to the International Space Station (ISS).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4703/1

201) Europe’s tentative step towards human spaceflight
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 4, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4704a.jpg)
The Exploration Company, a European startup, was already working on a cargo vehicle called Nyx when ESA announced its commercial cargo initiative. (credit: The Exploration Company)

In March, the European Space Agency released a report prepared by an independent High-Level Advisory Group on human spaceflight. That report called on ESA to embark on a bold new direction in the field, developing its own capabilities to transport astronauts to orbit and beyond, lest Europe fall behind China and the United States (see “Europe contemplates a space revolution”, The Space Review, March 27, 2023.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4704/1

48/XII 2023 [202-205]

202) Review: The Future of Geography
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 11, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4705a.jpg)

The Future of Geography: How the Competition in Space Will Change Our World
by Tim Marshall
Scribner, 2023
hardcover, 288 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-6680-3164-3
US$28
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1668031647/spaceviews

The “space race” hype is as strong today as ever—or, at least, since the original Space Race of the 1960s. Commentaries frequently assert that the United States is in a new space race, primarily with China, in topics ranging from military space activities to lunar exploration.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4705/1

203) Four key points regarding Saudi Arabia’s withdrawal from the Moon Agreement
by Michael J. Listner Monday, December 11, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4706a.jpg)
Saudi Arabia’s growing space program may have prompted the country to reverse its support for the Moon Agreement. (credit: Axiom Space)

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia announced its intention to withdraw from the Moon Agreement in a filing to the United Nations on January 5, 2023. The notification, which is required by Article 20[1] of the Moon Agreement, is interesting given Saudi Arabia acceded to the Moon Agreement in 2012. Saudi Arabia’s withdrawal from the Moon Agreement is significant as this is the first time a member of any of the five space law treaties has withdrawn.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4706/1

204) Creating a Venus exploration program
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 11, 2023

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While NASA has pushed back the launch of the VERITAS mission to Venus by three years, the project is seeking at least a partial reprieve. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

This week, planetary scientists will join their earth and space science colleagues in San Francisco for the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union, or AGU. (The conference is officially called the Fall Meeting, a vestige from a time when the AGU also had a smaller conference each spring.) There will be dozens of sessions on topics ranging from studies of the Moon and Mars to the first results from analysis of samples returned from the asteroid Bennu by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4707/1

205) Diamonds and DORIANS: The Soviet Union’s Almaz and the United States’ Manned Orbiting Laboratory military space stations (part 1)
by Bart Hendrickx and Dwayne A. Day Monday, December 11, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4708a.jpg)
Part of the Transportnyi Korabl Snabzheniya, or Transport Supply Spacecraft—“TKS” for short. This spacecraft was developed to support the Almaz military space station. One of these was photographed in orbit by an American reconnaissance satellite. (credit: Wikimedia Commons)

In the early 1980s, inside a secure US Air Force facility known as the Blue Cube and located not far from the 101 Freeway in Silicon Valley in Northern California, there was a large photograph hanging on a wall. It was in black and white and showed an ungainly-looking spacecraft, a cylinder with solar panels and a conical nose at one end.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4708/1


49/XII 2023 [206-210]

206) Review: Moonshot
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4709a.jpg)

Moonshot: A NASA Astronaut’s Guide to Achieving the Impossible
by Mike Massimino
Hachette Go, 2023
hardcover, 224 pp.
ISBN 978-0-306-83264-2
US$28
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/030683264X/spaceviews

To the general public, astronauts can seem like the closest thing to perfect people. They are physically fit individuals with backgrounds ranging from science and engineering to being military test pilots, with NASA picking a handful of the very best out of an applicant pool of more than 10,000 for each class. But astronauts, of course, are people that make mistakes like the rest of us, from misplacing tomatoes being harvested on the International Space Station for eight months to losing a tool bag on a recent space station spacewalk.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4709/1

207) Space sensemaking and space domain understanding: enabling data-centric AI for space flight safety
by Brien Flewelling Monday, December 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4710a.jpg)
The growing population of space objects requires satellite operators to take action more quickly to potential threats. (credit: ESA)

During his keynote speech at the AMOS conference in 2010, Gen. William Shelton, commander of Air Force Space Command, stressed that in a future war in space he would need automated space situational awareness with humans out of the loop.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4710/1

208) SpaceX Starship in lunar development
by Thomas L. Matula Monday, December 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4711a.jpg)
SpaceX’s Starship could be useful not just for transporting cargo to the Moon but also for providing infrastructure. (credit: SpaceX)

The November 18 test flight of Elon Musk’s Starship that was launched from Boca Chica on the Texas Gulf Coast suggests the day is ever closer this mega-rocket, in its future iterations, will be available for missions to the Moon.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4711/1

209) An extended mission for authorization
by Jeff Foust Monday, December 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4712a.jpg)
Under a House bill, commercial space stations like Orbital Reef would be authorized by the Commerce Department, but a White House proposal would instead place them under the Transportation Department. (credit: Blue Origin)

For the better part of a decade, US companies proposing novel space activities have faced regulatory uncertainty. While communications, remote sensing, and launch and reentry were overseen by the FCC, NOAA, and the FAA, respectively, companies planning applications that did not fit neatly in those categories—satellite servicing, commercial space stations, and commercial lunar landers, among others—did not know who had the authority to say yes, or no, to their plans.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4712/1

210) Diamonds and DORIANS: The Soviet Union’s Almaz and the United States’ Manned Orbiting Laboratory military space stations (part 2)

MOL and Almaz enter active development
by Dwayne A. Day and Bart Hendrickx Monday, December 18, 2023

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4713a.jpg)
The Douglas building where MOL would undergo final assembly prior to shipment to Vandenberg Air Force Base. (credit: NRO)

The American story

The Manned Orbiting Laboratory was initially started by the US Air Force in late 1963, studied throughout 1964, and received presidential authorization by summer 1965. Contract definition, proposal evaluations, and contract negotiations occurred thru late 1966, but by early 1967 it was clear that there was insufficient budget to proceed on the planned schedule and timeline and contract adjustments followed (see “Diamonds and DORIANS: the Soviet Union’s Almaz and the United States’ Manned Orbiting Laboratory military space stations (part 1),” The Space Review, December 11, 2023.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4713/1

Note: The Space Review will not publish the week of December 25. We will return on Tuesday, January 2, 2024. Happy Holidays!


1/I 2024 [1-4]

1) Review: Inside the Star Factory
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, January 2, 2024

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Inside the Star Factory: The Creation of the James Webb Space Telescope, NASA's Largest and Most Powerful Space Observatory
by Chris Gunn with Christopher Wanjek
MIT Press, 2023
hardcover, 188 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-262-04790-6
US$44.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/026204790X/spaceviews

For the last year and a half, the James Webb Space Telescope has dazzled scientists and the general public alike with stunning images (see “The transformation of JWST”, The Space Review, July 18, 2022.) Those images, besides their aesthetic value, have demonstrated the performance of the telescope and its instruments, and their ability to achieve their scientific goals.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4714/1

2) The longstanding mystery of the moons of Mars and the mission that could solve it
by Ben Rider-Stokes Tuesday, January 2, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4715a.jpg)
Japan’s MMX mission, scheduled to launch as soon as September, is designed to return samples from the Martian moon Phobos that could determine its origins. (credit: JAXA)

The two small moons of Mars, Phobos (about 22 kilometers in diameter) and Deimos (about 13 kilometers in diameter), have been puzzling scientists for decades, with their origin remaining a matter of debate. Some have proposed that they may be made up of residual debris produced from a planet or large asteroid smashing into the surface of Mars (#TeamImpact). An opposing hypothesis (#TeamCapture), however, suggests the moons are asteroids that were captured by Mars’s gravitational pull and were trapped in orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4715/1

3) The year new launch vehicles finally lift off
by Jeff Foust Tuesday, January 2, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4716a.jpg)
ULA’s Vulcan Centaur rocket, without a payload attached, during testing ahead of its first launch scheduled for as soon as January 8. (credit: ULA)

Last year features the most orbital launches of any year since the start of the Space Age. There were 221 orbital launch attempts worldwide, excluding the two Starship test flights that, strictly speaking, were intended to be suborbital had they gone as planned. That was far higher than the 186 from last year and more than double the 102 launches in 2019.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4716/1

Przegląd argumentów nad realizacją programu MOL. Była również propozycja wersji bezzałogowej.

4) Diamonds and DORIANS: program troubles, operations, cancellation, and legacy (part 3)
by Bart Hendrickx and Dwayne A. Day Tuesday, January 2, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4717x.jpg)
The MOL program received presidential approval in summer 1965. Within a year, the program had added an “Unmanned MOL” capability. This not only increased costs (the program now had to develop systems to operate MOL without astronauts), it called into question the reason for including astronauts in the first place. (credit: NRO)

As both the United States’ Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) and the Soviet Union’s Almaz programs progressed, they naturally ran into problems common to large, complicated space projects. But the MOL program faced an identity crisis from the start: if most of the mission could be performed robotically, why were astronauts needed at all?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4717/1


1/I 2024 [5-8]

5) Review: Orbital
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 8, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4718a.jpg)

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802161545/spaceviews
by Samantha Harvey
Atlantic Monthly Press, 2023
hardcover, 224 pp.
ISBN 978-0-8021-6154-3
US$24

You may have seen in recent weeks trailers for a movie simply called I.S.S. (with “International Space Station” sometimes added below it) due in theaters later this month. The premise of the movie is that, after war breaks out on Earth, the American and Russian crew of the station are pitted against each other to control it. The movie promises plenty of microgravity action, but perhaps not much else. That may be why it’s coming out in January, rarely a time when quality movies are released.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4718/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Styczeń 03, 2024, 12:44
6) NewSpace, satcom, and heavy rockets
by Aditya Chaturvedi Monday, January 8, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4719a.jpg)
India’s NSIL selected SpaceX’s Falcon 9, seen here launching a commercial satellite last week, for its GSAT-20 satellite launching later this year. (credit: SpaceX)

New Space India Limited (NSIL), ISRO’s commercial wing, has signed a contract with SpaceX for the launch of a communication satellite, GSAT-20, in mid-2024, aboard a Falcon 9. The satellite weighs around 4,700 kilograms, exceeding the 4,000-kilogram capability of ISRO’s GSLV Mark 3. It aims to boost connectivity across India.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4719/1

7) India’s mission for understanding the dynamics of the Sun
by Ajey Lele Monday, January 8, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4720a.jpg)
The Aditya-L1 spacecraft before its launch last September. (credit: ISRO)

On January 6, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully completed halo-orbit insertion of its solar observatory spacecraft, Aditya-L1. (In Sanskrit, Aditya means Sun.) It took 127 days for this craft to reach its final destination, the Lagrangian point 1 (L1) of the Sun-Earth system, around 1.5 million kilometers from the Earth. That is now where this spacecraft will operate for around five years, with an uninterrupted view of the Sun.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4720/1

8 ) Success and setbacks
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 8, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4721a.jpg)
The first Vulcan Centaur lifts off early Monday carrying Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander. (credit: ULA)

The first launch of a new rocket is a risky endeavor, with historical success rates on the order of 50%. Last year, for example, saw the first flights of ABL Space Systems’ RS1 and Relativity Space’s Terran 1 fail to reach orbit; the first integrated test flight of SpaceX’s Starship failed spectacularly as well. Lunar landers are also risky, with a historical success rate of less than 50%. Last year India succeeded with its Chandrayaan-3 lander but Japanese company ispace failed with its HAKUTO-R M1 mission.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4721/1

2/I 2024 [9-12]

9) Review: The Little Book of Aliens
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 15, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4722a.jpg)

The Little Book of Aliens
by Adam Frank
Harper, 2023
hardcover, 240 pp.
ISBN 978-0-06-327973-5
US$27.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0063279738/spaceviews

The search for evidence of life beyond Earth has followed several, often intertwined, paths. One involves the search for biosignatures, from microfossils on Mars to excess concentrations of oxygen on distant exoplanets, that are evidence of past or present life. That field of astrobiology has grown significantly in the last few decades and is now arguably driving projects like the Habitable Worlds Observatory, a multibillion-dollar next-generation space telescope.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4722/1

10) A unified theory of suborbital docking and refueling
by Francis Chastaing Monday, January 15, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4723a.jpg)
Combining concepts proposed for Black Horse (above) with another proposed spaceplane offers insights into suborbital docking and refueling. (credit: USAF)

In 1994, Mitchell Burnside Clapp briefly considered suborbital refueling as part of the development of the Black Horse, calling it “a speculative idea.” In 2004 and 2005, Allan Goff wrote two papers related to suborbital docking, proposing FLOC, for Fleet Launched Orbital Craft.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4723/1

11) How we’re searching for alien life at previously unexplored frequencies
by Owen Johnson Monday, January 15, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4724a.jpg)
The LOFAR radio telescope at Birr, Ireland, used for a SETI survey at low frequencies. (credit: Wikipedia)

Is there life beyond Earth? The question has turned out to be one of the hardest to answer in science. Despite the seemingly boundless expanse of the universe, which implies there’s potential for abundant life, the vast distances between stars render the search akin to locating a needle in a cosmic haystack.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4724/1

12) Twenty years of chasing the Moon
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 15, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4725a.jpg)
Twenty years after President George W. Bush set a goal of a human lunar return by 2020, NASA has yet to return to the lunar surface, but is making progress. (credit: NASA)

On January 14, 2004, President George W. Bush went to NASA Headquarters and delivered a speech outlining what would become known as the Vision for Space Exploration. That strategy called for retiring the Space Shuttle after it completed assembly of the International Space Station at the end of the decade, restarting robotic exploration of the Moon by 2008, and returning astronauts to the lunar surface as soon as 2015, and no later than 2020 (see “Looking beyond vision”, The Space Review, January 19, 2004).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4725/1

3/I 2024 [13-16]

13) Review: Things That Go Bump in the Universe
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 22, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4726a.jpg)

Things That Go Bump in the Universe: How Astronomers Decode Cosmic Chaos
by C. Renée James
Johns Hopkins University Press
hardcover, 304 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-4214-4693-6
US$29.95
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1421446936/spaceviews

Astronomers have, over the last several years, shown a growing interest in a topic known professionally as time domain and multimessenger astrophysics, or TDAMM. The topic has emerged as astronomers grapple with a universe that is far more dynamic than once thought.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4726/1

14) What do Australians think about space?
by Tristan Moss, Aleksandar Deejay, Cassandra Steer, and Kathryn Robison Hasani Monday, January 22, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4727a.jpg)
Australia is increasing its space activities, including work on a lunar rover, but many in the Australian public aren’t aware of those efforts. (credit: Australian Space Agency)

If someone were to ask you how space technologies impact your daily life, or how much Australia should invest in space, would you have an immediate answer or would you wonder why these questions were even being asked?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4727/1

15) Turnover and retention: an unspoken cost center affecting space companies
by Joseph Horvath Monday, January 22, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4728a.jpg)
As space companies scale up, they are often chasing the same small number of “unicorn” workers while missing out on talent in adjacent industries. (credit: SpaceX)

The space industry has two major pain points, and they are not related to systems, capabilities, or public excitement about the future. The biggest hurdles facing companies today are workforce availability and capital resources. While slightly different challenges, they are related in how they impact a space company’s ability to grow and remain competitive.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4728/1

16) The phases of lunar lander success
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 22, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4729a.jpg)
JAXA’s SLIM spacecraft did land on the Moon last week, but likely not the orientation depicted in this illustration. (credit: JAXA)

The launch industry has gotten comfortable with—or at least grudgingly accepted—the concept of partial success and the importance of setting expectations. It acknowledges there is a gray area between total mission success and failure, like on last month’s launch of an Alpha rocket by Firefly Aerospace that placed its payload into orbit, but not the desired orbit because of an upper stage malfunction.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4729/1

4/I 2024 [17-20]

17) Review: Good Luck Have Fun
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 29, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4730a.jpg)

Good Luck Have Fun: Relativity’s Journey to Launch the First 3D Printed Rocket to Space
by Relativity Space
Relativity Space, 2024
paperback, 224 pp., illus.
ISBN 979-8-9895039-0-2
US$50
https://store.relativityspace.com/collections/all/products/good-luck-have-fun-the-book

Since the beginning of last year, several rockets have made their first launches. Some have been unquestionably successful, like Vulcan Centaur’s debut earlier this month; others, not so much. Somewhere in between was the first launch of Relativity Space’s Terran 1 rocket last March.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4730/1

18) Space-related incidents during Taiwan’s elections
by Ajey Lele Monday, January 29, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4731a.jpg)
A Chinese launch of a science spacecraft days before Taiwan’s elections prompted missile warnings on the island because of the rocket’s flight path. (credit: Xinhua)

On January 13, 2024, Taiwan held elections for its presidency. Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate William Lai won these elections. His party is not known to be a pro-China party. During the entire process of the elections, there was an intense debate about the possibility of China influencing them through various tactics.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4731/1

19) The ingenuity of technology demos
by Jeff Foust Monday, January 29, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4732a.jpg)
The Ingenuity helicopter, intended to make no more than five flights, instead flew 72 times, racking up more than two hours in the air and covering 17 kilometers. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

On a Friday morning last month, a small ceremony took place at the National Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy Center in northern Virginia. In one corner of the museum, in the shadow of one of the museum’s most famous artifacts—the shuttle Discovery—a much smaller flying machine sat on a table.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4732/1

20) The sacred Moon: Navigating diverse cultural beliefs in lunar missions
by Deana L. Weibel Monday, January 29, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4733a.jpg)
The presence of payloads on the Peregrine carrying cremated remains prompted criticism from the Navajo Nation. (credit: ULA)

On January 8, 2024, United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur rocket successfully lifted off into space. Among its payloads was the Peregrine lunar lander, a spacecraft built by Astrobotic Technology. This was to be the first lunar landing not sponsored by a government agency, although the lander did carry some NASA payloads (Wall 2019) as well as a number of commercial payloads.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4733/1

5/II 2024 [21-24]

21) Review: NASA’s Discovery Program
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 5, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4734a.jpg)

NASA’s Discovery Program: The First Twenty Years of Competitive Planetary Exploration
by Susan M. Niebur with David W. Brown, Editor
NASA, 2023
ebook, 444 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-62683-076-9
Free
https://www.nasa.gov/history/nasas-discovery-program-book/

At last week’s meeting of NASA’s Small Bodies Assessment Group, a group devoted to issues of exploration of asteroids, comets, and other small solar system bodies, a question came up: when will NASA issue its next call for proposals for missions in the Discovery program?
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4734/1

22) The case for a fleet of Martian helicopters
by Ari Allyn-Feuer Monday, February 5, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4732c.jpg)
While NASA is studying sending one or two helicopters on a Mars Sample Return lander, a fleet of such craft could conduct new kinds of sciece. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

The riotous success of the Ingenuity helicopter on Mars suggests the potential for an entirely new kind of Mars exploration mission: a swarm of hundreds or thousands of similar small helicopters landing and exploring all over Mars, all at once.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4735/1

23) The Missing Link: Found
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, February 5, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4736a.jpg)
The large radio telescope at Jodrell Bank in England was built to observe the universe, but during the Cold War it was occasionally used to detect signals from Soviet spacecraft. According to a new podcast, the United States’ National Security Agency used it to detect a secret signal known as “the missing link” used by the Soviets to send video images to the ground. (credit: Mike Peel; Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics, University of Manchester, Wikimedia Commons.)

Jodrell Bank Observatory is a research facility south of Liverpool in the center of England. It was first established after World War II and gradually expanded to include a number of radio telescopes, the most prominent being a 76-meter (250-foot) dish, the third largest steerable radio telescope in the world.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4736/1

24) Did a NASA study pull the plug on space solar power?
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 5, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4737a.jpg)
A NASA illustration of two kinds of space-based solar power systems it studied, comparing their cost and environmental impact with alternative energy sources. (credit: NASA)

For more than a year and a half, the small community of researchers studying, and enthusiasts supporting, space-based solar power had been eagerly anticipating a report NASA was preparing on the subject. The study, announced at the International Space Development Conference in May 2022, was intended to reexamine the economics of SBSP based on technological advances and declining launch costs. It was the first study of SBSP sponsored by NASA in more than a decade.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4737/1

6/II 2024 [25-28]

25) Review: Dark Star
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 12, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4738a.jpg)
Dark Star: A New History of the Space Shuttle
by Matthew H. Hersch
The MIT Press, 2023
paperback, 328 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-0-262-54672-0
US$45.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0262546728/spaceviews

In a chamber at NASA’s Neil Armstrong Test Facility west of Cleveland, a spaceplane is being tested ahead of its first launch. Sierra Space’s Dream Chaser is a lifting body that will launch inside the payload fairing of a ULA Vulcan Centaur rocket later this year, but will glide back to a runway landing after completing a mission to the International Space Station.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4738/1

26) Lunar science is entering a new active phase with commercial launches of landers
by Jack Burns Monday, February 12, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4739a.jpg)
The IM-1 lander, scheduled to land on the Moon on February 22 if it launches this week, is carrying several NASA science and technology demonstration payloads. (credit: Intuitive Machines)

For the first time since 1972, NASA is putting science experiments on the Moon in 2024. And thanks to new technologies and public-private partnerships, these projects will open up new realms of scientific possibility. As parts of several projects launching this year, teams of scientists, including myself, will conduct radio astronomy from the south pole and the far side of the Moon.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4739/1

27) Nuclear Transit: nuclear-powered navigation satellites in the early 1960s
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, February 12, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4740a.jpg)
Launch of the first Transit 5BN satellite on September 28, 1963 at Vandenberg Air Force Base. This was the first nuclear-powered satellite, although it had solar panels to power a backup transmitter. Although it successfully reached orbit, it deployed upside down, with its transmitters pointing toward space, and was only partially successful. (credit: Peter Hunter Collection)

Technology goes through phases of acceptance. What starts out as interesting, novel, unique, and amazing eventually becomes ubiquitous, boring, accepted, even ignored and invisible. Two decades ago, when GPS navigation was first appearing in cars, the people who used it were surprised, and although very few people who used it probably understood how it worked, most of them probably knew that it was made possible by satellites.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4740/1

Zwolnienia w JPL (ok. 500 osób).
Misja MSR zagrożona.
Powołano komisję do zbadania alternatywnych opcji (tańszych) MSR.
Obciążenie kadr obowiązkami było wysokie, więc jeśli nie dojdzie do powrotu pracowników do pracy, to trudno wyobrazić sobie realizację dotychczasowych zadań.

28) MSR at serious risk
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 12, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4741a.jpg)
Uncertainty about the funding for MSR and how the program wil be restructured is raising new questions about the program’s future. (credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

Last Tuesday’s announcement was shocking yet not entirely unexpected. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced it would lay off 530 employees, or about 8% of its total workforce, along with 40 contractors. Employees were notified Wednesday, after virtual meetings with managers (most employees were told to work from home “so everyone can be in a safe, comfortable environment on a stressful day”) if they were among the unlucky ones. The layoffs took effect immediately for most, but affected employees will receive pay and benefits for 60 days. (...)

A couple months later, the IRB report made clear that Mars Sample Return, as currently designed, had no chance of fitting into that cost cap. The report, released in September, concluded MSR had “a near zero probability” of launching a sample retrieval lander and Earth return orbiter by 2028 as currently planned. It also estimated the total cost of the program at between $8 billion and $11 billion. (...)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4741/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Luty 13, 2024, 11:42
7/II 2024 [29-32]

29) Review: The Space Race
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 19, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4742a.jpg)

The Space Race: The Untold Story of the First Black Astronauts
Directed by Lisa Cortes and Diego Hurtado de Mendoza
91 minutes, not rated
Streaming on Disney+ and Hulu
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt27390817/

Just after midnight Eastern time on March 1, a Crew Dragon spacecraft is set to launch to the International Space Station on the Crew-8 mission. Among the astronauts on board will be Jeanette Epps, a Black woman who was selected as a NASA astronaut in 2009 but is only now making her first flight.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4742/1

30) The evolution of India’s weather satellite programs
by Ajey Lele Monday, February 19, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4743a.jpg)
A GSLV Mark 2 rocket launched the INSAT-3DS weather satellite February 17. (credit: ISRO)

On February 17, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully launched the GSLV-F14 mission. It was the tenth flight of ISRO’s Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) with an indigenous cryogenic upper stage and the seventh operational flight of GSLV with such a stage. This launch placed India’s INSAT-3DS satellite into a geosynchronous transfer orbit.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4743/1

31) From Southwest Regional Spaceport to Spaceport America
by Thomas L. Matula Monday, February 19, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4744a.jpg)
New Mexico’s Spaceport America, developed with Virgin Galactic as the anchor tenant, is far different than what was earlier proposed as the Southwest Regional Spaceport. (credit: Spaceport America)

As a space economist with a long interest in commercial spaceports, I was among hundreds of spectators parked along the tracks of the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad in southern New Mexico on May 22, 2021. We came to witness the first crewed flight into suborbital space from Spaceport America.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4744/1

32) Delivering a business case for rocket cargo
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 19, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4745a.jpg)
A notional illustration of the “Rocket Cargo” concept being studied by the US Air Force for the rapid delivery of cargo. SpaceX’s Starship is the most likely vehicle to be able to perform such services in the near term. (credit: USAF)

Even in an era where the landing and reuse of rocket boosters has become commonplace (at least for one company), the idea seems a little, well, out there. Launch a rocket and have it land, 60 or 90 minutes later, halfway around the world, carrying tens of tons of cargo needed for military operations, humanitarian relief, or other purposes where time is of the utmost essence.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4745/1

8/II 2024 [33-36]

33) Review: The Battle Beyond
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 26, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4746a.jpg)

The Battle Beyond: Fighting and Winning the Coming War in Space
by Paul Szymanski and Jerry Drew
Amplify Publishing, 2024
hardcover, 400 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-63755-071-7
US$35.00
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1637550715/spaceviews

Earlier this month, Rep. Mike Turner (R-OH), chair of the House Intelligence Committee, warned fellow House members of a “serious national security threat” that he called on the White House to declassify. Within hours, various reports indicated that threat came from a Russian anti-satellite weapon of some kind, but details of which were unclear.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4746/1

34) Cybersecurity for satellites is a growing challenge
by Sylvester Kaczmarek Monday, February 26, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4747a.jpg)
Protecting space assets from cyberattacks is becoming an urgent issue.

In today’s interconnected world, space technology forms the backbone of our global communication, navigation, and security systems. Satellites orbiting Earth are pivotal for everything from GPS navigation to international banking transactions, making them indispensable assets in our daily lives and in global infrastructure.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4747/1

35) The middle of No and Where: Johnston Island and the US Air Force’s nuclear anti-satellite weapon
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, February 26, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4748g.jpg)
Johnston Island, located hundreds of kilometers from Hawaii, was the location of an American nuclear-armed anti-satellite program for approximately a decade. The island was small and offered no protection from weather or rocket launch accidents. The island is now abandoned. (credit: USAF)

Recently there was a flurry of media attention about Russia’s reported development of a nuclear-armed anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon. Soon after the space age began in the late 1950s, both the United States and Soviet Union began studying and then developing and deploying ASATs. From 1962 to 1975 the United States Air Force operated the nuclear-armed Program 437 ASAT from a remote location in the Pacific Ocean known as Johnston Island. Johnston was not only remote, it was small.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4748/1

36) The phases of lunar lander success, revisited
by Jeff Foust Monday, February 26, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4749a.jpg)
An image from the Intuitive Machines IM-1 lunar lander mission after the spacecraft entered orbit around the Moon. (credit: Intuitive Machines)

Once again, the space community is grappling with how to characterize something less than undisputed, 100% perfection in a mission. That was the case last year when SpaceX launched its Starship vehicle on its first two test flights, both failing to complete their mission profiles but providing valuable experience for the company ahead of its next test flight, as soon as March (see “Grading on a suborbital curve”, The Space Review, April 24, 2023.)
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4749/1


9/III 2024 [37-40]

37) Ode to Engle and Truly
by Emily Carney Monday, March 4, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4750a.jpg)
Astronauts Joe H. Engle, left, and Richard H. Truly greet reporters upon their return to Ellington Air Force Base near NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC), from Kennedy Space Center (KSC) after learning their flight (STS-2) has been postponed a week. (credit: NASA)

“Nostalgia—it’s delicate, but potent… It’s a twinge in your heart far more powerful than memory alone. This device isn’t a spaceship; it’s a time machine. It goes backwards and forwards… it takes us to a place where we ache to go again.” – Don Draper, Mad Men.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4750/1

38) Taking stock of the US space program
by Namrata Goswami Monday, March 4, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4721a.jpg)
The first Vulcan Centaur launched in January, one sign of the strength of the US space program even as it has weaknesses elsewhere. (credit: ULA)

In 2023, a paradigmatic shift occurred regarding government space programs that was perhaps missed by the global space community. Euroconsult’s 2023 Government Space Program report highlighted that shift: defense-related space expenditures ($59 billion) exceeded civil space budgets ($58 billion) in 2023 for the first time.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4751/1

39) Squinting at the universe
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 4, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4752a.jpg)
A notional design for the Habitable Worlds Observatory space telescope presented at a recent meeting. NASA and the science community is only beginning the work to determine the real design of the spacecraft, expected to launch in the 2040s. (credit: NASA)

Last week, many astronomers got bad news about a good thing. The Space Telescope Science Institute, which operates the James Webb Space Telescope, announced the selections for the next round of JWST observations, called Cycle 3 and set to begin this summer. The institute said it selected 253 proposals for 5,500 hours of “prime time” observations from solar system objects to the distant universe.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4752/1

40) A North Korean satellite starts showing signs of life
by Marco Langbroek Monday, March 4, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4753a.jpg)
Kim Jong Un and his daughter visiting a Malligyong assemblage facility in May 2023. A Malligyong satellite (or mock-up thereof) can be seen in the background (credit: KCNA)

Three and a half months ago, on November 21, 2023, North Korea launched its first military reconnaissance satellite, Malligyong 1. A Chollima-1 rocket launched from Sohae inserted Malligyong-1 (international designator: 2023-179A) into a Sun-synchronous orbit of 512 by 493 kilometers and an inclination of 97.4 degrees. Within days of the launch, North Korea claimed that the satellite is taking imagery of targets of interest.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4753/1

10/III 2024 [41-44]

41) Review: The New World on Mars
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 11, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4754a.jpg)

The New World on Mars: What We Can Create on the Red Planet
by Robert Zubrin
Diversion Books, 2024
hardcover, 320 pp., illus.
ISBN 978-1-63576-880-0
US$28.99
https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1635768802/spaceviews

As soon as this Thursday, SpaceX will launch its Starship/Super Heavy vehicle on its third integrated test flight, after launches last April and November. On this flight SpaceX hopes, beyond avoiding the explosive ends of those earlier flights, to test a payload bay door and transfer propellant within Starship, key capabilities needed for that vehicle’s early missions to launch Starlink satellites and land humans on the Moon for NASA.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4754/1

42) The psychological challenges of a long voyage to Mars
by Nick Kanas Monday, March 11, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4755a.jpg)
The four-person crew of NASA’s CHAPEA experiment enter their simulated Mars habitat last summer for a year-long Mars analog mission. (credit: NASA/Josh Valcarcel)

Within the next few decades, NASA aims to land humans on the Moon, set up a lunar base, and use the lessons learned to send people to Mars as part of its Artemis program.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4755/1

43) India unveils its first set of Gaganyaan astronauts
by Jatan Mehta Monday, March 11, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4756a.jpg)
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi greets the four Gaganyaan astronauts at a February 27 event. (credit: Press Information Bureau)

After four years of secrecy, the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced on February 27 the first four astronauts selected to fly on the country’s initial set of human spaceflight missions mid-decade via ISRO’s ambitious Gaganyaan program. The selectees are all test pilots and Group Captains: Prashanth Nair, Angad Prathap, Ajit Krishnan, and Shubhanshu Shukla. They have received extensive training in India and Russia, and at least one of them will receive advanced training in the US at NASA facilities sometime this year. The announcement of Gaganyaan astronauts is a great time to review India’s progress in putting people in space.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4756/1

44) The difficult early life of the Centaur upper stage
by Trevor Williams Monday, March 11, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4757a.jpg)
A Centaur V upper stage being hoisted into position to be integrated with a Vulcan rocket ahead of the Vulcan’s first launch. (credit: ULA)

On January 8, the first Vulcan rocket by United Launch Alliance successfully placed the Peregrine lander on a trajectory bound for the Moon. This lander then experienced propulsion problems that prevented a lunar landing attempt, but the Vulcan had performed its task perfectly. The upper stage of the Vulcan, the Centaur V (V signifying 5, not Vulcan), is a high-energy upper stage that contributes to the Vulcan’s impressive performance for planetary missions and others.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4757/1

11/III 2024 [45-48]

45) Review: Space: The Longest Goodbye
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 18, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4758a.jpg)

Space: The Longest Goodbye
directed by Ido Mizrahy
87 minutes, not rated
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt24082558/

NASA is offering people a chance to go to Mars—or, rather, “Mars.” The agency announced last month they were accepting applications for its second year-long mission in its Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog (CHAPEA) project.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4758/1

46) “A rose, by any other name”: Proposing a national naming competition for our lunar exploration program (part 1)
by Cody Knipfer Monday, March 18, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4759a.jpg)
NASA has used a variety of naming conventions for both crewed and robotic spacecraft throughout its history. (credit: NASA)

What’s in a name?

For Shakespeare’s Juliet Capulet, it is the embodiment of forbidden love. The last name of her amour, “Montague,” bears significance—in her and Romeo’s case, the tragic implications of a familial rivalry. Much the same, names have weight in the real world, especially so for the real-world explorers of yesteryear and today.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4759/1

47) Texas Space Commissions, from Conestoga to Starship
by Thomas L. Matula Monday, March 18, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4760a.jpg)
Texas hosted the first launch of a privately developed rocket more than 40 years ago but soon lost any first-mover advantage. (credit: Celestis)

The Lone Star State once again has a Texas Space Commission thanks to a bill signed into law on June 14, 2023, by Governor Greg Abbott.[1] The former Texas Aerospace Commission, which ceased operations in 2003, started out as the Texas Space Commission in 1987, spurred on by the launch of the first commercial rocket into space five years before.[2]
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4760/1

Trzeci test odbył się po trajektorii suborbitalnej przy uzyskaniu prędkości orbitalnej.
http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n240301.htm#10
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=5664.msg190176#msg190176

48) Accelerating Starship
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 18, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4761a.jpg)
Starship/Super Heavy lifts off March 14 from SpaceX’s Starship site in South Texas. (credit: SpaceX)

When Starship lifted off Thursday morning from SpaceX’s launch site at Boca Chica, Texas, the one question on most people’s minds was this: how far would it get this time? Its first flight, nearly 11 months earlier, ended four minutes after liftoff when the tumbling Starship/Super Heavy stack was detonated by a flight termination system; the liftoff had, in the process, made a mess of the pad because of the lack of a water deluge system (see “Grading on a suborbital curve”, The Space Review, April 24, 2023).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4761/1

12/III 2024 [49-52]

49) “For All Mankind”: space drama’s alternate history constructs a better vision of NASA
by Val Nolan Monday, March 25, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4762a.jpg)
Masha Mashkova and Joel Kinnaman in the fourth season of “For All Mankind”. (credit: Apple TV+)

Great art is often difficult to quantify. The Apple TV+ series “For All Mankind” is a case in point, running the risk of being too sci-fi for drama fans (rockets, moon bases, Mars) and having too much naturalistic drama for sci-fi aficionados (jealousy, divorce, institutional politics).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4762/1

50) Preventing a “Space Pearl Harbor”: Rep. Turner leads the charge
by Brian G. Chow Monday, March 25, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4431f.jpg)
Maneuvers by China’s SJ-21 in GEO, including moving a Beidou satellite out of the belt, is just one of the many Chinese space activities with counterspace implications. (credit: ExoAnalytic Solutions)

Accolades are due to House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner and the White House for a quick and amicable settlement of Russia’s developing space threat. It involved a balancing act between the American public’s need to know and the Biden Administration’s need for secrecy.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4763/1

51) “A rose, by any other name”: Proposing a national naming competition for our lunar exploration program (part 2)
by Cody Knipfer Monday, March 25, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4764a.jpg)
A naming contest that went a bit awry led to a treadmill on the International Space Station being named for Stephen Colbert, complete with a custom patch. (credit: NASA)

[Part 1 was published last week.]

“By any other name…”: On naming competitions and outreach

Public consultation can take many forms: invited expert input, advisory committees, informal and formal “requests for information”—and write-in competitions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4764/1

52) Lessons from the first CLPS lunar landing missions
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 25, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4765a.jpg)
An image of the IM-1 landing, showing one of the lunar lander legs breaking as the spacecraft hit the surface faster than it was designed to. (credit: Intuitive Machines)

The IM-1 lunar lander mission officially came to an end Saturday. As the Sun dipped below the horizon on February 29, nearly a week after landing, flight controllers at Intuitive Machines put the lander, known as Odysseus or “Odie,” into a mode so that, when sunlight returned to the lander in a few weeks, it could wake up and start transmitting—if it managed to survive bitterly cold conditions.
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4765/1
Tytuł: Odp: The Space Review
Wiadomość wysłana przez: Orionid w Marzec 20, 2024, 06:09
Trzeci test odbył się po trajektorii suborbitalnej przy uzyskaniu prędkości orbitalnej.
http://lk.astronautilus.pl/n240301.htm#10
https://www.forum.kosmonauta.net/index.php?topic=5664.msg190176#msg190176

48) Accelerating Starship
by Jeff Foust Monday, March 18, 2024

(https://www.thespacereview.com/archive/4761a.jpg)
Starship/Super Heavy lifts off March 14 from SpaceX’s Starship site in South Texas. (credit: SpaceX)

When Starship lifted off Thursday morning from SpaceX’s launch site at Boca Chica, Texas, the one question on most people’s minds was this: how far would it get this time? Its first flight, nearly 11 months earlier, ended four minutes after liftoff when the tumbling Starship/Super Heavy stack was detonated by a flight termination system; the liftoff had, in the process, made a mess of the pad because of the lack of a water deluge system (see “Grading on a suborbital curve”, The Space Review, April 24, 2023).
https://www.thespacereview.com/article/4761/1