The Space Review

[Orionid]

Review: Diary of an Apprentice Astronaut
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 27, 2021



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

[Orionid]

Covid and Mars
by Frank Stratford Monday, September 27, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Criticism of space cowboys isn’t enough
by Blake Horn Monday, September 27, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Two directorate heads are better than one
by Jeff Foust Monday, September 27, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Review: Countdown
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021



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

[Orionid]

Inspiration4 sent four people with minimal training to orbit and brought space tourism closer to reality
by Wendy Whitman Cobb Monday, October 4, 2021


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).

[Orionid]

Resilience and space situational awareness: an interview with NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Five big questions about the International Space Station becoming a movie set
by Alice Gorman Monday, October 4, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Review: Asteroids
by Thomas E. Simmons Monday, October 11, 2021



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

[Orionid]

The UK looks for its place in space
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 11, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Lollipops and ASATs
by Dwayne A. Day Monday, October 11, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Aerostat: a Russian long-range anti-ballistic missile system with possible counterspace capabilities
by Bart Hendrickx Monday, October 11, 2021


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

[Orionid]

Grimes and space communes
by Layla Martin Monday, October 18, 2021


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

[Orionid]

The Indian Space Association seeks to broaden commercial interests
by Ajey Lele Monday, October 18, 2021


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

[Orionid]

38/X 2021 [159-162]

159) Review: Countdown
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021



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

160) Inspiration4 sent four people with minimal training to orbit and brought space tourism closer to reality
by Wendy Whitman Cobb Monday, October 4, 2021


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).

161) Resilience and space situational awareness: an interview with NASA astronaut Mike Hopkins
by Jeff Foust Monday, October 4, 2021


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

162) Five big questions about the International Space Station becoming a movie set
by Alice Gorman Monday, October 4, 2021


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