ISRO CLEARS GSAT-11 FOR LAUNCH - The ISRO has cleared for launch GSAT-11, the satellite which was recalled from Kourou in French Guinea for thorough checks, after losing contact with its another satellite that was launched from Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh.in March this year, an official said. The 5,700-kg GSAT-11 satellite was slated for launch on May 26 from Kourou, a site in South America which India uses to launch its heavy-weight satellite. More (Source: Times of India - Jun 18)
RUSSIA LAUNCHES SOYUZ-2.1B CARRIER ROCKET WITH GLONASS-M NAVIGATION SATELLITE - Russia launched a Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket from the Plesetsk space center on Sunday to orbit a Glonass-M satellite, the Russian Defense Ministry said. "On Sunday, at 00:46 Moscow time [21:46 GMT]… the Space Forces of the Aerospace Forces successfully launched a middle-class Soyuz-2.1b carrier rocket with a navigation Glonass-M spacecraft," the ministry said in a statement. Hours later the ministry reported that the satellite reached the designated orbit. More (Source: Sputnik International - Jun 17)
SPACEX HOPES TO LAUNCH 4,000 SATELLITES, MOSTLY FROM FLORIDA, NASA REPORT SAYS - SpaceX has plans to launch more than 4,000 satellites, the majority of which will head into space from the Space Coast, according to an environmental impact study done by the Elon Musk-led company and NASA. If it comes to fruition, the work would further solidify Cape Canaveral as the world’s busiest private launch center. Buried in a 73-page study released in April was a reference to a project SpaceX has been pursuing that would establish a constellation of small, Internet-beaming satellites for the company. More (Source: Orlando Sentinel - Jun 16)
SPACE STATION DIGITAL AMATEUR RADIO TV SYSTEM TRANSMITTER DETERMINED TO BE DEFECTIVE - The Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) “Ham Video” digital Amateur Radio TV (DATV) transmitter on the International Space Station (ISS) is reported to be defective, with onboard repair not possible. Also known as HamTV, the DATV system stopped working in mid-April, and a subsequent test on June 1 using a second L/S band patch antenna on the Columbus module had failed. ARISS-EU Mentor Gaston Bertels, More (Source: ARRL - Jun 15)
STATION ASTRONAUTS INSTALL NEW CAMERAS ON SUCCESSFUL SPACEWALK - Two astronauts floated outside the International Space Station Thursday and installed two new cameras on the front of the lab complex that will provide views of commercial crew ships during final approach and docking. The spacewalkers also replaced a faulty high-definition camera and closed a door that was jammed open on an external instrument. Floating in the Quest airlock, Expedition 56 commander Drew Feustel and Ricky Arnold switched their spacesuits to battery power at 8:06 a.m. EDT (GMT-4)... More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 15)
RUSSIA WANTS TO ZAP SPACE JUNK WITH A HUGE FRICKIN’ LASER - Space junk is a big problem. The amount of trash floating around in Earth orbit has gradually piled up over the decades and we’ve now reached a point where NASA and other space agencies around the world are forced to plan for the likelihood that anything they shoot into space might end up crashing into some random piece of litter. NASA even went so far as to install a special sensor on the International Space Station to track the number of times it is hit by tiny bits of space junk. More (Source: BGR - Jun 14)
JAPANESE INTELLIGENCE-GATHERING SATELLITE SUCCESSFULLY LAUNCHED - An all-weather spy satellite for the Japanese government launched Tuesday on top of an H-2A rocket, extending the country’s surveillance reach with coverage of North Korea and other strategic locations worldwide. The radar-equipped reconnaissance craft lifted off at 0420 GMT (12:20 a.m. EDT) Tuesday from the Tanegashima Space Center, Japan’s primary launch base, located on an island in the southern part of the country. Liftoff occurred at 1:20 p.m. Japan Standard Time, marking the 39th launch of an H-2A rocket, and the second H-2A launch of the year. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 14)
VACATION ON THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION, FOR THE PERSON WHO HAS EVERYTHING - Are you tired of Lake Como? Bored by your round-the-world cruise on the Queen Elizabeth? Well cheer up, because there's finally a way to really get away from it all. Axiom Space, which bills itself as the first commercial space station, said Wednesday it'll offer seven- to 10-day vacations on the International Space Station as early as 2020, according to The New York Times. At $55 million a person, the cost is equally out of this world. The company plans to launch its habitation pods connected to the ISS in 2022. More (Source: CNET - Jun 14)
THE 2018 WORLD CUP BALL IS NAMED AFTER A 1960S SATELLITE - Over the course of the month-long World Cup, fans will cheer for every “golazo” and groan over every near miss, or defensive miscue. One thing most people outside of the pitch won’t lose sleep over, however, is the sport’s most important object: the ball. This year’s ball, the Telstar 18, is named as a tribute to Adidas’ first official World Cup ball from Mexico 1970, but the name has an even richer history than that—one that goes back more than 50 years to a tiny satellite that changed the world. More (Source: History - Jun 14)
PHOTOS: RUSSIA’S WORLD CUP STADIUMS, AS SEEN FROM THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - After spending roughly $11 billion to host the World Cup, Russia will kick off the competition on Thursday (June 14) with matches being played at 12 stadiums around the country. Along with much-needed transportation and security infrastructure, a massive chunk of Russia’s spending was on the stadiums themselves. Russia commissioned several new ones, while expanding and updating a clutch of existing venues, with sometimes terrifying outcomes. Overall, around $4 billon was spent on stadium construction and renovations over the past several years. More (Source: Quartz - Jun 12)
SPACEFLIGHT STRIKES DEAL WITH ROCKET LAB FOR THREE SATELLITE LAUNCH EXTRAVAGANZAS - Seattle-based Spaceflight has partnered with Rocket Lab for three launches over the next year, including one of the first launches for BlackSky’s Earth observation constellation. All three launches will send an assortment of small satellites into low Earth orbit from Rocket Lab’s facility on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand. More (Source: GeekWire - Jun 12)
POOR WEATHER FORECAST DELAYS H-2A ROCKET LAUNCH - Projected weather impacts from Tropical Storm Maliksi passing over the Pacific Ocean south of Japan have prompted officials to push back the launch of an H-2A rocket and an Earth-imaging reconnaissance by one day to Tuesday, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency announced Saturday. JAXA said deteriorating weather conditions predicted Sunday, when the H-2A rocket was supposed to roll out of the Vehicle Assembly Building to its launch pad at the Tanegashima Space Center, forced officials to postpone the launch. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 12)
CARRIER JET WITH PEGASUS ROCKET RETURNING TO CALIFORNIA, POSTPONING NASA SATELLITE LAUNCH - NASA and Northrop Grumman officials decided Friday to return a Pegasus rocket and its carrier aircraft from Hawaii to California, aborting a trip to Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean for next week’s scheduled launch of a NASA research satellite to conduct additional testing. The return trip to California will postpone the launch of NASA’s Ionospheric Connection Explorer, known as ICON, indefinitely. Launch was scheduled for next Thursday, June 14, U.S. time. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 9)
SPACE STATION CREW DOUBLES WITH FRESH ARRIVAL - A Soyuz spacecraft carrying three crewmembers successfully joined with the International Space Station today (June 8), doubling the population of the orbiting complex to six people. The Russian-built Soyuz MS-09 docked with the space station a few minutes ahead of schedule, at 9:01 a.m. EDT (1301 GMT, 3:01 p.m. local Moscow time). The new arrivals were NASA's Serena Auñón-Chancellor, Russian cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev and European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst. More (Source: Space.com - Jun 9)
SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW DESTRUCTION CAUSED BY GUATEMALA'S FUEGO VOLCANO - The images show a town buried, nearly obliterated, by Sunday's deadly volcanic eruption in Guatemala that's claimed over 90 lives. Pyroclastic flows swallowed the rural town of San Miguel Los Lotes. These flows -- a combination of ash, rock and volcanic gases -- travel so fast during an eruption that its impossible for anything to outrun them. CNN meteorologist Ivan Cabrera says the pyroclastic flow on Sunday was over 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit (about 1,000 degrees Celsius). Now, San Miguel Los Lotes is buried in what remains of these flows. More (Source: CNN - Jun 8)
PEGASUS ROCKET, NASA SATELLITE HEAD FOR LAUNCH BASE IN PACIFIC - Slung under the belly of a specially-equipped carrier airplane, a Northrop Grumman Pegasus rocket took off Wednesday from Vandenberg Air Force Base on a two-day trek to a remote U.S. military test site in the Pacific Ocean, where crews will ready the air-dropped booster for launch of a NASA research satellite next week. The ferry flight from California to Kwajalein Atoll in the mid-Pacific Ocean will position the Pegasus rocket, its carrier jet, and support teams for final preparations for launch June 14 with NASA’s Ionospheric Connection Explorer, or ICON, a satellite designed to probe the link between Earth’s atmosphere and space weather. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 7)
ASTRONAUTS LAUNCHING TO SPACE STATION WEDNESDAY MORNING: WATCH IT LIVE - Three astronauts are launching toward the International Space Station (ISS) tomorrow morning (June 6), and you can watch their departure from Earth live. NASA astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor, cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev and European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst are scheduled to lift off aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan tomorrow at 7:12 a.m. EDT (1112 GMT; 5:12 p.m. local Baikonur time). You can watch the launch live here at Space.com, courtesy of NASA TV; coverage begins at 6:15 a.m. EDT (1015 GMT). More (Source: Space.com - Jun 6)
LONG MARCH 3A ROCKET LAUNCHES FENGYUN-2H METEOROLOGICAL SATELLITE - China on Tuesday launched the Fengyun-2H weather satellite, successfully inserting the near 1.4-metric-ton spacecraft into a geostationary-transfer orbit. The Long March 3A launch vehicle lifted off from Launch Complex 3 at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China at 09:07 a.m. Eastern, in accordance with airspace closure notices published days in advance. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) announced success of the launch just under an hour after liftoff. More (Source: SpaceNews - Jun 6)
DEADLY FUEGO VOLCANO ERUPTION IN GUATEMALA SPOTTED FROM SPACE - Satellites are keeping tabs on a powerful volcanic eruption in Guatemala that has killed dozens of people. Volcan de Fuego, which lies about 40 miles (70 kilometers) southwest of Guatemala City, has been simmering for years, occasionally flaring up with bouts of dramatic activity. Tragically, one such outburst occurred on Sunday (June 3). "A deadly mixture of ash, rock fragments, and hot gases rushed down ravines and stream channels on the sides of the volcano," officials with the NASA Earth Observatory wrote in a statementMonday (June 4). More (Source: Space.com - Jun 6)
