UNITED NATIONS SATELLITE UNESCOSAT TO TEST VIABILITY OF ASTRONAUT POO AS SPACE FUE - THE United Nations is preparing to go boldly where no man has gone before. At least, not without surgical gloves and a peg on his nose. UNESCOSat is the UN's first satellite. It's a $US5 million project to promote global cooperation, education and our shared heritage as we push further into space as a race. A large part of the push requires fuel - namely, hydrogen. And one of the best ways to harvest hydrogen is to get bacteria to create it from waste products. The problem is, nobody has properly studied how bacteria behave in microgravity, so the UN's using its first mission to carry several bacterial payloads in order to see how they cope with it all.    More
(Source: NEWS.com.au - Nov 23)

AIR FORCE LAUNCHES MASSIVE, SECRET SPY SATELLITE - A powerful Delta 4 rocket roared to life and climbed away from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Sunday evening on a high-priority mission to boost a National Reconnaissance Office spy satellite into orbit. Under a cloudy sky, the hydrogen-fueled engines in the three common core boosters of the United Launch Alliance Delta 4 ignited with a rush of orange fire at 5:58 p.m. EST and quickly throttled up to nearly 2 million pounds of thrust.    More
(Source: CBS News - Nov 23)

NASA'S NEWEST MICROSATELLITE FASTSAT LAUNCHES SUCCESSFULLY - NASA’s Fast, Affordable, Science and Technology Satellite, or FASTSAT, launched at 7:25 p.m. CST Friday aboard a Minotaur IV rocket from Kodiak Launch Complex on Kodiak Island, Alaska. FASTSAT is a unique platform that can carry multiple small payloads to low-Earth orbit creating opportunities for researchers to conduct low-cost scientific and technology research on an autonomous satellite in space. FASTSAT separated from the Minotaur IV rocket approximately 22 minutes after launch, entering low-Earth orbit 406 miles above Earth and immediately began powering up the spacecraft.    More
(Source: - Nov 21)

SHUTTLE DISCOVERY'S LAUNCH DELAYED A FEW MORE DAYS - Work to repair the shuttle Discovery's external tank is going well, but more time is needed to complete an engineering review and to develop the necessary flight rationale, the justification for launching with a repaired tank after unexpected damage. As a result, NASA announced Thursday, the flight will remain on hold until at least Dec. 3, four days after the opening of a short end-of-year launch window. If Discovery is eventually cleared for launch, countdown clocks would begin ticking around 1 a.m. on Nov. 30, setting up a launch attempt at 2:51:59 a.m. EST on Dec. 3.    More
(Source: Space Flight Now - Nov 19)

U. OF MICH. STUDENTS, PROFS AWAIT SATELLITE LAUNCH - University of Michigan engineering students and professors are close to making history. If all goes according to plan, the first satellite built completely by students from the Ann Arbor school will be sent into space on Friday night. "I certainly get goose bumps when I think about it," assistant aerospace engineering professor James Cutler told the Detroit Free Press. The 6.5-pound satellite is scheduled to share a ride on a 78-foot-tall rocket with six other satellites carrying 16 experiments for the military, NASA and universities.    More
(Source: Chicago Tribune - Nov 19)

SOLAR SAIL DEMO PACKED UP TO PROVE NEW TECHNOLOGIES - For less than $1 million, scientists are planning to show off an innovative solar sail experiment beginning with a blastoff from the Alaska frontier Friday, proving new propulsion technologies that could help rid space of unnecessary debris. The NanoSail-D mission will unfurl a 100 square foot polymer sail from a satellite the size of a loaf of bread. Researchers say the sail will harness light pressure from the sun to change its orbit, eventually slowing the craft's speed enough to drop from orbit and burn up in Earth's atmosphere.    More
(Source: Space Flight Now - Nov 18)

ESSENTIAL EAVESDROPPING SATELLITE LAUNCHING FRIDAY - One cannot overstate the importance of Friday night's Delta 4-Heavy launch from Cape Canaveral to national security, a mission by the massive rocket that will deploy "the largest satellite in the world" to hear the whispers of evil. Countdown clocks are targeting a liftoff time of 6:06 p.m. EST (2306 GMT) from the Florida spaceport's Complex 37. The evening's available launch opportunity likely extends upwards of four hours.    More
(Source: Space Flight Now - Nov 18)

INSPECTORS FIND FOURTH CRACK IN DISCOVERY SPACE SHUTTLE - Inspectors have found a fourth crack in support beams on the external fuel tanks of the space shuttle Discovery, whose final flight was delayed because of a hydrogen leak, NASA said. The latest crack was found while technicians were removing foam while inspecting the support beams, which are called stringers, in the aftermath of the hydrogen leak, the space agency said late on Monday. Two nine-inch (21-centimeter) cracks were found in an adjacent support beam on Friday, and a three-inch (7.5 centimeter) fissure was uncovered over the weekend.    More
(Source: AFP - Nov 17)

SPACE JUNK: A RISKY GAME OF SPACE INVADERS - Dead satellites and debris orbiting Earth pose a real threat to astronauts, warns Michael Day. When, in the early hours of February 10, 2009, an American communications satellite called Iridium 33 smashed into a Russian military satellite 500 miles above Earth's surface, the experts called it an "unprecedented event". A better description might have been "an accident waiting to happen".    More
(Source: Telegraph.co.uk - Nov 17)

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