IRAN SATELLITE LAUNCH A FAILURE, U.S. OFFICIALS SAY - Iran's attempted satellite launch was a failure that fell far short of claimed successes, U.S. security officials said on Tuesday, but an analyst said the test still marked progress toward a potential weapon. "The attempted launch failed," a U.S. intelligence official told Reuters, speaking on condition of anonymity. More (Source: Reuters - Aug 20)
IRAN SPARKS US CONCERN WITH SATELLITE ROCKET LAUNCH - Iran said it had sent a rocket carrying a dummy satellite into space on Sunday, triggering fresh concern in Washington that the technology could be diverted to ballistic missiles. The launch is likely to further exacerbate tensions with the West over its nuclear drive, which Iran's arch-foe Washington and its allies claim is a cover for atomic weapons ambitions. More (Source: AFP - Aug 17)
SUPERBIRD-7 + AMC-21 UP, UP & AWAY TO ORBITAL SLOTS - A successful launch has placed the Superbird-7 and AMC-21 telecommunications satellites into accurate geostationary transfer orbits. This was the 9th mission performed by Ariane 5s in a 12-month period, during which the workhorse vehicles carried 16 civilian and military telecommunications satellites along with the first Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) for the International Space Station. More (Source: SatNews.com - Aug 17)
JAPAN GETS FIRST HOME-GROWN COMMERCIAL COMMUNICATIONS SATELLITE - Mitsubishi Electric Corp. announced Friday that it had successfully launched Japan's first domestically produced commercial communications satellite. The Superbird-7 blasted into space on a launcher made by European consortium Arianespace earlier in the day from the Guiana Space Center, before successfully separating from the rocket, the company said in a statement. More (Source: AFP - Aug 15)
NASA WON'T LAUNCH FALL SHUTTLE MISSIONS EARLY - NASA mission managers decided Thursday not to push for earlier launch dates for two space shuttle missions set to blast off this fall. The shuttle Atlantis will remain on track for a planned Oct. 8 launch to overhaul the Hubble Space Telescope while its sister ship Endeavour will continue toward a Nov. 10 liftoff to the International Space Station, NASA spokesperson Kyle Herring told SPACE.com. More (Source: Space.com - Aug 15)
NASA PUSHES BACK FIRST LAUNCH OF SPACE SHUTTLE REPLACEMENT - Jeff Hanley, manager of NASA's Constellation program overseeing the development of the multibillion-dollar Orion crew capsules and their Ares I rockets, told reporters that the agency remains on target for its March 2015 deadline to bring the new spacecraft online. More (Source: Fox News - Aug 13)
HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE HITS ORBIT 100,000 - The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) hit the 100,000-orbit mark today, nearly two decades after it launched into space. The beloved observatory has been faithfully circling Earth since its April 1990 launch, offering us Earthlings glimpses of the cosmos as we've never had before. Now, after travelling around Earth at nearly five miles per second for 100,000 orbits, Hubble's odometer reads about 2.72 billion miles — that's roughly 5,700 round trips to the Moon. More (Source: Space.com - Aug 13)
ASTRONAUTS READY FOR RISKY HUBBLE MISSION - Seven NASA astronauts are eagerly looking forward to a risky, but pivotal, shuttle flight to the Hubble Space Telescope this fall. Veteran shuttle commander Scott Altman and his crew are preparing to launch in early October aboard the Atlantis orbiter on what is expected to be NASA's final service call on the iconic space observatory. The telescope passed its 100,000th orbit around Earth on Monday. More (Source: MSNBC - Aug 13)
U.S. SATELLITE SHOOTDOWN: THE INSIDE STORY - While assessing the hazards of hydrazine reentry from space, a journalist discovers the hazards of media commentary as well. Assessing technological risk is a thorny enough problem here on Earth, even with our experience and our intuition about familiar uncertainties, factors, and processes. More (Source: IEEE Spectrum Online - Aug 11)
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