SWOT SATELLITE ALL SET TO DEPART FOR UNITED STATES - After more than a year in assembly, integration and testing at Thales Alenia Space’s facility in Cannes, France, for the French and U.S. space agencies CNES and NASA, the SWOT satellite (Surface Water and Ocean Topography) is making final preparations to depart for its forthcoming launch from the United States. SWOT is a joint mission of CNES and NASA, with contributions from the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) and the United Kingdom Space Agency (UKSA).   More
(Source: Thales - Sep 7)

HIGH-POWER EUROPEAN BROADBAND SATELLITE SET FOR LAUNCH FROM FRENCH GUIANA - An Ariane 5 rocket is set to blast off Wednesday from French Guiana — a day later than planned due to a poor weather forecast Tuesday — with a Eutelsat-owned satellite designed to beam broadband internet signals across Europe from a position in geostationary orbit. Billed as the most powerful communications satellite ever built in Europe, the new spacecraft is riding as a solo passenger on the European Ariane 5 rocket set for liftoff from the Guiana Space Center, the European-run spaceport in French Guiana. The launch window Wednesday opens at 5:45 p.m EDT (2145 GMT; 6:45 p.m. French Guiana time) and extends for an hour and 26 minutes...   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Sep 7)

INCREDIBLE AURORA FILMED FROM ISS AFTER HUGE SOLAR STORM HITS EARTH - An incredible aurora has been filmed from the International Space Station (ISS) as it orbited hundreds of miles above the Earth. NASA posted the captivating footage to Twitter on Sunday after a geomagnetic storm hit our planet. The time-lapse video shows a view from the ISS as it traveled around 270 miles above the Indian Ocean toward the Coral Sea east of Australia, during which time the "magnificent" aurora could be seen.   More
(Source: Newsweek - Sep 6)

CHINA BEGINS LAUNCH CAMPAIGN FOR FINAL SPACE STATION MODULE - Work to assemble a Long March 5B heavy-lift rocket is underway at Wenchang spaceport as China prepares to complete the construction of its Tiangong space station. Components of the 849-metric-ton Long March 5B rocket were recently delivered to Wenchang, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) announced Sept. 3. The rocket is now being prepared for an early October launch of the 17.9-meter-long, 4.2-meter-diameter and 22-ton Mengtian (“dreaming of the heavens”) experiment module.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Sep 6)

SPACEX LAUNCHES FIRST STARLINK RIDESHARE MISSION OF 2022 - SpaceX launched another Falcon 9 Block 5 on Sunday, September 4 at 10:09 PM EDT (02:09 UTC on September 5). Lifting off from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, this mission carried 51 Starlink satellites, as well as the rideshare Varuna-TDM, to low-Earth orbit (LEO). It marks the 40th Falcon 9 launch of 2022–a launch every 6.2 days.   More
(Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - Sep 5)

STARTUPS SCOUT AND PRIVATEER TO COLLABORATE ON SPACE-TRACKING TECHNOLOGIES - Space-tracking startup Scout Space announced Sept. 1 it is partnering with Privateer Space, a new venture also focused on space situational awareness services for satellite operators. Scout is based in Alexandria, Virginia; Privateer is located in Maui, Hawaii. “The collaboration is focused on integrating Scout’s systems architecture and data collection capabilities with Privateer’s data solutions,” the companies said in a statement.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Sep 5)

CHINA LAUNCHES YAOGAN-33 02 SATELLITE - China launched the Yaogan-33 02 satellite atop a Long March-4C carrier rocket at 7:44 a.m. Beijing Time from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Northwest China on Saturday. The remote sensing satellite entered its preset orbit which signals the launch was a complete success, according to China Media Group. It will be used for science experiments, census of national land resources, crop yield estimation and disaster prevention.   More
(Source: CGTN - Sep 4)

GIANT SOLAR SAIL WILL PROPEL TINY SPACECRAFT TO INTERCEPT AND STUDY ASTEROID - Catching a ride on Artemis 1 is a miniaturized CubeSat called NEA Scout that will use a thin, aluminum-coated solar sail about the size of a tennis court to propel it towards the smallest asteroid ever to be studied by a spacecraft. NEA Scout will serve as a bold robotic reconnaissance mission to fly by and return data from an asteroid representative of near-Earth asteroids that may one day become destinations for humans.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Sep 4)

ROBOTIC SPACE ARM SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETES TEST BY MOVING A SUITCASE-SIZED OBJECT AROUND THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - The European Space Agency (ESA) is celebrating another milestone for the European Robotic Arm (ERA), which "effortlessly" completed a test on the International Space Station last week. The 11-metre arm completed its first transfer following commands from cosmonauts inside the space station as teams from Russia and the Netherlands watched on from Earth.   More
(Source: ABC - Sep 3)

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