NASA INVITES MEDIA TO VIEW NOAA’S WEATHER SATELLITE AHEAD OF LAUNCH - Media are invited to view the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite T (GOES-T) satellite Thursday, Jan. 20, at 9:30 a.m. EST at the Astrotech Space Operations payload processing facility in Titusville, Florida. Media will have an opportunity to photograph GOES-T and interview project and program officials. Media interested in attending this event must apply by 4 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 6, 2022, and submit their request online at https://media.ksc.nasa.gov. More (Source: NASA - Dec 30)
CHINA URGES US TO PROTECT ITS SPACE STATION FROM SATELLITES - China is calling on the United States to protect a Chinese space station and its three-member crew after Beijing complained that satellites launched by Elon Musk’s SpaceX nearly struck the station. A foreign ministry spokesman accused Washington on Tuesday of ignoring its treaty obligations to protect the safety of the Tiangong station’s three-member crew following the July 1 and Oct. 21 incidents. More (Source: AP News - Dec 30)
CHINA’S SPACE STATION MANEUVERED TO AVOID STARLINK SATELLITES - China has informed the United Nations that its crewed space station twice maneuvered to avoid potential collisions with SpaceX Starlink satellites earlier this year. A notification dated Dec. 6 by China under Article V of the Outer Space Treaty stated that the Tianhe space station module conducted preventive collision avoidance due to close approaches by the Starlink-1095 (2020-001BK) and Starlink-2305 (2021-024N) satellites on July 1 and Oct. 21 respectively. More (Source: SpaceNews - Dec 29)
ELON MUSK, SPACEX FACE ONLINE BACKLASH IN CHINA AFTER SPACE STATION NEAR-MISSES - Chinese citizens lashed out online against billionaire Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on Monday after China complained that its space station was forced to take evasive action to avoid collision with satellites launched by Musk’s Starlink programme. More (Source: CNBC - Dec 28)
SOYUZ 2.1B LAUNCHES WITH 36 ONEWEB SATELLITES - Starsem, Arianespace, and Roscosmos have launched a Soyuz 2.1b for OneWeb flight 12. Lift-off from Site 31/6 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan occurred at 13:10 UTC (08:10 EST) on December 27. Also known as ST-37 by both Arianespace and Starsem, the latter is a joint French-Russian company that commercializes Soyuz launches. This year, a total of five OneWeb missions were launched from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in eastern Russia, and another two launched from Baikonur. Vostochny is the newest cosmodrome for Russia, while Baikonur is the oldest and originated from the Soviet era. More (Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - Dec 27)
CHINA LAUNCHES ZIYUAN-1 02E SATELLITE VIA CHANG ZHENG 4C - China has deployed a new Earth resources observation satellite Sunday via its Chang Zheng 4C rocket. The Ziyuan-1 02E satellite, along with an amateur radio CubeSat, lifted off from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center at 03:11 UTC (11:11 Beijing Time). Ziyuan (ZY), meaning Resource, is a series of remote-sensing satellites which China uses to acquire high-resolution images that can be used for surveying Earth resources, disaster management, and ecological and land use monitoring. More (Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - Dec 27)
JAMES WEBB SPACE TELESCOPE NOTCHES CRUCIAL MANEUVER TO SET ITS PATH - The James Webb Space Telescope is truly on its way. The massive observatory launched today (Dec. 25) from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, at 7:20 a.m. EST (1220 GMT). Just 12.5 hours later, the spacecraft began a vital maneuver on its month-long journey to its future outpost as the observatory executed a 65-minute-long thruster burn that concluded at 8:55 p.m. EST (0155 GMT), according to a statement from NASA. More (Source: Space.com - Dec 27)
CHINESE ASTRONAUT PAIR COMPLETE SIX-HOUR SPACEWALK - Two Shenzhou-13 astronauts embarked on a six-hour extravehicular activity Sunday to install equipment outside China’s Tianhe space station module. Astronaut Ye Guangfu, wearing a Fetian EVA suit with yellow markings, opened the Tianhe airlock hatch at 5:44 a.m. Eastern Dec. 26 before exiting the space station module, according to the China Manned Space Agency. Mission commander Zhai Zhigang, with red markings on his Feitian suit, followed his colleague outside at 6:37 a.m., embarking on his third spacewalk. Wang Yaping, the third Shenzhou-13 crew member, assisted from inside Tianhe, operating the module’s large robotic arm. More (Source: SpaceNews - Dec 27)
CAN NASA BUILD A NEW SPACE STATION? - By 2023 (or 2024, or 2025, or maybe 2030, depending on whom you ask) you may look up into the night sky and see no International Space Station (ISS) flying above you. Russia, you see, keeps threatening to pull out of the project and take its space station modules with it -- and right now, ISS can't operate without them. More (Source: The Motley Fool - Dec 27)
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