PRIVATE FIRM PREPARES TO LAUNCH THREE AIR FORCE SATELLITES FROM NEW ZEALAND - A trio of Air Force satellites is ready to blast off from New Zealand on an Electron rocket as early as Saturday, according to the company charged with getting them into space. Rocket Lab, founded by New Zealander Peter Beck in 2006 and headquartered in Huntington Beach, Calif., launched its first rocket, dubbed “It’s Business Time,” from New Zealand in January 2018 and its first commercial satellite in November. This month’s launch is part of the Air Force’s Rapid Agile Launch Initiative (RALI) to procure small, commercial launch vehicles that included $5.7 million for Rocket Lab for a dedicated launch mission, Space News reported April 3.   More
(Source: Stars and Stripes - May 3)

SPACEX IS SET TO LAUNCH A CARGO MISSION TO THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION ON FRIDAY - Early Friday morning, SpaceX is set to launch another one of its Dragon cargo capsules to orbit, loaded with supplies and science experiments for the International Space Station. It’s an otherwise routine launch for the company — the 17th one that SpaceX has launched for NASA since 2012. However, this mission comes two weeks after the passenger version of SpaceX’s Dragon capsule exploded during an engine test. The exact cause of that accident has yet to be identified, but the cargo version of SpaceX’s Dragon capsule is a very different vehicle than the passenger version, known as Crew Dragon.   More
(Source: The Verge - May 3)

BLUE ORIGIN ‘ONE STEP CLOSER’ TO HUMAN FLIGHTS AFTER SUCCESSFUL SUBORBITAL LAUNCH - Taking another step toward flying space tourists to the edge of space, Jeff Bezos’s space company Blue Origin again flew its New Shepard suborbital booster Thursday with a package of microgravity research experiments. The single-stage rocket took off from Blue Origin’s privately-operated launch site north of Van Horn, Texas, at 9:35 a.m. EDT (8:35 a.m. CDT; 1335 GMT). Named for Mercury astronaut Alan Shepard, the rocket climbed into a clear sky powered by a hydrogen-fueled BE-3 main engine, which accelerated the vehicle to a speed of more than 2,200 mph (3,540 kilometers per hour) in less than two-and-a-half minutes.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 3)

ELECTRICAL ISSUES BEING RESOLVED TO ALLOW CRS-17 DRAGON LAUNCH - NASASpaceFlight.com Forums L2 Sign Up SLS/Orion SpaceX Commercial ISS International Other Electrical issues being resolved to allow CRS-17 Dragon launch written by Chris Bergin and Pete Harding April 30, 2019 NASA postponed the next Dragon resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) after an issue with the Station’s Main Bus Switching Units (MBSUs) – a component of the ISS United States Orbital Segment (USOS) Electrical Power System (EPS) – was observed this week. The CRS-17 launch was slipped to Friday while the issue was being evaluated. However, work to restore the redundant string to the robotic arm that will capture Dragon is proceeding to plan, initially with the use of jumpers, soon to be followed with a robotic changeout of the faulty MSBU on Thursday.   More
(Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - May 2)

CHINA LAUNCHES MAPPING SATELLITES - A Chinese Long March 4B rocket successfully launched two Tianhui satellites Monday to conduct land surveys, mapping and scientific experiments in space, according to reports from state-run media. The satellites lifted off aboard the Long March 4B launcher at 2252 GMT (6:52 p.m. EDT) Monday, China’s government-run Xinhua news agency reported. The launch occurred at 6:52 a.m. Beijing time Tuesday, a little more than an hour after sunrise at the Taiyuan space base in northern China’s Shanxi province.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - May 2)

INTELSAT STILL SEARCHING FOR CAUSE OF IS-29E LOSS, REPLACEMENT SATELLITE TBD - Intelsat estimates the in-orbit failure of its first high-throughput satellite will cost the company between $45 million and $50 million in revenue for the year. Luxembourg and Virginia-based Intelsat said it is still working with Boeing on understanding why the uninsured, three-year-old Intelsat-29e satellite it built sprung a fuel leak three weeks ago and stopped communicating shortly after. The investigation has so far indicated that Intelsat-29e’s failure is unrelated to the propulsion issues with Intelsat-33e, a Boeing-built satellite that launched in 2016, Steve Spengler, Intelsat’s chief executive, said April 30.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - May 1)

SATELLITE CONSTELLATIONS AND RADIO ASTRONOMY - In the San Augustine Plains of central New Mexico, 27 radio telescopes stand tall, operating nearly 24 hours, 7 days a week capturing extremely weak signals emitted from all over the Universe. This flat and vast land, once a seabed, sits at an altitude of 7,000 feet and is surrounded by 360 degrees of mountains. Despite the ideal conditions of this location, "listening" to these faint radio emissions is becoming increasingly difficult as the Earth becomes "noisier" in the same direction in which these dish antennas are pointed, the sky. At ground level, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's (NRAO) Very Large Array keeps a continuous live monitoring station dedicated for receiving Wi-Fi and Bluetooth radio transmissions for visitors' cellphones and other electronic devices...   More
(Source: Space Daily - Apr 30)

SPACE STATION POWER GLITCH COULD DELAY SPACEX LAUNCH PLANS - An electrical distribution unit aboard the International Space Station malfunctioned Monday, taking down two of the lab's eight power channels. The crew is in no danger while engineers troubleshoot the problem, officials said, but if it can't be resolved, the electrical box in question might have to be replaced with a spare, possibly prompting NASA to delay launch of a SpaceX Dragon supply ship Wednesday. Assuming an on-time launch atop a Falcon 9 rocket, the Dragon cargo capsule, loaded with nearly 5,500 pounds of equipment and supplies, is expected to catch up with the station early Friday and then stand by while the lab's robot arm locks on and pulls it in for berthing.   More
(Source: CBS News - Apr 30)

SPACEX DELAYS NEXT DRAGON CARGO LAUNCH TO MAY 1 - SpaceX has pushed back the launch of a Dragon cargo mission for NASA this week by 24 hours, with liftoff now targeted for Wednesday (May 1). The uncrewed Dragon resupply ship will now launch to the International Space Station Wednesday at 3:59 a.m. EDT (0759 GMT) from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, according to SpaceX and NASA. SpaceX test-fired the Falcon 9 rocket that will launch the mission on Saturday (April 27).    More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 29)

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