PAKISTAN URGES NO MILITARIZATION OF SPACE AFTER INDIA DOWNS SATELLITE - Pakistan issued a call against military threats in outer space on Wednesday, hours after India said it had shot down one of its own satellites in a demonstration of its growing power in space. “Space is the common heritage of mankind and every nation has the responsibility to avoid actions which can lead to the militarization of this arena,” Pakistan’s foreign ministry said in a statement. More (Source: Reuters - Mar 28)
FLEETS OF AUTONOMOUS SATELLITES TO COORDINATE TASKS AMONG THEMSELVES - Space missions have long benefited from some autonomous operations being carried out aboard spacecraft, but with a sharp increase expected in the number of satellites being launched in the next few years, researchers are using automation and artificial intelligence to make them smarter and more effective. Technology firms and researchers see scope for giving satellites more onboard control, to circumvent difficulties in communicating with Earth and reduce the need for continuous hands-on supervision and interventi More (Source: Phys.org - Mar 28)
INDIA JOINS SPACE 'SUPER LEAGUE' AS IT SHOOTS DOWN A SATELLITE FOR THE FIRST TIME - India’s quest to become a serious space player just took another big step forward, after the country successfully used a missile to shoot down a satellite. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who is hoping for re-election next month, said Wednesday that the test, dubbed Mission Shakti, put his country into the space “super league.” “A while ago, our scientists shot down a live satellite at a low-earth orbit,” Modi said in a televised address to the nation. “I congratulate all scientists who have made this possible and made India a much stronger nation.” More (Source: Fortune - Mar 28)
'BUCKET-LIST SHOT': AUSTRALIAN GETS RARE PHOTO OF SPACE STATION IN FRONT OF MOON - An amateur Australian astronomer who took a “perfect” photo of the International Space Station passing in front of the moon says it took him eight years to set up. Ken Lawson, from Geraldton in Western Australia, has been an avid astronomer and photographer since childhood. On 14 March he captured the shot of the space station passing between Earth and the moon, in perfect light, with a simple camera and telescope. More (Source: The Guardian - Mar 28)
ISS SSTV TRANSMISSIONS APRIL 1-2 - Dmitry R4UAB reports cosmonauts on the International Space Station will again be transmitting SSTV images, April 1-2, on 145.800 MHz FM as part of the Inter-MAI-75 experiment. A Google translation reads: “Inter-MAI-75” (Education and promotion of space research) – an experiment aimed at combining the efforts of educational universities and radio amateurs in Russia and the United States... More (Source: AMSAT UK - Mar 27)
LOCKHEED MARTIN SHIPS SECOND GPS III SATELLITE - The U.S. Air Force’s second new GPS III satellite has arrived in Florida for launch. According to the release, GPS III is the most powerful and resilient GPS satellite ever put on orbit. Developed with an entirely new design, for U.S. and allied forces, it aims to have three times greater accuracy and up to eight times improved anti-jamming capabilities over the previous GPS II satellite design block, which makes up today’s GPS constellation. GPS III also will be the first GPS satellite to broadcast the new L1C civil signal. Shared by other international global navigation satellite systems, like Galileo, the L1C signal will improve future connectivity worldwide for commercial and civilian users. More (Source: Via Satellite - Mar 27)
SPACEFLIGHT PREPARES TO SEND 21 RIDESHARE SATELLITES ABOARD PSLV C45 - Spaceflight, the leading satellite rideshare and mission management provider, reports it will launch 21 spacecraft on a rideshare mission from India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) at India's Satish Dhawan Space Center. The launch is scheduled for Mon., April 1, 2019 Indian Standard Time (Sun., March 31 PDT). Payloads aboard the mission include the Astrocast-02 3U cubesat from Switzerland-based Astrocast and Flock 4a, 20 next-generation Dove satellites from Planet. More (Source: Space Daily - Mar 27)
CHINESE STARTUP PLANS FIRST ORBITAL LAUNCH ATTEMPT THIS WEEK - A Chinese startup named OneSpace could test its first full-scale launcher as soon as Wednesday in a bid to become China’s first privately-funded rocket company to place a satellite in orbit around the Earth. OneSpace’s OS-M rocket will lift off from the Jiuquan space center in the Gobi Desert, a barren expanse in northwest China’s Inner Mongolia autonomous region. The exact timing of the launch has not been disclosed by OneSpace or Chinese state media agencies, but tweets published by OneSpace officials suggest the flight is scheduled for some time Wednesday. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 27)
NASA CANCELS FIRST ALL-FEMALE SPACEWALK OVER SPACESUIT SIZES - It hadn’t been planned as a historic mission, yet it would have represented a moment of sorts: the first all-female spacewalk. But that moment will have to wait, NASA said Monday, because of a somewhat basic issue — spacesuit sizes. The two astronauts who were scheduled to walk together in space on Friday, Anne C. McClain and Christina H. Koch, would both need to wear a medium-size torso component. But only one is readily available at the International Space Station. More (Source: New York Times - Mar 26)
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