SPACEX WANTS TO BUILD UP TO 1 MILLION EARTH SATELLITE INTERNET CONNECTIONS - The company just took the next step toward getting satellite internet to customers. The news: You still need ground-based systems to receive a signal from satellite internet. With SpaceX’s February 1 filing to the US Federal Communications Commission, it’s requesting to deploy up to a million ground stations in the US—including in Alaska, Hawaii, the Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico—to provide connection points to its internet satellites on behalf of its sister company SpaceX Services.   More
(Source: MIT Technology Review - Feb 13)

US TO EXTEND USE OF RUSSIA'S SOYUZ FOR ISS MISSIONS UNTIL APRIL 2020 - The United States will extend the use of Russian Soyuz spacecraft to bring NASA astronauts to the International Space Station and ensure their return to Earth until April 2020, a Russian space industry source told Sputnik. "The following scheme is planned for now: two NASA astronauts will remain on the ISS for nine months instead of the usual six. So, Nick Hague starts his mission on March 14 [2019] on the Soyuz MS-12 and returns to Earth on 18 December on the Soyuz MS-13, while Andrew Morgan will travel to the orbital station on Soyuz MS-13 on 6 July and will return on Soyuz MS-15 in April 2020", the source said.   More
(Source: Space Daily - Feb 13)

SECOND IRANIAN SATELLITE LAUNCH ATTEMPT IN A MONTH FAILS - Iran’s second try in less than a month to send a satellite into orbit apparently failed shortly after liftoff from a remote desert launch pad under daily surveillance from a fleet of commercial imaging spacecraft, according to U.S. government officials and independent analysts. Images of the launch pad in north-central Iran taken by orbiting satellites owned by U.S. companies suggest a rocket launch occurred last week, but the U.S. military’s catalog of space objects registered no new spacecraft in orbit.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Feb 12)

HAPPY SATELLITE COLLISION DAY! IT IS 10 YEARS SINCE RUSSIA AND IRIDIUM GOT TOO CLOSE FOR COMFORT - As Elon Musk crowed over the performance of SpaceX's Raptor engine and Northrop Grumman's Cygnus departed the International Space Station (ISS), debris watchers were ruing the 10th anniversary of the first accidental hypervelocity satellite collision. On 10 February 2009, a 950kg Russian military satellite smacked into an Iridium Comms bird, destroying both spacecraft and leaving a cloud of debris large enough to give Sandra Bullock the jitters.   More
(Source: The Register - Feb 12)

SPACEX DRAGON CREW DEMO-1 FLIGHT TO SPACE STATION: WHAT TO EXPECT - Elon Musk's company aims to fly the first demonstration mission of its Crew Dragon capsule to the International Space Station (ISS) on March 2. This flight, known as Demo-1, will be uncrewed. But if all goes well, Crew Dragon will likely carry astronauts to and from the orbiting lab for the first time this summer. [Take a Walk Through SpaceX's Crew Dragon] Here's what you need to know about Crew Dragon, Demo-1 and the short-term future of human spaceflight.   More
(Source: Space.com - Feb 12)

RUSSIAN SATELLITE REGISTERS UNKNOWN PHYSICAL PHENOMENA IN EARTH'S ATMOSPHERE - An ultraviolet telescope installed on the Russian satellite Lomonosov has registered light "explosions" in the planet's atmosphere, whose physical nature has not been explained so far, the director of the Research Institute of Nuclear Physics at the Russian State University said in an interview with Sputnik. "With the help of the telescope, we have obtained even more important results than we expected. It looks like we have encountered new physical phenomena… We do not yet know their physical nature…    More
(Source: Sputnik International - Feb 11)

SPACEX SEEKS FCC APPROVAL FOR UP TO 1M STARLINK SATELLITE EARTH STATIONS - SpaceX has opened a new window into its ambitious plans for a global satellite broadband data network, thanks to an earth-station license application filed with the Federal Communications Commission. The application, filed on behalf of a sister company called SpaceX Services, seeks blanket approval for up to a million earth stations that would be used by customers of the Starlink satellite internet service. The stations would rely on a flat-panel, phased-array system to transmit and receive signals in the Ku-band to and from the Starlink constellation.   More
(Source: Yahoo News - Feb 10)

SINGAPORE'S HOMEGROWN SATELLITE LAUNCHES INTO ORBIT - Singapore is probably not the first place that comes to mind when you think of space exploration. But the island state is establishing itself as a force in the new space race by building a fleet of small, low-cost satellites. The satellite is testing technologies the scientists hope will pave the way for what could be Singapore’s first moon mission. Scientists say that within five years, they will be able to build satellites small but robust enough to make the journey.   More
(Source: TRT World - Feb 10)

CYGNUS SUPPLY SHIP DEPARTS SPACE STATION FOR EXTENDED MISSION - A commercial Cygnus supply ship departed the International Space Station on Friday for an extended mission to deploy five nanosatellites and conduct other experiments before re-entering the atmosphere and burning up with more than two tons of trash. The space station’s nearly 58-foot-long (17-meter) robotic arm grappled the Cygnus spacecraft and pulled it away from a berthing port on the orbiting outpost’s Unity module early Friday, setting up for release of the supply ship at 11:16 a.m. EST (1616 GMT) under the command of Expedition 58 flight engineer Anne McClain.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Feb 9)

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