THIS SMALL JAPANESE RE-ENTRY CAPSULE IS READY FOR A TEST FLIGHT FROM SPACE STATION - A brand-new Japanese re-entry capsule, designed to bring back experiments from space, is gearing up for its first test flight after hitching a ride to the International Space Station aboard a robotic cargo ship. The space capsule arrived at the space station Thursday (Sept. 27) along with 5 tons of supplies on Kounotori7, the seventh uncrewed H-II Transfer Vehicle resupply ship (also known as HTV-7) launched to the orbiting lab by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). Kounotori is Japanese for "White Stork."    More
(Source: Space.com - Sep 29)

CHINA COULD BE FACING SPACE STATION DELAY, TIANGONG-2 TO BE DEORBITED - China’s plan to launch and construct a space station could be hit by a test flight delay of the launcher designed to send the modules into orbit. An online report by People’s Liberation Army Daily, a military newspaper, reports Lin Xiqiang, deputy director of the China Manned Space Engineering Office (CMSEO), as saying at a press conference in Beijing on Wednesday that the Long March 5B will not make its planned test launch in the first half of 2019. “Due to the failure of the launch of the Long March 5 remote launch vehicle, the first flight of the Long March 5B carrier rocket will be postponed. The specific implementation time needs to be clarified after coordination with relevant departments,” Xiqiang said.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Sep 28)

JAPANESE CARGO SHIP ARRIVES AT SPACE STATION - A Japanese cargo ship loaded with more than 10,000 pounds of supplies and equipment, including a new set of solar array batteries, was captured by the International Space Station's robot arm early Thursday to wrap up a trouble-free rendezvous. With station commander Drew Feustel and Serena Auñón-Chancellor operating the Canadian-built arm, the HTV-7 "Kounotori" cargo craft was captured at 7:34 a.m. EDT (GMT-4) as the two spacecraft were passing 251 miles above the northern Pacific Ocean.   More
(Source: Space.com - Sep 28)

SATELLITE COMPANY PARTNERS WITH BEZOS' AWS TO BRING INTERNET CONNECTIVITY TO THE 'WHOLE PLANET' - Iridium Communications announced a partnership with Amazon Web Services on Thursday, to develop a satellite-based network called CloudConnect for Internet of Things (IoT) applications. "We're really covering the whole planet ... with terrestrial networks today it's still only 10 percent or 20 percent" of the Earth, Iridium CEO Matt Desch told CNBC. "Everybody today can connect pretty easily with very little effort. Now that Amazon has put our language into the cloud platform, they can extend their applications to the satellite realm."   More
(Source: CNBC - Sep 28)

NASA'S PINT-SIZED SATELLITE COULD IMPROVE WEATHER FORECASTS - Apparently, NASA has been testing a small, shoebox-sized satellite that could make weather forecasts a lot more accurate. It's called RainCube for "Radar in a CubeSat," and it uses tiny instruments to provide real-time look inside storms. The agency has deployed the test unit from the ISS into Low Earth Orbit in July, which captured its first images of a storm over Mexico in August. In September, the satellite also captured images of Hurricane Florence's first rainfall. In other words, the experiment has been successful, though most likely far from over. See, the hope is to use a whole fleet of RainCubes to monitor severe storms.   More
(Source: Endgadget - Sep 27)

JAPAN'S MINI SPACE ELEVATOR GOES TO SPACE - The concept of the space elevator is set to get a workout, following the weekend launch of a pair of satellites bound for the International Space Station, Science News reported Monday. The experiment, under the auspices of researchers at Shizuoka University in Japan, will be the first movement trial conducted in space as part of the Space Tethered Autonomous Robotic Satellite (STARS) project. The two small STARS-ME satellites will be connected by a 10-meter cable, and a robotic device will travel along it between the satellites. That's a tiny representation of what a full-size space elevator might someday do running from Earth all the way to spacecraft in orbit.   More
(Source: CNET - Sep 26)

ARIANE 5 ROCKET LOFTS 2 SATELLITES ON MILESTONE 100TH LAUNCH - Europe's workhorse Ariane 5 rocket aced its 100th launch tonight (Sept. 25), carrying two telecommunications satellites to orbit in a drama-filled liftoff. An undisclosed issue brought the countdown clock to a halt 94 seconds before the targeted launch time of 5:53 p.m. EDT (2153 GMT; 6:53 p.m. local time at the launch site in Kourou, French Guiana). The webcast of the French company Arianespace, which boasted more than 3,000 viewers at that point, suddenly went silent as a scrolling banner relayed that the launch was on hold.    More
(Source: Space.com - Sep 26)

JAPANESE CARGO SHIP LAUNCHES TOWARD SPACE STATION - A robotic Japanese resupply ship has launched toward the International Space Station (ISS), kicking off a five-day orbital chase. The HTV-7 freighter — which is loaded with more than 5 tons (4.5 metric tons) of science gear, food, fuel and other supplies — lifted off atop an H-II rocket from Japan's Tanegashima Space Center today (Sept. 22) at 1:52 p.m. EDT (1752 GMT; 2:52 a.m. on Sept. 23 Japan standard time). If all goes according to plan, HTV-7 will arrive at the orbiting lab early Thursday morning (Sept. 27), NASA officials said.    More
(Source: Space.com - Sep 24)

SATELLITE FLARE PHOTOBOMBS A LUNAR ECLIPSE UNDER THE MILKY WAY - Captured 15 minutes after the end of totality during the longest total lunar eclipse of the century, this scene shows the red glow of a partially eclipsed moon very close to Mars. With the galactic core of the Milky Way, you can see Saturn above the constellation Sagittarius. Near the Milky Way's colorful, dusty arc, a flare from the Chinese Earth-observing satellite Formosat-2 (also known as Rocsat-2) passes overhead.   More
(Source: Space.com - Sep 24)

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