AIR FORCE: SATELLITE READY FOR LAUNCH - As the first Lockheed Martin-built GPS III satellite prepares to ship to the launch pad, the U.S. Air Force has declared that the second GPS III satellite is complete, fully tested and ready to launch. The Air Force's "Available for Launch" declaration is the final acceptance of Lockheed Martin's second GPS III Space Vehicle (GPS III SV02) — declaring it technically sound and ready to launch. GPS III SV02 will bring new capabilities to U.S. and allied military forces, and a new civil signal that will improve future connectivity worldwide for commercial and civilian users.   More
(Source: R & D Magazine - Aug 22)

VEGA LAUNCH DELAYED 24 HOURS - The liftoff of a European satellite to measure global wind fields has been delayed 24 hours to Wednesday in hopes of a better weather forecast at the Vega rocket’s launch base in French Guiana, officials announced Monday. The European Space Agency’s Aeolus satellite is ready for launch aboard a solid-fueled Vega rocket, the smallest booster in Arianespace’s fleet, to begin a three-year science mission to monitor wind speeds in Earth’s atmosphere.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Aug 21)

TINY ASTERIA SATELLITE SPOTS EXOPLANET IN TRANSIT, A FIRST FOR CUBESAT TECHNOLOGY - The mini-spacecraft known as CubeSats are capable of many wondrous things, just like the MarCO twin satellites, the first-ever to leave Earth’s orbit and set out on a journey toward Mars, have recently proven. One other soldier in the brave CubeSat army has now reached another type of milestone, becoming the first to measure the transit of an exoplanet, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge announced in a news release. The tiny satellite is dubbed ASTERIA, short for Arcsecond Space Telescope Enabling Research in Astrophysics, and was developed by MIT together with NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.   More
(Source: The Inquisitr - Aug 20)

WORLD’S FIRST WIND-MAPPING SATELLITE SET TO LAUNCH - A satellite that will be the first to comprehensively monitor wind around the globe is finally ready to fly. After nearly two decades in the planning, the European Space Agency’s (ESA’s) Aeolus mission is slated to launch from Kourou, French Guiana, on 21 August. Meteorologists think that its data will significantly improve weather forecasts, because the lack of detailed wind measurements is one of the biggest gaps in the global Earth-observing system. Aeolus, a €480-million (US$550-million) mission, will use ultraviolet lasers to track wind speed and direction in the lowermost 30 kilometres of the atmosphere.    More
(Source: Nature - Aug 18)

BEIJING TO LAUNCH SATELLITE NETWORK TO MONITOR SOUTH CHINA SEA TRAFFIC - Officials in China's Hainan province are preparing to send a series of satellites into space starting in 2019 in order to keep track of "every reef and ship" within the contested waters of the South China Sea. The project is headed by the Sanya Institute of Remote Sensing in Hainan and has been sponsored by the provincial government, according to the China News Service. In total, 10 satellites will be launched into low-Earth orbit by the end of 2021.   More
(Source: Sputnik International - Aug 17)

SPACEWALKERS TOSS NANOSATELLITES INTO ORBIT, HOOK UP BIRD MIGRATION MONITOR - Clad in pressurized spacesuits, two Russian cosmonauts headed outside the International Space Station on Wednesday and hand-released four tiny CubeSats and installed hardware for a German experiment to track animal migration. The 7-hour, 46-minute excursion by Russian flight engineers Oleg Artemyev and Sergey Prokopyev began at 1617 GMT (12:17 p.m. EDT) as they opened the hatch to the station’s Pirs airlock.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Aug 16)

MYSTERY RUSSIAN SATELLITE'S BEHAVIOUR RAISES ALARM IN US - A mysterious Russian satellite displaying "very abnormal behaviour" has raised alarm in the US, according to a State Department official. "We don't know for certain what it is and there is no way to verify it," said assistant secretary Yleem Poblete at a conference in Switzerland on 14 August. She voiced fears that it was impossible to say if the object may be a weapon. Russia has dismissed the comments as "unfounded, slanderous accusations based on suspicions". The satellite in question was launched in October last year.   More
(Source: BBC News - Aug 16)

SPACEX VOWS MANNED FLIGHT TO SPACE STATION IS ON TRACK - ech magnate Elon Musk's SpaceX vowed Monday to send its first astronauts into orbit on schedule next year—part of a drive to restore America's dominance of the space race. Gwynne Shotwell, the aerospace manufacturer's president, told journalists in Los Angeles an unmanned flight to the International Space Station in November would pave the way for a manned mission in April 2019.    More
(Source: Phys.org - Aug 15)

TINY SATELLITE TO SEARCH UNIVERSE FOR MISSING MATTER - HaloSat was launched into orbit in May aboard a Cygnus spacecraft and released from the International Space Station over Australia on July 13, 2018. It is charged with studying the halo of hot gas surrounding the Milky Way as part of a mission to search for matter missing from the universe.   More
(Source: HowStuffWorks - Aug 15)

Previous Next