SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW CRATERS AT ALLEGED SYRIAN CHEMICAL WEAPONS FACILITIES - The Syrians say some targeted sites didn't receive any damage. Satellite images given to CNN appear to show the contrary -- extensive damage. The US Department of Defense early Saturday released a map that it says shows their three Syrian airstrike targets. CNN provided that map to two satellite imagery companies, DigitalGlobe and Planet.com. Satellite images from those companies appear to show extensive airstrike damage to facilities allegedly involved with Syria's chemical weapons program.   More
(Source: CNN - Apr 15)

NASA MAY EXTEND SPACE STATION MISSIONS TO ADDRESS POTENTIAL COMMERCIAL CREW DELAYS - NASA is in discussions with its Russian counterparts about extending some upcoming space station missions as a way to buy more time for development of commercial crew vehicles. During an April 12 hearing by the commerce, justice and science subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee on the agency’s fiscal year 2019 budget proposal, NASA Acting Administrator Robert Lightfoot said longer “increments” of crews on the ISS could be one way to provide more schedule margin in the event of additional delays by Boeing and SpaceX in the development of their crewed spacecraft.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Apr 14)

ATLAS 5 ROCKET READIED FOR HIGH-ALTITUDE MULTI-SATELLITE FLIGHT SATURDAY - United Launch Alliance crews at Cape Canaveral are finishing final preparations for an Atlas 5 rocket launch Saturday evening to dispatch three U.S. military satellites directly to an orbital perch more than 20,000 miles over the equator. Set for blastoff at 7:13 p.m. EDT (2313 GMT) Saturday, the Atlas 5 rocket will fly in its most powerful configuration, helped off Cape Canaveral’s Complex 41 launch pad with five Aerojet Rocketdyne-built solid rocket boosters and a Russian-made RD-180 main engine producing a combined 2.6 million pounds of thrust.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 14)

THE AMBITIOUS PROPOSAL TO CREATE A SPACE 'MUSEUM' IN ORBIT - On 18 May 2009, 570km (350 miles) above the Earth, astronaut John Grunsfeld became the last human to touch the Hubble Space Telescope. Before re-entering Space Shuttle Atlantis’ airlock at the end of the final and gruelling servicing mission, he recalled a quote from science fiction legend, Arthur C Clarke. “The only way of finding the limits of the possible, is by going beyond them into the impossible,” he said over the intercom to the VIPs gathered in mission control. “On this mission, we tried some things that many people said were impossible… we wish Hubble the very best.”   More
(Source: BBC News - Apr 13)

THE SNEAKY WAYS CHINA AND RUSSIA COULD THREATEN US SATELLITES - Major global powers, such as China and Russia, are focusing more on space weapons that neutralize others’ satellites rather than those that destroy payloads on orbit, a new report has found. The study by the Secure World Foundation, released Wednesday morning and previewed exclusively with Defense News, is a comprehensive collection of public-source information about the counterspace capabilities of China, Russia, North Korea and other world powers that could threaten American dominance in space.    More
(Source: DefenseNews.com - Apr 13)

SOYUZ ROCKET: RUSSIA'S RELIABLE BOOSTER - The Soyuz rocket – not to be confused with the Soyuz spacecraft – is a line of Russian boosters that have seen variants fly since the mid-1960s. It is used for both cargo and astronaut transportation. The Soyuz rocket is best known today for being the main form of transportation to the International Space Station. NASA bought astronaut seats on Soyuz spacecraft (which the rocket carries into space) starting in 2011, after the space shuttle program retired.    More
(Source: Space.com - Apr 12)

ISRO LAUNCHES FOR SECOND TIME IN TWO WEEKS - Riding a column of red-hot rocket exhaust, an Indian Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle fired into orbit Wednesday with a replacement satellite for the country’s home-grown navigation network. The PSLV took off at 2234 GMT (6:34 p.m. EDT) with a rush of flame from a solid-fueled core motor and four strap-on solid rocket boosters. Two more augmentation rockets ignited around 25 seconds after liftoff to give the 145-foot-tall (44-meter) launcher another boost into a predawn sky over India’s spaceport on Sriharikota Island, a piece of land on the country’s eastern coastline.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 12)

CHINESE LONG MARCH 4C ROCKET DEPLOYS FOUR SATELLITES IN ORBIT - Three Chinese military surveillance spacecraft and an experimental nanosatellite rode a Long March 4C rocket into orbit Tuesday. The Long March 4C rocket took off at 0425 GMT (12:25 a.m. EDT; 12:25 p.m. Beijing time) from the Jiuquan space center located in the Inner Mongolia region of northwestern China, according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 11)

THERE'S A LOT OF SPERM ON THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION RIGHT NOW - For the first time, err, officially, NASA will set loose human sperm in outer space. The Micro-11 mission, which made its way to space aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket's Dragon resupply capsule, amounts to a bunch of containers of frozen human and bull sperm. Aboard the International Space Station (ISS), scientists will thaw the sperm, according to a NASA statement, and then study it to see how weightlessness affects its ability to move and prepare to fuse with an egg.   More
(Source: Live Science - Apr 10)

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