THE LOW-COST MINI SATELLITES BRINGING MOBILE TO THE WORLD - Large chunks of the planet are still of out of reach of mobile phone signals - that's about four billion people without access to digital communications. But this could change thanks to shrinking satellite sizes and costs. Lower-cost, space-based mobile phone services will soon be a reality thanks to one firm's fleet of nano-satellites that will bounce your voice or text signal from one spacecraft to the next and finally down to the person you're calling. More (Source: BBN News - Feb 23)
RECYCLED SPACEX ROCKET BOOSTS PAZ RADAR SATELLITE, FIRST STARLINK TESTBEDS INTO ORBIT - Launching with a Spanish radar observation craft and the first two experimental satellites for SpaceX’s planned global broadband network, a Falcon 9 rocket fired away from California’s Central Coast shortly before sunrise Thursday after several days of delays. The 229-foot-tall (70-meter) Falcon 9 launcher climbed into a clear sky from Space Launch Complex 4-East at Vandenberg Air Force Base, riding a column of orange exhaust from nine kerosene-burning Merlin main engines. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Feb 22)
ARMY’S IMAGING SATELLITE UP AND RUNNING, BUT ITS FUTURE IS TBD - How valuable is it for troops in the field to have their own dedicated source of satellite imagery and other space-based intelligence? That is a question officials hope to answer in upcoming military exercises where commanders will have an opportunity to test the Army’s newly deployed Kestrel Eye microsatellite. The Kestrel Eye Block IIM was sent into orbit in October from the International Space Station. “It is now operational,” said Dan Harkins, marketing manager at Adcole Maryland Aerospace, the satellite manufacturer. More (Source: SpaceNews - Feb 22)
SPACEX DELAYS FALCON 9 ROCKET LAUNCH DUE TO HIGH-ALTITUDE WINDS - SpaceX called off an attempted launch of its Falcon 9 rocket in California today (Feb. 21) due to strong high-altitude winds, according to the company's CEO, Elon Musk. The Falcon 9 rocket was scheduled to lift off at 9:17 a.m. EST (1417 GMT) from Space Launch Complex 4E at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base. But about 10 minutes before liftoff, SpaceX announced it was standing down from the launch try. More (Source: Space.com - Feb 22)
GOODBYE, ISS. HELLO, PRIVATE SPACE STATIONS? - Have you heard? The ISS might go away in 2025. Yep, that ISS—our big, honking space laboratory in the sky, one of the most successful international partnership stories of all time. Continually staffed since 2000. Off the Earth, for the Earth. One of the most expensive public projects ever, second possibly only to America’s Interstate Highway System. Unofficially, 2025 has been the station’s retirement year since 2014, when NASA and its international partners agreed to keep it flying through 2024. But there’s always been an assumption that end date could stretch to 2028, a point cited as when degrading hardware might start making life aboard the station a little dicey. More (Source: The Planetary Society - Feb 21)
GOES-S TO LAUNCH NEXT WEEK JOINING GOES-16 IN NOAA’S NEW GENERATION OF WEATHER SATELLITES - America’s fleet of weather satellites will grow this March as NASA and NOAA launch GOES-S, the newest satellite that will help meteorologists to improve forecast accuracy. GOES-S will be the second member of a new generation of geostationary weather satellites, joining GOES-16, formerly known as GOES-R, which launched on Nov. 19, 2016 “The GOES-S satellite will join GOES-16 as NOAA continues to upgrade its satellite fleet,” Secretary of Commerce Wilbur Ross said. More (Source: Accuweather - Feb 21)
SPACEX LAUNCH OF PAZ AND MICROSAT-2A AND -2B POSTPONED - The launch of the Spanish PAZ satellite from Vandenberg AFB by SpaceX has been postponed, with a reference to "technical reasons" by that country's Ministry of Defense as the reason for the new delay. PAZ, when on orbit, will perform both military and civil operations, such as troop movements, environmental observations and more. More (Source: SatNews - Feb 19)
NASA EVICTS GOLD-HELMETED ROBO-ASTRONAUT FROM SPACE - NASA is sending the ISS Robonaut – a sinister-looking humanoid with legs like tentacles – back to Earth for repairs. Robonaut 2 has officially been out of action since 2015 after a hardware upgrade went terribly wrong leaving the dexterous humanoid incapacitated. Following failed attempts to get the gold-helmeted action man back on its feet, it will now be sent home for a fix, with the intention of one day returning to the International Space Station. More (Source: RT - Feb 17)
RUSSIA, CHINA WILL HAVE ANTI-SATELLITE WEAPONS “WITHIN A FEW YEARS” - The U.S. intelligence community’s new worldwide assessment of threats to the United States and its allies issued a stark warning about space warfare: Russia and China will be able to shoot down our satellites within two to three years. The capability would seriously jeopardize the U.S. fleet, including Global Positioning System satellites, military and civilian communications satellites, and spy satellites. But would either country use them? And if they did, would they risk even greater damage to their own networks? More (Source: Popular Mechanics - Feb 16)
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