NASA'S NEW SATELLITE WILL LOOK FOR EARTH-SIZED PLANETS NEARBY - The Kepler mission scopes out stars and galaxies thousands of light-years away to find exoplanets. NASA's upcoming planet hunter, however, will keep an eye on solar systems closer to home. The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite or TESS will find planets by observing stars and looking out for shadows cast by transiting planets. It will be programmed to compute for a planet's size and the time it takes to orbit its star, because those are the information astronomers need to determine if it's habitable. Since Earth- and even super-Earth-sized planets are tiny, though, TESS will observe small bright dwarf stars only hundreds of light-years away. The satellite is slated to blast off to space in 2017 or 2018 and is expected to observe 200,000 stars within its two-year lifespan. I   More
(Source: Engadget - Jul 30)

NASA'S NEW SPACE PLANE IS GETTING READY TO TAKE FLIGHT - NASA's next cargo delivery vehicle - a spunky little space plane that looks like it could be an offspring of the space shuttle - is getting ready to fly. The svelte and snub nosed Dream Chaser will soon be shipped to the Mojave desert in California where it would begin a series of ground tests that would eventually culminate with a flight from an altitude of 2.5 miles high. To get to this point, however, has been a long road for its manufacturer, the Sierra Nevada Corp. The company had originally pursued a NASA contract to fly astronauts to the International Space Station.    More
(Source: Chicago Tribune - Jul 30)

SPY SATELLITE INFRASTRUCTURE SUPPORTED BY SUCCESSFUL ATLAS 5 ROCKET LAUNCH - A clandestine satellite for the U.S. reconnaissance program was successfully launched by an Atlas 5 rocket today, riding a ferocious torrent of fire and smoke off the pad before disappearing behind a curtain of secrecy. The 194-foot-tall United Launch Alliance rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral’s Complex 41 at 8:37 a.m. EDT (1237 GMT) to cap a flawless early morning countdown. A combined 1.5 million pounds of thrust sent the vehicle to the east, along a 99-degree flight azimuth, carrying the NROL-61 payload for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office that runs the country’s spy satellite network. The twin solid boosters burned out 90 seconds into flight, then separated about 40 seconds later when dynamic pressure conditions were apt.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jul 30)

YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT TAKES TO MOVE A 2-TON SATELLITE ACROSS CALIFORNIA - You may not have heard of DigitalGlobe, but you've definitely seen its work in action. For over two decades, the company has been capturing high-resolution pictures of the Earth and selling them to organizations you're familiar with. Much of Google Earth, Google Maps, Apple Maps imagery and surveying systems used by the U.S. government is provided by DigitalGlobe. Its photography has been used for everything from disaster relief to city planning to simply helping your Uber driver figure out where he's taking you. On September 15th, the company is launching a brand-new satellite, the WorldView-4, into orbit.    More
(Source: Fast Company - Jul 29)

JAPAN’S SIXTH HTV CARGO MISSION SLATED FOR SEPT. 30 LAUNCH - Japan’s space agency has set Sept. 30 as the target launch date for the country’s sixth resupply mission to the International Space Station, carrying cargo, experiments and six lithium-ion batteries to kick off a major upgrade of the lab’s electrical system. The cylinder-shaped cargo craft is set for liftoff at 1716 GMT (1:16 p.m. EDT) Sept. 30 from the Tanegashima Space Center, a facility nestled on the southern coast of Tanegashima Island in southern Japan, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency announced Tuesday.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jul 29)

CHINESE ROCKET BURNS UP OVER WESTERN U.S. - Pieces of China's newest rocket could be seen burning up in the skies over the western U.S. last night as the spacecraft re-entered the earth's atmosphere. What was first described as a freak meteor shower or space junk appears to have been an experimental Chinese rocket called Long March 7, according to experts who tweeted on social media. Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, says it's a notable event. "So far in 2016 there have been 25 reentries of objects massing 1 ton or more. But objects of 5 ton+ class like this are rare."   More
(Source: TWC News - Jul 28)

CHINESE SATELLITE IS ONE GIANT STEP FOR THE QUANTUM INTERNET - China is poised to launch the world’s first satellite designed to do quantum experiments. A fleet of quantum-enabled craft is likely to follow. First up could be more Chinese satellites, which will together create a super-secure communications network, potentially linking people anywhere in the world. But groups from Canada, Japan, Italy and Singapore also have plans for quantum space experiments. “Definitely, I think there will be a race,” says Chaoyang Lu, a physicist at the -University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, who works with the team behind the Chinese satellite. The 600-kilogram craft, the latest in a string of Chinese space-science satellites, will launch from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in August. The Chinese Academy of Sciences and the Austrian Academy of Sciences are collaborators on the US$100-million mission.   More
(Source: Nature - Jul 28)

CHINA TO LAUNCH 1ST HIGH-CAPACITY BROADBAND SATELLITE - China is scheduled to launch its first high-capacity broadband satellite by the end of 2018, and to begin satellite communications services by 2019, according to the satellite system's blueprint. The blueprint was revealed as part of a contract signed between the Shenzhen government and China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) on July 23, according to CASC's official WeChat platform. A new company, APT Mobile SatCom Limited (APSTAR), co-founded by the two bodies, was also unveiled.   More
(Source: China.org.cn - Jul 27)

NEW SATELLITE FOR SPY AGENCY AWAITS LAUNCH INTO SPACE THURSDAY - An Atlas 5 rocket carrying a classified national security satellite was rolled to the launch pad this morning for Thursday’s flight to bolster the U.S. intelligence-gathering space architecture. Liftoff will occur at 8:37 a.m. EDT (1237 GMT). The duration of the day’s usable launch window remains classified. Weather forecasters expect favorable conditions for liftoff, placing 80 percent odds on launching. The only concern is a stray coastal shower impeding the rules. United Launch Alliance will perform the satellite-delivery mission using a 421-configured Atlas 5 rocket that is distinguished by a nose cone 14 feet in diameter and two solid-fuel boosters for added takeoff thrust.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jul 27)

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