SPACEX TARGETS WEDNESDAY FALCON 9 LAUNCH - A busy stretch on the Eastern Range continues with SpaceX’s planned Wednesday morning launch of a Falcon 9 carrying a pair of commercial communications satellites. There’s an 80 percent chance of favorable weather for the targeted 10:29 a.m. liftoff, at the opening of a 44-minute window at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Launch Complex 40. The mission is one of three in quick succession this month, along with two by United Launch Alliance. ULA’s Delta IV Heavy rocket on Saturday blasted off with a U.S. intelligence satellite on the mission's second attempt in three days, while an Atlas V is being prepared for a June 24 liftoff with a Navy communications satellite.   More
(Source: Florida Today - Jun 12)

LIGHTSAIL-2 TO SEND MORSE CODE - The Planetary Society CubeSat LightSail-2 will transmit Morse code from space, and you can make the sound your ringtone Jason Davis @jasonrdavis reports that during last year’s LightSail-1 mission (call sign KK6HIT), dozens of radio enthusiasts around the wrote in to tell us they heard our solar sailing CubeSat chattering away in low-Earth orbit. Every few seconds, LightSail automatically transmits a beacon packet.   More
(Source: AMSAT UK - Jun 12)

CHINESE SPACE STATION 'OUT OF CONTROL', WILL DO BEST FIREWORK IMPRESSION - The Chinese space agency has apparently lost control of its Tiangong 1 mini-space station, which is expected to return to Earth as a fireball. The Middle Kingdom's state media reported in March that the space station's systems had been shut down and the platform was officially retired. Now there's word from the science community that the controllers no longer have command of its systems and won't be able to bring it back down to earth in a controlled manner. "It wouldn't surprise me if that's the case, there have been rumors about it on the mailing lists for months," Jonathan Tate, director of the UK's Spaceguard Centre, told The Reg.   More
(Source: The Register - Jun 11)

ULA LAUNCH SCRUBBED, WILL TRY AGAIN SATURDAY - Inclement weather caused United Launch Alliance to scrub a planned launch about 55 seconds before it was scheduled to send a spy satellite into orbit. Satellite imagery had shown a major storm that had mostly moved off into the Atlantic Ocean, but a second system caused the scrub. The backup time was set for 1:51 p.m. on Saturday. It comes after ULA CEO Tory Bruno said on Twitter that the chances of a launch tonight remained "small, but not zero" but that he was "not hopeful." Amid darkening, overcast skies, United Launch Alliance crews had been conducting tests to determine when exactly its rocket will be ready to launch.   More
(Source: Orlando Sentinel - Jun 10)

RUSSIAN PROTON-M WITH US INTELSAT SATELLITE LAUNCHED FROM BAIKONUR - The Russian Proton-M rocket carrying a US Intelsat DLA-2 satellite was successfully launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Thursday, a Roscosmos spokesman said. The launch was initially set to take place on Wednesday but was postponed for technical reasons.    More
(Source: Sputnik News - Jun 9)

HOW IS THERE INTERNET ON THE SPACE STATION? - We covered some of the tricks behind NASA’s communication with spaceships a little while back, but the International Space Station’s internet access is pretty interesting. There are some significant challenges with getting the internet set up in space, beginning with not being able to run a fiber-optic cable from ground to space, and we still don’t have a planetary scale wifi network yet, so getting a wifi hotspot in space is still a challenge. The vast majority of communication with the ISS happens via radio. Radio is a pretty straightforward means of broadcasting information, and we’re pretty familiar with radio for audio recordings.   More
(Source: Forbes - Jun 9)

LAUNCH OF NEXT SPACE STATION CREW MOVED TO JULY - Russian managers have delayed the launch of a Russian-U.S.-Japanese crew to the International Space Station two weeks until early July to allow time for additional software testing on an upgraded version of the Soyuz spacecraft. Officials from Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, announced the delay Monday, saying the extra testing will improve the safety of the mission. Russia’s Tass news agency reported last week that the launch of the Soyuz crew may be delayed from June 24 to resolve a potential glitch in the capsule’s software that could pose a problem during the spacecraft’s docking with the International Space Station.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Jun 9)

SPACEX PLANS TO RELAUNCH A USED ROCKET FOR THE FIRST TIME THIS FALL - Today, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk shared a picture of all the rockets the company has landed so far, noting that one of them will re-fly for the first time in September or October. When that happens, SpaceX will finally be able to boast that it has reused one of its Falcon 9 vehicles. Those target dates are a little later than what Musk had originally suggested, however. After SpaceX's first drone ship landing in April, the CEO said the Falcon 9 rocket could fly again on an orbital mission as early as May or June. It was an ambitious turnaround time for the company, especially since SpaceX is just now figuring out how to put its reusable rocket strategy into practice. Eventually, SpaceX hopes to land and re-fly its rockets within just a few weeks.   More
(Source: The Verge - Jun 9)

“ANOMALY” FORCES ARIANESPACE TO DELAY SATELLITE LAUNCH - The company said early Tuesday that an “anomaly” took place prior to the Ariane 5’s rollout to the launch pad. The unspecified anomaly involved a fluid connector between the vehicle’s upper stage and the launch table. Arianespace said it will announce a new launch date for the mission, carrying the EchoStar 18 and BRIsat commuincations satellites, “very soon.”    More
(Source: SpaceNews - Jun 8)

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