RUSSIA’S BRAND NEW COSMODROME LAUNCHES FIRST-EVER ROCKET - Russia’s new Vostochny Cosmodrome has conducted its first space launch on Thursday. A Soyuz rocket boosted three scientific and distance viewing satellites into orbit. The lift-off took place at 5:01am Moscow time (2:01am GMT) and some 8 minutes 44 seconds into the flight the Volga upper stage carrying three satellites successfully separated from the Soyuz rocket. All three satellites launched on the Soyuz rocket have been successfully deployed to their specified orbits. More (Source: RT - Apr 28)
INDIAN LAUNCH ROUNDS OUT DOMESTIC NAVIGATION NETWORK - India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle blasted off Thursday with the seventh and final spacecraft for a regional navigation network to provide position data to users across the subcontinent independent of foreign satellite systems. The PSLV took off from the First Launch Pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Center on India’s east coast at 0720 GMT (3:20 a.m. EDT), or 12:50 p.m. local time, Thursday. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Apr 28)
INDIA'S NAVIGATION SATELLITE LAUNCH: COUNTDOWN PROGRESSING SMOOTHLY - The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is all set to launch an Indian rocket with the country's seventh navigation satellite and the countdown has already begun on Tuesday morning The 51 hour, 30 minute countdown for the launch of 44.4 metre, 320 tonne Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) carrying Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System-IRNSS-1G is scheduled for Thursday is progressing smoothly, ISRO said on Wednesday. According to the ISRO, the progressing status of the countdown for the launch of India's navigation satellite is expected to blast off at 12.50 pm on Thursday. More (Source: Zee News - Apr 28)
SPACEX WINS ITS FIRST SATELLITE LAUNCH FOR THE US AIR FORCE - SpaceX has been awarded an $87.2 million contract from the US Air Force to launch a military GPS satellite in May 2018, Space News reports. It will be the first national security launch SpaceX performs for the Air Force, since the company was authorized to launch military satellites in May 2015. "It was practically guaranteed that SpaceX would win" It was practically guaranteed that SpaceX would win the contract because the company was bidding unopposed. The only other spaceflight company authorized to launch military satellites is the United Launch Alliance, a partnership between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. More (Source: The Verge - Apr 28)
NASA ASTRONAUTS WILL FLY COMMERCIAL TO INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - Five years after the lastNASA astronauts flew from Cape Canaveral, Florida, to the International Space Station, a new group is preparing for a trip, this time on a private spacecraft. On Tuesday, veteran astronauts Eric Boe and Sunita Williams used touch-screen simulators to practice docking Boeing Co.'s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft with the space station during a training session near Lambert-St. Louis International Airport. The simulator, called the Crew Part-Task Trainer, helps prepare astronauts and flight controllers for missions, flight conditions and situations including the rendezvous and docking with the space station. More (Source: CBS News - Apr 28)
NEW ‘MICROSCOPE’ SATELLITE TO TEST EINSTEIN’S THEORY OF RELATIVITY IN ORBIT - Einstein’s theory of general relativity is to be put to the test by a newly launched satellite in an experiment that could upend our understanding of physics. The French “Microscope” orbiter will try to poke a hole in one of Einstein’s most famous theories, which provides the basis for our modern understanding of gravity. Scientists will use the kit to measure how two different pieces of metal — one titanium and the other a platinum-rhodium alloy — behave in orbit. More (Source: Raw Story - Apr 27)
WE JUST LOST ANOTHER CRITICAL CLIMATE SATELLITE - One of climate change’s most important biographers — a 2,700-pound satellite orbiting 450 miles above the surface of the Earth — just recorded its last data point. Earlier this month, the National Snow and Ice Data Center announced that, after nine years and five months in orbit, the satellite known as F17 had stopped transmitting sea ice measurements. That’s not unusual — satellites in F17’s series, all named sequentially, are normally expected to last about five years, though some make it much longer. But F17’s failure could preempt the end of the series entirely. Walter Meier, a sea ice researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, called the satellite program “one of the longest, most iconic datasets” illustrating climate change, particularly in the Arctic and Antarctic. More (Source: Grist - Apr 27)
CHINA TO LAUNCH SPACE STATION IN 2018, AIMS TO BECOME NEXT 'SPACE GIANT' - The Chinese recently celebrated Space Day with the proclamation of their mission to Mars. But they set their eyes for more than that. China wanted to become the next space giant and in order to make that happen, they are developing their own Space Station which is scheduled to be launched in 2018. During the recent Space Day celebration, Chinese President Xi Jinping expressed his desire to make China a "space giant". More (Source: Nature World News - Apr 27)
ÑUSAT-1 TO CARRY AMSAT ARGENTINA LINEAR TRANSPONDER – LAUNCH SCHEDULED FOR MAY 30, 2016 - The Argentinian earth observation satellite ÑuSat-1 will carry a linear transponder built by AMSAT Argentina. The satellite is scheduled to launch on a CZ-4B rocket from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in China on May 30, 2016 into a 500 km sun-synchronous orbit with an inclination of 97.5 degrees and a Local Time of the Ascending Node (LTAN) of 10:30. The AMSAT Argentina U/v inverting transponder, named LUSEX, wiil have an uplink of 435.935 MHz to 435.965 MHz and a downlink of 145.935 MHz to 145.965 MHz. Total power output is 250 mW. There will also be a CW beacon at 145.900 MHz with a power output of 70 mW. More (Source: AMSAT - Apr 27)
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