RUSSIAN PROTON-M LIFTS GARPUN MILITARY SATELLITE TO ORBIT - A Russian Proton-M rocket has successfully launched the Garpun 12L (meaning “harpoon” in Russian) military communications satellite into orbit on Saturday, Dec. 12, at 7:19 p.m. EST (00:19 GMT on Sunday, Dec. 13). Liftoff of the rocket took place from Site 81/24 at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The launch of this mission was initially scheduled for Dec. 10, but it was postponed after the loss of the Kanopus-ST satellite on Dec. 5 when it failed to separate from the Soyuz-2.1v booster. Additional checks of the spacecraft separation system were performed to make sure that the failure won’t happen again. Due to the military nature of the Garpun mission, very little information was released regarding preparations for the launch. The mission also wasn’t broadcasted live.    More
(Source: SpaceFlight Insider - Dec 15)

SOYUZ, WITH CREW OF THREE, SET FOR LAUNCH TO SPACE STATION - Four days after a Soyuz ferry craft brought three space station fliers down to a frigid landing in Kazakhstan, three fresh crew members are poised for launch early Tuesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome to boost the lab's crew back to six. Soyuz TMA-19M commander Yuri Malenchenko, NASA flight engineer and co-pilot Timothy Kopra and European Space Agency astronaut Timothy Peake are set to blast off from Baikonur at 6:03 a.m. on Dec. 15 (5:03 p.m. local time in Kazakhstan).   More
(Source: CBS News - Dec 15)

INSIDE BAIKONUR, THE SPACE STATION THAT WILL SEND MAJOR TIM PEAKE INTO SPACE - A blue-clad engineer adjusted a valve, a needle spun on a dial, and the huge engine of a Soyuz rocket let out a gasp as if it was breathing. Fifty meters long, and packed with 300 tons of highly combustible oxygen-enriched fuel when loaded, there is nothing small about the rocket that will carry Major Tim Peake into space on Tuesday. But in the vast assembly hangars where Russian engineers were running their final checks, it seemed tiny – an impression only heightened by the delicacy with which the technicians run through their final tests.    More
(Source: The Telegraph - Dec 14)

SPACEX EYES DEC. 19 FOR FIRST LAUNCH SINCE JUNE - SpaceX is targeting Dec. 19 for a critical commercial launch that will double as the debut flight of an upgraded Falcon 9 rocket and the company’s return-to-flight mission after a failure six months ago halted SpaceX’s busy launch manifest. Final preparations are underway inside SpaceX’s rocket assembly hangar at Cape Canaveral’s Complex 40 launch pad, where technicians are putting together the two-stage rocket and readying 11 small dishwasher-sized satellites to be orbited for Orbcomm. Elon Musk, SpaceX’s founder and chief executive, tweeted an update on the launch early Thursday.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Dec 13)

RUSSIAN WEATHER SATELLITE LIFTS OFF ABOARD ZENIT ROCKET - A weather satellite to help civilian and military forecasters track storm systems over Russia’s vast territory launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Friday aboard a Ukrainian-built Zenit rocket, perhaps on its final flight as Russian-Ukrainian relations sour and demand wanes for the 1980s-era launcher. The Elektro-L 2 weather satellite, enclosed inside the Zenit rocket’s nose shroud, is beginning a 10-year mission to collect near-realtime images of weather systems from Europe to the Asia-Pacific, joining an international fleet of geostationary weather satellites owned by the United States, Europe, India, China and Japan.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Dec 12)

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION TRIO RETURN TO EARTH - A crew of astronauts landed safely back on Earth Friday morning after spending nearly six months on the International Space Station. NASA’s Kjell Lindgren, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko and Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui touched down shortly after 8 a.m. EST, according to NASA. The trio landed in Kazakhstan on the Russian-built Soyuz capsule, which undocked from the space station at around 4:49 a.m. EST. While aboard the station, Lindgren participated in two spacewalks with NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, to perform maintenance work on the station and to prepare it for the arrival of commercial crew vehicles sometime in 2017.   More
(Source: Time.com - Dec 12)

NASA PLANS TO LEAVE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION TO EXPLORE DEEPER SPACE - In the interest of saving money, NASA is planning to cut its ties to the International Space Station, which has maintained a continuous human presence in low-Earth orbit for 15 years. According to ARS Technica, NASA's head of human spaceflight said the agency plans to leave the space station as soon as possible. Earlier this year, the U.S. Congress agreed to extend funding for the ISS from 2020 to 2024.    More
(Source: Chron.com - Dec 11)

ISRO TO LAUNCH 6 SINGAPOREAN SATELLITES ON DECEMBER 16 - India will be launching six Singaporean satellites weighing a total of around 625 kg on December 16 evening through its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV) rocket, a senior official said. "It is a commercial launch. The rocket is expected to blast off from the Sriharikota rocket port at 6 pm on December 16. The Indian rocket will be carrying six satellites all from Singapore," a senior official of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), preferring anonymity, told IANS on Thursday. According to him, the major luggage for the PSLV rocket will be the earth observation satellite called TeLEOS, weighing around 400 kg.    More
(Source: NDTV - Dec 11)

CHRISTMAS DELIVERY: SPACE STATION GETS 1ST US SHIPMENT IN MORE THAN HALF-YEAR, PRESENTS ABOARD - The International Space Station accepted its first U.S. shipment in more than half a year early Wednesday, receiving Christmas presents and much-needed groceries for the resident astronauts. "There's much rejoicing on the ground," Mission Control radioed. NASA astronaut Kjell Lindgren (CHELL LEND-grin) used the space station's big robot arm to grab the capsule and its 3 ½ tons of cargo. The operation went smoothly, thanks to all the practice Lindgren put in. He operated the crane via joy sticks, joking earlier this week, "I knew those hours playing video games would come in handy!"   More
(Source: US News - Dec 10)

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