EUROPE READIES FOR SATELLITE LAUNCH, MOVES CLOSER TO OWN SATNAV - Europe is set to launch the next two satellites Thursday for its multi-billion-euro Galileo satnav system, a rival to America's GPS, according to space firm Arianespace. This would bring Europe a step closer to providing initial navigation services by next year, Arianespace chief executive Stephane Israel told AFP, after many years of frustrating delays. "The programme is truly on track, moving forward, keeping its promises," he said. Weather permitting, a Russian Soyuz rocket will launch the satellite pair -- numbers 11 and 12 in the Galileo constellation orbiting Earth -- from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, at 1151 GMT. More (Source: Yahoo7 News - Dec 17)
PSLV COMPLETES COMMERCIAL LAUNCH WITH SIX SINGAPOREAN SATELLITES - Six spacecraft for Singapore lifted off Wednesday aboard an Indian Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle. Clustered atop the the PSLV on a launch pad at the Satish Dhawan Space Center on India’s east coast, the satellites were manufactured in Singapore, with launch services arranged with Antrix Corp., the commercial arm of the Indian Space Research Organization. Liftoff occurred at for 1230 GMT (7:30 a.m. EST) Wednesday the Indian spaceport, where the PSLV blasted off at 6 p.m. local time, just after sunset. More (Source: SpaceFlight Now - Dec 17)
SOYUZ CREW OVERCOMES GLITCH TO DOCK WITH SPACE STATION - A Russian Soyuz spacecraft streaked into space and chased down the International Space Station Tuesday, but a problem with the ferry ship's automated rendezvous system forced commander Yuri Malenchenko to take over manual control at the last minute. After backing away and assessing the ship's alignment and control, he deftly guided the craft in for docking at the lab's Rassvet module to complete a four-orbit rendezvous. While manual dockings are relatively rare, Malenchenko, one of Russia's most experienced cosmonauts and a veteran of five previous flights, had no problem lining back up on the Rassvet docking target and the ship nosed into the attachment mechanism at 12:33 p.m. EST (GMT-5). More (Source: CBS News - Dec 15)
COUNTDOWN BEGINS FOR ISRO'S LAUNCH OF SIX SINGAPORE SATELLITES - The 59-hour countdown for the launch of six Singapore satellites by Indian Space Research Organisation on board its Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle from Sriharikota began today. The launch is scheduled at 6.00 PM on December 16, at Satish Dhawan Space Centre in the spaceport of Sriharikota. "The 59-hour countdown activity of PSLV-C29/TeLEOS-1 Mission has started at 07.00 hours today," ISRO said. More (Source: Economic Times - Dec 15)
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)
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