CHINA PREPARES LAUNCHING OF A COMMERCIAL SATELLITE - Jilin-1 satellite, the first developed in the country for teleslection and commercial use with remote control, will be released next October in northeast China's Jilin Province, report its designers. Jilin-1 consists of four satellites, one for high-definition pictures, one to test new space technology and two for video, said Xuan Ming, chairman of Chang Guang Satellite Technology Co., Ltd. More (Source: Radio Cadena Agramonte - Aug 17)
MILITARY SATELLITE PREPPED FOR AUG. 31 LAUNCH FROM CAPE - The Space Coast will launch more International Space Station cargo as a result of last fall’s Antares rocket explosion in Virginia. Orbital ATK last week announced that it now plans to launch two Cygnus cargo craft missions on United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The first of those launches, announced soon after the Antares mishap last October, is planned in early December. Orbital ATK said another Cygnus would launch on Atlas V next year, complementing two or three Antares launches from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Virginia. More (Source: Florida Today - Aug 16)
JAPAN PREPARES TO LAUNCH KOUNOTORI-5 TO SPACE STATION - Japan is poised to launch their fifth Kounotori vehicle to the International Space Station. The flight is currently set to take place at Aug. 16, 2015, and will deliver supplies to the International Space Station (ISS). The launch is tentatively set for 8:35 a.m. EDT (9:35 p.m. Japan Standard Time, JST). The time of liftoff will likely change as the orbit of the ISS is updated closer to the flight time. Kounotori-5 (HTV-5) will ride atop the H-IIB Launch Vehicle No. 5, launching from the Yoshinobu Launch Complex on Tanegashima Island in Japan. This launch is a joint operation between Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, Ltd., and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) to provide supplies, experiments, and equipment to the Expedition 44 crew members on board the ISS. More (Source: SpaceFlight Insider - Aug 16)
TAIWAN PREPARING SATELLITE LAUNCH - Taiwan is preparing to launch a new satellite in early 2016 that will be capable of a 2-meter resolution. US-based Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, will launch the FORMOSAT-5 on a Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California. The FORMOSAT-5 will have a remote sensing imager that will provide 2-meter panchromatic (black and white) and 4-meter multispectral (color) spatial resolution. This is the first space program where the National Space Organization (NSPO) takes full responsibility for the complete satellite system including payloads, said a representative of the National Applied Research Laboratories (NARLabs). The revelation was made at the 2015 Taipei Aerospace & Defense Technology Exhibition (TADTE), being held Aug. 13-16 in Taiwan's capital, Taipei. More (Source: DefenseNews.com - Aug 15)
RUSSIAN PROGRESS CARGO SPACECRAFT LEAVES INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - The Russian automated Progress M-26M cargo spacecraft has undocked from the Zvezda service module of the International Space Station (ISS), according to NASA. The unpiloted spacecraft, which NASA identified as Progress 58, left the space station at 6:19 a.m. EDT, Friday, August 14, moving away from the orbiting laboratory to a safe location where it will remain until flight engineers command it to reenter Earth’s atmosphere. The intense heat of reentry will cause the craft to burn up in the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean. The undocking of the Progress 58 vehicle cleared the Zvezda docking port for the relocation of the Soyuz TMA-16M spacecraft on August 28. More (Source: Zee News - Aug 15)
DEADLY BLAST IN CHINA CAPTURED BY WEATHER SATELLITE - A few hours after the deadly blast in China that reportedly killed several people in the city of Tianjin, we now have some more facts about it being revealed. The deadly blast which was caught on camera by several people across the city was so intense, it was also caught by a weather satellite orbiting the Earth. According to KQED News, a weather satellite owned by the Japan Meteorological Agency captured the moment the deadly blast in China rocked the city of Tianjin. The satellite named Himawari-8 took photos of the deadly blast. An animated satellite view of the blast was tweeted by Dan Lindsey, a NOAA atmospheric scientist at the Colorado State University. More (Source: The Inquisitr - Aug 13)
IN-SPACE SATELLITE CONSTRUCTION MAY BE COMING SOON - A new partnership could pave the way for the first off-Earth assembly line. Space manufacturing company Made In Space is teaming with NanoRacks, which helps commercial customers make use of the International Space Station, to develop an orbital construction-and-deployment service for tiny satellites known as cubesats. The service, which the two companies are calling Stash & Deploy, will cache a variety of standard and custom cubesat parts aboard the space station. Many of these components will be built by Made In Space's Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF), a commercial-scale 3D printer that the company aims to launch later this year. More (Source: Space.com - Aug 13)
ORBITAL ATK BUYS SECOND ATLAS ROCKET LAUNCH FOR SPACE STATION RUN - Orbital ATK Inc is buying a second Atlas rocket launch to fly supplies to the International Space Station for NASA while it redesigns its Antares booster following a launch accident last year, the aerospace company said on Wednesday. The Oct. 28 accident, which occurred seconds after launch from Virginia’s Wallops Island, destroyed a Cygnus capsule filled with cargo bound for the space station. A final report on the accident is pending. In December, Orbital said it had bought an Atlas rocket launch from United Launch Alliance, a partnership of Lockheed Martin Corp and Boeing Co, to help fulfill its $1.9 billion cargo delivery contract with NASA while it recovers from the accident. Terms of the contract were not disclosed. The launch is targeted for early December from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida to the space station, a permanently staffed, $100 billion research laboratory that flies about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth. More (Source: Reuters - Aug 13)
CYGNUS SEGMENT ARRIVES TO BEGIN PROCESSING FOR ISS RESUPPLY MISSION - A pressurized cargo module that soon will take four tons of materials and supplies to the International Space Station began the intensive processing for launch when it arrived Monday at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Cygnus spacecraft - developed and produced by Orbital ATK - will be assembled at Kennedy and launched for the first time in December on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. The unpiloted spacecraft will be the fourth operational mission for the Cygnus line of resupply spacecraft for the orbiting laboratory. This model, the Enhanced Cygnus, will be the largest ever flown and will carry some 3,000 pounds more to the station than the previous versions, enabling a delivery to the station of about 8,000 pounds of important research and supplies. More (Source: NASA - Aug 13)
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