RUSSIA GIVES SPACE STATION CREW THE KEYS TO ITS SHIP - No one kept a secret like the old Soviet space program kept a secret. Back in the early days of the space race, Sergei Korolev, the Soviets’ chief designer, was known only as, well, the Chief Designer, the better to prevent any assassination attempts that officials from Roscosmos—the Russian NASA—convinced themselves the Americans were cooking up. Baikonur, the Russian Cape Canaveral, hidden away in the Kazakh steppes, stole its name from a mining town 200 miles north, the better to confuse enemies who might come looking for it.   More
(Source: Time - Mar 24)

U.S. TAKING STEPS TO FIX TECHNICAL ERROR WITH BOEING GPS SATELLITES - The U.S. Air Force on Sunday said it is working to resolve a technical error that affects some Boeing Co Global Positioning System (GPS) satellites, although it did not hurt the accuracy of GPS signals received by users around the world. Air Force Space Command said the glitch affected the "indexing" of some GPS messages from a type of satellite known as IIF, which affects how messages are sorted and stored. The issue came to light in recent days, but a close examination of archive data showed the problem had gone unnoticed since 2013. It gave no details of the extent of the problem, its impact on performance or how it had come to light.   More
(Source: Reuters - Mar 23)

ISRO PLANS TO LAUNCH NAVIGATION SATELLITE ON MARCH 28 - India is likely to put into orbit its fourth regional navigationsatellite on March 28, with the country’s space agency now in the process of loading the rocket with the satellite, an official said on Thursday. “The process of integrating the IRNSS-1D (Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System) is underway and it is expected to be completed today (Thursday) or tomorrow (Friday),” an official of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) told IANS, preferring anonymity. India’s rocket port is located at Sriharikota in Andhra Pradesh, around 80 km from here. ”The rocket launch is tentatively fixed at 5.19 p.m. on March 28. However, a final decision will be taken after testing the rocket and the satellite and everything is found sound,” he added.   More
(Source: BGR India - Mar 22)

ARIANESPACE TO LAUNCH SATELLITES FOR EARTH IMAGING, DATA RELAY - Arianespace announced four launch orders this week to deploy spacecraft in orbit for a subsidiary of Google, the United Arab Emirates and Europe’s new laser data relay satellite network. The missions will launch from the Guiana Space Center on the northern coast of South America, where Arianespace operates the Ariane 5, Soyuz and Vega rocket families. Revealed in conjunction with the Satellite 2015 conference in Washington, the contracts cover launches starting in 2016, when a lightweight solid-fueled Vega rocket will send four high-resolution Earth observation satellites into polar orbit for Skybox Imaging.   More
(Source: SpaceFlignt Now - Mar 22)

SPACEX SWAPS ORDER OF NEXT TWO FALCON 9 LAUNCHES - Confronted with pesky problems in the Falcon 9 rocket’s helium pressurization system, SpaceX has shuffled the order of the next two launches, choosing to go ahead with the liftoff of a Dragon supply ship on a cargo delivery flight to the International Space Station around April 10. The launch of a European-built communications satellite for the government of Turkmenistan, originally set for March 21, will now occur no sooner than late April, tentatively around April 24, officials said this week. Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s president chief operating officer, said in Washington this week the extra time will allow engineers to complete an assessment of an issue with helium storage bottles inside the Falcon 9 rocket. The rocket uses helium gas to pressurize its propellant tanks.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 22)

BIGELOW AEROSPACE'S INFLATABLE HABITAT READY FOR SPACE STATION TRIP - A new, inflatable addition to the International Space Station is ready for its close-up. NASA officials viewed Bigelow Aerospace's Bigelow Expandable Activity Module (BEAM) at the company's facility in Las Vegas on March 12. BEAM is scheduled to depart later this year for NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and then blast toward the station atop SpaceX's Falcon 9 booster. BEAM's time attached to the orbiting lab should provide a key test for expandable space habitats, which represent a dramatic departure from traditional metallic designs.   More
(Source: Space.com - Mar 20)

RUSSIAN PROTON-M LAUNCHES WITH EKSPRESS-AM7 MISSION - A Russian Proton-M was in action on Wednesday, lofting the Ekspress-AM7 communications satellite on what is a multi-hour flight to a geostationary orbit via its Briz-M Upper Stage. The Russian workhorse launched from its traditional home at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 22:05 UTC on a nominal first leg of the flight. The Proton booster tasked with launching the satellite was 4.1 m (13.5 ft) in diameter along its second and third stages, with a first stage diameter of 7.4 m (24.3 ft).   More
(Source: NASASpaceFlight.com - Mar 19)

LOCKHEED MARTIN THROWS ITS HAT INTO ISS CARGO COMPETITION - Lockheed Martin has proposed a semi-reusable resupply platform to send up cargo to the International Space Station beginning in 2018, adding another competitor to a crowded list of companies bidding to win multibillion-dollar contracts from NASA. The robotic logistics carrier would loft heftier cargo than any other vehicle currently servicing the space station and use a long-lived satellite to pick up supply containers launched into orbit, then fly the equipment to the crew aboard the 250-mile-high research laboratory.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Mar 18)

ESA SUCCESSFULLY CORRECTS SIXTH GALILEO SATELLITE'S ORBIT - The ESA has successfully corrected the orbit of its sixth Galileo satellite following its launch into an elongated orbit in August 2014. It took 14 maneuvers to reposition the probe, which is designed to form part of a new global navigation system on par with existing GPS and Glonass solutions. The fifth and six Galileo satellites were launched together in August 2014, and are designed to follow the same path on their course around Earth, orbiting on opposite sides of the planet. Due to a malfunction during assent, the two satellites were launched into a lower orbit than intended, with the sixth probe hitting altitudes of between 13,713 km (8,521 miles) and 25,900 km (16,094 miles), bring it into contact with the harmful Van Allen Belt.   More
(Source: Gizmag - Mar 17)

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