ISRO PLANS A NEW HIGH-RESOLUTION EARTH SATELLITE - The Indian Space Research Organisation is to build a remote sensing satellite, Cartosat-3, capable of taking images of the earth with a resolution of 0.25 metres. Currently, GeoEye-1 produces the highest resolution earth images taken by a commercial satellite. The American spacecraft, launched in September 2008, is capable of taking panchromatic images with 0.41 metre resolution. WorldView-2, another satellite operated by the same company, DigitalGlobe, offers a best resolution of 0.46 metres. However, in accordance with U.S. regulations, commercially released images from these satellites are degraded to 0.5 metre resolution. More (Source: The Hindu - Mar 8)
US-RUSSIAN CREW LAUNCHING TO SPACE STATION IN RECORD TIME - The next crew to launch toward the International Space Station will make the trip faster than any astronauts before them, thanks to a new docking plan being tested this month. NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and Russian cosmonauts Pavel Vinogradov and Alexander Misurkin are set to launch to the space station March 28 at 4:43 p.m. EDT (2043 GMT) aboard a Russian Soyuz capsule. While it normally takes Soyuz vehicles two days to reach the orbiting laboratory after launch, Cassidy, Vinogradov and Misurkin will make the trip in just six hours. More (Source: Space.com - Mar 7)
NASA GIVES SPACEX THE GO-AHEAD FOR DRAGON HOOKUP WITH SPACE STATION - One day after a thruster-system glitch caused a holdup in a commercial cargo capsule's scheduled rendezvous with the International Space Station, NASA and the SpaceX rocket venture said they were ready for an orbital hookup on Sunday. NASA and the SpaceX rocket venture said the maneuvers for the rendezvous would begin overnight, setting up SpaceX's unmanned Dragon cargo ship to be grappled with the space station's robotic arm at 6:31 a.m. ET Sunday. It would take at least an hour more for the Dragon to be brought in for its berthing at the station's Harmony module, SpaceX said. More (Source: NBCNews.com - Mar 3)
WORLD'S 1ST SMARTPHONE SATELLITE DIALS EARTH FROM SPACE - A tiny satellite powered by a Google Nexus One smartphone has become the world's first "phonesat" to orbit Earth, its builders say. The United Kingdom Space Agency's miniature STRaND-1 satellite launched into space on Monday (Feb. 25) is one of seven spacecraft riding into orbit aboard an Indian rocket. It will test several new space technologies, including its WARP DRiVE — a novel space propulsion technology that will test a water-alcohol based thruster system. More (Source: Space.com - Mar 2)
NASA TO LAUNCH UNM SATELLITE INTO SPACE - NASA is preparing to launch a University of New Mexico student-built satellite. The Albuquerque Journal reports that NASA will launch in August a 4-inch cube called Trailblazer. Officials say the satellite will gather radiation levels from space that will be analyzed by mechanical and electrical engineering students. Craig Kief, deputy director of Configurable Space Microsystems Innovations & Applications Center, says around 25 students helped design and build the satellite over the last two years. More (Source: Foster's Daily Democrat - Mar 2)
SPACEX ROCKET BLASTS OFF ON RESUPPLY MISSION TO SPACE STATION - Blast off! SpaceX's Falcon rocket launched Friday at 10:10 a.m. ET from Cape Canaveral on a resupply run to the International Space Station. The unmanned rocket is owned by the SpaceX company, and carried the company's Dragon capsule filled with more than a ton of space station supplies and experiments -- rather than the chocolate-vanilla swirl ice cream carried aboard a previous mission. This time, Dragon's freezers are going up filled with mouse stem cells, protein crystals and other research items. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said snacks straight from the orchard of an employee's father are on board -- and not just apples. More (Source: Fox News - Mar 1)
VIETNAM TO LAUNCH THIRD SATELLITE INTO ORBIT - Vietnam will launch its third satellite into orbit in the second quarter of 2013, according to a document approved by the Vietnamese Government Office. Vietnamese media VnExpress quoted Bui Trong Tuyen, vice president of Vietnam's Space Technology Institute, as saying that the VNREDSat-1A, an earth observation optical satellite, is designed for the service of earth observation, analysis of natural resources, environmental management and natural disasters monitoring. More (Source: Space Daily - Feb 28)
SPACEX SET TO LAUNCH SUPPLY ROCKET TO SPACE STATION FRIDAY - Rocket maker SpaceX is targeting Friday as the launch date for the next NASA cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station. The Hawthorne, Calif., company, formally known as Space Exploration Technologies Corp., performed a successful resupply mission to the space station in October and a demonstration mission in May. SpaceX is the only commercial company to perform such a task. Its Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled for blastoff Friday morning from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. More (Source: RYOT - Feb 28)
INDIAN ROCKET CARRYING SEVEN SATELLITES BLASTS OFF - An Indian rocket carrying seven satellites - the Indo-French satellite SARAL, world's first smart phone-operated nano satellite, a space telescope satellite and four other foreign satellites - Monday blasted off from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre here, around 80 km north of Chennai. A little after 6 p.m., the rocket - Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle-C20 (PSLV-C20) - standing 44.4 metres tall and weighing around 230 tonnes hurtled towards the skies ferrying seven satellites to sling into orbit. President Pranab Mukherjee and scientists at Indian Space Research Organisation's (ISRO) rocket mission control room intently watched the rocket's progress towards the heavens, escaping the earth's gravitational pull with a one way ticket. More (Source: The Daily News - Feb 25)
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