SPACE SHUTTLE ENDEAVOUR ROLLS INTO NEW HOME AS CROWDS CHEER - The space shuttle Endeavour's journey of 123 million miles ended Sunday afternoon when it rolled into its final resting place at the California Science Center in Los Angeles, where it will go on public display later this month. It took more than two days for the shuttle to inch its way across the 12 miles from the Los Angeles International Airport to the science center, navigating around trees and light poles along the narrow path.    More
(Source: CNN - Oct 15)

RUSSIA LAUNCHES US TELECOMS SATELLITE - Russia’s Proton-M carrier rocket with a US telecoms satellite, Intelsat-23, blasted off on Sunday from the Baikonur space center in Kazakhstan, a Russian Federal Space Agency spokesman said. “Proton-M with the Intelsat-23 satellite was launched at the designated time - 12:37 p.m. Moscow time [8:27 GMT]. The separation of the spacecraft from the Briz-M upper stage is scheduled for 22:07 p.m. Moscow time [18:07 GMT],” the spokesman said.    More
(Source: RIA Novosti - Oct 15)

CHINESE DEMO SATELLITES SHOT INTO SPACE BY LONG MARCH - China successfully launched a Long March 2C rocket Sunday, orbiting a pair of engineering research satellites to test new technologies in space, according to state-run media reports. The Long March 2C launcher lifted off at 0325 GMT Sunday (11:25 p.m. EDT Saturday) from the Taiyuan space center in northern China's Shanxi province, a remote site about 265 miles southwest of Beijing. Launch occurred at 11:25 a.m. Beijing time.    More
(Source: Spaceflight Now - Oct 15)

ORBCOMM SATELLITE LAUNCHED BY FALCON 9 HAS FALLEN TO EARTH - The satellite that was launched to orbit as a secondary payload by the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket on October 7, 2012 has deorbited, falling back to Earth. The ORBCOMM OG2 satellite was a prototype communications satellite that was launched along with the Dragon capsule for the CRS-1 resupply mission to the International Space Station.    More
(Source: Phys.Org - Oct 13)

ORBCOMM'S OG2 SATELLITE DEORBITS - Orbcomm declared its OG2 prototype spacecraft a total loss Oct. 11 after the second-generation communications satellite that flew as a secondary payload on SpaceX's first cargo mission to the International Space Station (ISS) was dropped into a lower orbit than intended. The New Jersey-based satellite messaging services provider said it had filed a claim against an insurance policy that covered the spacecraft for up $10 million, which Orbcomm said would largely offset the expected cost of the satellite and its launch.    More
(Source: Aviation Week - Oct 13)

TWIN NAVIGATION SATELLITES LAUNCHED BY SOYUZ ROCKET - A Soyuz rocket boosted two validation platforms from French Guiana into orbit Friday for Europe's Galileo navigation network, setting the stage for further launches every six months over the next few years to build a constellation of satellites beaming global positioning services to airplanes, automobiles and millions of users. The identical 1,543-pound satellites blasted off at 1815 GMT (2:15 p.m. EDT) atop a 151-foot-tall Soyuz 2-1b launcher, climbing into a mostly clear sky over the Guiana Space Center, a European-run base on the French Guiana coast near the community of Sinnamary.    More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Oct 13)

ENVISAT: DEAD SATELLITE MAY POSE LIABILITY RISK TO ESA, SPACE LAWYER SAYS - The European Space Agency (ESA) faces the uncomfortable choice of either actively removing its dead Envisat satellite from low Earth orbit or risk being held liable if Envisat damages another satellite, a member of the International Institute of Space Law (IISL) said. Because it elected to continue operating Envisat until it had too little fuel to be powered to a lower orbit, as international guidelines prescribe, ESA could be held liable for negligence, or even gross negligence, if Envisat or pieces of it damage an active satellite in the 100-plus years Envisat will remain in orbit, according to the IISL analysis.    More
(Source: The Huffington Post - Oct 11)

SPACEX DRAGON CAPSULE DOCKS AT ISS, BEARING 1,000 POUNDS OF CARGO - A privately built robotic space capsule arrived at the International Space Station early Wednesday (Oct. 10) to make the first-ever commercial cargo delivery to the orbiting lab under a billion-dollar deal with NASA. The unmanned Dragon spacecraft was captured by station astronauts using a robotic arm after an apparently flawless approach by the cargo-laden space capsule, which was built by the private spaceflight company SpaceX. It is the first of 12 resupply flights SpaceX will fly for NASA under a $1.6 billion deal.    More
(Source: The Huffington Post - Oct 10)

ORBCOMM SATELLITE IN WRONG ORBIT AFTER FALCON 9 LAUNCH - Orbcomm Inc., owner of a data communications satellite launched by SpaceX on Sunday, is evaluating whether it can recover the spacecraft after it was deployed in a lower-than-planned orbit by a Falcon 9 rocket. The 363-pound Orbcomm satellite, built by Sierra Nevada Corp., is designed to provide two-way data communications services for customers in the heavy equipment, transportation, maritime, agriculture, oil and gas, energy, and government sectors.    More
(Source: Spaceflight Now - Oct 9)

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