Friday, February 2, 2024

Courting SpaceX's constellation coordination expertise

Here's your Friday rundown of the top stories from SpaceNews this week.

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Your weekly news rundown from SpaceNews.

Top Stories

The Office of Space Commerce and SpaceX are teaming up on research and development activities related to automated collision avoidance and satellite conjunction assessment screenings.

The Office of Space Commerce has entered into a research partnership to explore how SpaceX's automated satellite collision avoidance software could support plans for a civil space traffic coordination system.

Government agencies are struggling to obtain sufficient funding for space weather observations. Unlike hurricanes and tornadoes, space weather events don't often leave a trail of damage. "We need a big visible event on Super Bowl Sunday that wipes out the satellites," joked Nicola Fox, NASA associate administrator for science, at the American Meteorological Society annual meeting in Baltimore this week. "And now that the Ravens aren't in the Super Bowl, bring it on."

National Space Council official Diane Howard: "Strategy, clear pricing, clear requirements and real funding are needed to send a consistent and reliable message to investors."

Latest Headlines

Commercial

Intuitive Machines and NASA say they are in the final stages of preparations for the launch of that company's first lunar lander mission, but exactly when the spacecraft will lift off remains unclear.

Starlab Space, the joint venture developing the Starlab commercial space station, has selected SpaceX's Starship to launch the station on a single flight.

Silicon Valley startup Orbital Composites and Michigan-based Virtus Solis Technologies announced plans Feb. 1 to conduct a 2027 space-based solar power demonstration. The demonstration is destined for medium-Earth orbit, where Earth's atmosphere will not interfere with "continuous solar power generation," according to the news release.

Launch

Rocket Lab launched the first four satellites for space situational awareness (SSA) company NorthStar Earth and Space Jan. 31 in another test for the company's efforts to recover and eventually reuse Electron boosters.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 successfully launched a Northrop Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station for the first time Jan. 30.

PLD Space has secured 40.5 million euros ($43.8 million) from the Spanish government after completing a preliminary design review of its Miura 5 launch vehicle.

Despite a much shortened mission, Lockheed Martin said it successfully accomplished many of the objectives of the technology demonstration that launched late December on a Firefly Alpha rocket.

Civil

More than 40 members of Congress from California have asked the White House to reverse cuts NASA has imposed on the Mars Sample Return (MSR) program, warning of job losses and a "decade of lost science."

NASA is hosting a workshop later this month to learn about options for low-cost missions to an asteroid that will make a close approach to the Earth in 2029, a move that has confused some scientists who believe a shelved smallsat mission can meet NASA's needs.

Vigil could provide notice of four to five days of high-speed winds streaming toward Earth.

Military

Col. Joyce Bulson said the Space Systems Command ontinues to evaluate other refueling solutions for potential use.

Over the next couple of months, the U.S. Space Force organization responsible for delivering weather information to Defense Department customers will take a hard look at weather data requirements.

China's experimental reusable spacecraft recently performed maneuvers to raise its orbit but is apparently yet to release objects as it did in previous flights.

Chief Master Sgt. Ron Lerch, of the Space Systems Command's intelligence directorate, said China's rapidly advancing military space-based reconnaissance capabilities are worrisome.







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