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The general in charge of the Space Force says that U.S. intelligence about space activities is good but could be better. Gen. Chance Saltzman, chief of space operations, said at the Mitchell Institute's Space Security Forum Wednesday that he has robust intelligence about what foreign adversaries are doing in outer space. However, he said having additional sensors and analytics tools would further boost the Space Force's visibility into technologies being tested by strategic competitors like China and Russia. "You can never have too much space domain awareness," Saltzman said, including data from international partners and the private sector. [SpaceNews]
ESA is studying options for increased cooperation with the Indian space agency ISRO. At a briefing Wednesday after an ESA Council meeting, agency officials said they received a presentation from the chairman of ISRO, S. Somanath, at their meeting to get an update on Indian space activities. ESA said the agency has been exploring options of enhanced cooperation in science, exploration and operations since late 2022, but has not disclosed any specific options under consideration. [SpaceNews]
China is signing new partners for a proposed international lunar base but is struggling to find national-level support. China's Deep Space Exploration Laboratory signed memoranda of understanding this month with the Asociaciรณn de Astronomรญa de Colombia and Kyrgyzstan's Arabaev Kyrgyz State University regarding potential cooperation on the International Lunar Research Station. The agreements with organizations and universities may reflect difficulties China is having getting support from national governments, perhaps because of Russia's involvement with the initiative. [SpaceNews]
One commercial space station company has hired a former executive from another such company. Vast has hired Clay Mowry as an adviser to provide guidance and counsel as it develops its Haven-1 commercial station and future larger stations. Mowry was previously chief revenue officer at Voyager Space, which is working on the Starlab commercial space station, and earlier held positions at Blue Origin and Arianespace. Separately, a former Vast employee filed suit in a California court this week, alleging he was fired from the company last year after raising concerns that the company was violating FCC regulations for spectrum it plans to use for Haven-1. Vast denied the claims and says it will fight the suit in court. [SpaceNews]
Sierra Space has hired a new chief operating officer. The company announced Thursday that it hired Amish Patel as COO to oversee company operations, including its supply chain and manufacturing. Patel was previously vice president of global supply chain at Rocket Lab and also worked at SpaceX and L3Harris. [Sierra Space]
| | Footprints on the Moon Begin with L3Harris
For six decades, L3Harris has teamed with NASA to develop technology that's been critical to the evolution of human spaceflight. In fact, our technology has been part of every crewed NASA mission: from Project Mercury to Apollo to the Space Shuttle to the International Space Station era and now beyond – as part of NASA's Artemis campaign. L3Harris' contributions to NASA's Artemis missions include propulsion, communications and launch avionics for NASA's Space Launch System rocket, Orion spacecraft and Gateway lunar space station. Learn more. | | Other News
The final launch in the decades-long history of the Delta rocket is scheduled for today, weather permitting. A Delta 4 Heavy is scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral at 1:40 p.m. Eastern carrying a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office. Forecasts, though, predict only a 30% chance of acceptable weather because of strong winds. The launch will be the last not just for the Delta 4 Heavy but the entire Delta family of rockets, dating back more than six decades. [Spaceflight Now]
Japan's SLIM lunar lander continues to defy the odds. The lander has survived a second lunar night and is transmitting data again, the Japanese space agency JAXA announced Thursday. SLIM landed in January and the solar-powered spacecraft was not designed to survive the lunar night. However, SLIM revived in late Feburary and sent data for several data before going back into hibernation for a second night. [Japan Times]
A mission designed to study the sun has now discovered 5,000 comets. An amateur scientist studying images from the ESA-NASA Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) detected the milestone comet earlier this week. SOHO launched in 1995 to study the sun, but it has also been able to discover "sungrazer" comets that pass close to the sun that cannot otherwise be seen. Such comets often do not survive their close passages to the sun. [NASA]
Astronomers have obtained a new view of the supermassive back hole at the center of our galaxy. The Event Horizon Telescope, a globe-spanning network of observatories, created the image of the black hole called Sagittarius A* in polarized light. That view shows magnetic field lines around the black hole, about 4.3 million times the mass of the sun, and reveals structures similar to the far larger black hole at the core of the galaxy M87. Astronomers said the image of Sagittarius A* suggests it may be ejecting a jet of material not previously seen, based on its similarities to the black hole in M87. [Space.com]
| | Quadratic Budget Equations
"You can't do math with letters. Well, you can't do arithmetic. I guess you can do algebra."
– Casey Dreier, chief of space policy at The Planetary Society, discussing the "TBD" entry for Mars Sample Return in NASA's fiscal year 2025 budget proposal during an Aerospace Industries Association webinar Wednesday.
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