 | Top Stories
The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) is planning to spend up to $700 million on a project to apply artificial intelligence to satellite imagery. NGA plans to release a request for proposals for contracts that will focus on annotating raw data such as images and videos to make it comprehensible for machine learning models. In the context of satellite imagery, this could involve labeling specific objects like buildings, roads or vegetation, and is a crucial step in developing supervised learning models. Vice Adm. Frank Whitworth, director of NGA, said the initiative represents the agency's largest ever contract for data labeling, and aims to bolster NGA's machine learning capabilities for analyzing satellite imagery and other geospatial data. [SpaceNews]
NGA will also start a project to ensure the reliability and trustworthiness of AI models used by its analysts. The initiative seeks to create guidelines for evaluating the performance and accuracy of computer vision models employed in the analysis of satellite imagery and other geospatial data. The pilot program is still in its early stages, with many specifics yet to be determined, but Whitworth said it aligns with the Department of Defense's guidelines for the ethical use of AI and responds to a recent White House executive order on the subject. [SpaceNews]
Telesat is selling a remote satellite services business to help finance its LightSpeed constellation. Telesat is selling Infosat Communications to Calgary-based Network Innovations for an undisclosed amount. The announcement came weeks after Telesat CEO Dan Goldberg said the operator was considering raising proceeds in the region of 10 million Canadian dollars ($7.4 million) by selling a non-core business. Infosat Communications was created more than 25 years ago with a focus on distributing satellite connectivity to oil and gas, utility and maritime customers in North America, particularly in Canada. [SpaceNews]
Atlas Space Operations has raised $15 million to grow its ground station services business. The company announced the "pre-Series C" round Wednesday led by NewSpace Capital, bringing the total raised by the company to $50 million. Michigan-based Atlas uses network management software to connect antennas and provide a federated network or more than 50 antennas that enables customers to leverage unused ground station capacity. The company says the funding will provide it with the working capital needed to triple its revenues over the next year. [SpaceNews]
Space startups see new opportunities in providing space domain awareness (SDA) services in geostationary orbit. Atomos Space, an in-space transportation and logistics startup, is planning two missions to GEO where its servicing vehicle will attach SDA payloads developed by Katalyst Space onto commercial telecom satellites. The companies say they are seeing increased interest in demand for SDA payloads along with broader satellite servicing capabilities. Katalyst's CEO argues that the SDA hosted payload market could be worth $1 billion in the next five years. [SpaceNews]
The Space Force and NGA are working to improve satellite image delivery. Gen. Michael Guetlein, second in command of the Space Force, said he met last week with the director of the NGA to discuss ways to speed up collecting and delivery of satellite imagery, including placing Space Force operators in a new "joint mission management center" at NGA's headquarters. NGA and the National Reconnaissance Office have faced criticism from the House Armed Services Committee's Strategic Forces subcommittee for inadequately supporting military combatant commands' demand for tactical intelligence. [SpaceNews]
Evolution Space and The Spaceport Company conducted a sounding rocket launch from a ship. The solid-fuel rocket by Evolution Space reached an altitude of nearly 17 kilometers after launch from The Spaceport Company's ship in the Gulf of Mexico Saturday off the coast of Mississippi. The test served to validate The Spaceport Company's sea-based launch equipment and ground support equipment. [SpaceNews]
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| Other News
An electrical issue scrubbed the final Vega launch Tuesday. Arianespace said electrical problems with "ground links" halted the countdown several hours before the scheduled liftoff from French Guiana. The launch has been rescheduled for Wednesday night at 9:50 p.m. Eastern. The launch, the final one of the original Vega rocket, will place the Sentinel-2C Earth observation satellite into orbit. [Arianespace]
Benchmark Space Systems won an Air Force Research Lab (AFRL) contract to develop thrusters using a green propellant. The $4.9 million contract, announced Wednesday, covers development of Benchmark 22-newton to 100-newton propulsion systems using ASCENT, a green monopropellant developed by AFRL. The contract builds upon a previous award that focused on a 22-newton thruster. ASCENT is easier to handle than hydrazine, traditionally used for spacecraft thrusters, and provides better performance. [SpaceNews]
Sierra Space has completed a set of tests for part of its Dream Chaser spacecraft. The company announced Wednesday that the Shooting Star cargo module passed acoustics tests at the Kennedy Space Center, simulating the noise of launch. Shooting Star is attached to Dream Chaser to provide additional cargo capacity as well as solar power and thrusters, and is jettisoned after undocking. Sierra Space has not indicated when Dream Chaser will launch after it was taken off the second Vulcan Centaur mission, which will now launch with a mass simulator. [SpaceNews]
Silicon Valley startup Collimate is seeking to make it easier for satellite operators to manage downlinks. The company offers a tool for predicting the success of satellite downlinks, after considering space weather, terrestrial weather and the location and profile of ground-based antennas. That tool uses artificial intelligence to predict the success of downlinks based on past experience. [SpaceNews]
A proposed reality TV show in India would send the winner on a suborbital flight. Indian TV producer Banijay Asia says it is teaming up with the Space Exploration and Research Agency (SERA), a venture previously known as the Crypto Space Agency, on a competition where the winner would get a seat on a Blue Origin New Shepard flight. The announcement included few details about what the competition would entail or when the winner would fly. [NDTV]
AIAA has slected Clay Mowry as its new CEO. The aerospace organization announced Tuesday that Mowry will take over as CEO on Oct. 1, succeeding the retiring Dan Dumbacher. Mowry has been an executive at Arianespace, Blue Origin and Voyager Space, and also serves as president of the International Astronautical Federation through next October. [AIAA]
| |  | It Just Makes That Noise Sometimes
"It would be very NASA to have slipped the surly bonds of Earth, inventing and perfecting technology from our wildest imagination, pushed humanity's adventurous spirit to the furthest limits, and still not have cracked the ability to set up a home theater system without occasionally being forced to say, 'I dunno, it just makes that noise sometimes.'"
– From a Defector article about odd noises heard inside the Starliner spacecraft over the weekend that turned out to be an audio configuration issue.
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