Top stories of the week from SpaceNews
Welcome to our weekly roundup of the top SpaceNews stories of the week, brought to you every Friday! This week, Europe launches its final original Vega rocket, China plans a Mars Sample Return mission, and more. | | |
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By Jeff Foust, September 4, 2024 |
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The final flight of the original version of Europe's Vega rocket successfully placed an Earth observation satellite into orbit Sept. 4.
The Vega rocket lifted off from the European spaceport at Kourou, French Guiana, at 9:50 p.m. Eastern. The launch was delayed a day because of an electrical issue with ground systems that halted the countdown a few hours before the scheduled liftoff time.
Vega deployed its payload, the Sentinel-2C satellite, into a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of about 775 kilometers nearly an hour after liftoff. | | |
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China to launch Mars sample return mission in 2028, will follow planetary protection guidelines
Tianwen-3 will consist of two launches from Earth. Two Long March 5 rocket launches will carry a lander and ascent vehicle and an orbiter and return module respectively. Entry, descent and landing will build on technology used for the Tianwen-1 rover landing. The mission may also include a helicopter and a six-legged crawling robot for collecting samples away from the landing site.
NASA reaffirms decision to cancel OSAM-1 In a statement posted online Sept. 5, NASA announced it would proceed with closing out the On-orbit Servicing, Assembly, and Manufacturing 1 (OSAM-1) project, ending work on the mission at the end of the current fiscal year, which concludes Sept. 30. | | |
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| | | China's secretive reusable spaceplane lands after 267 days in orbit State media Xinhua issued a brief report on Sept. 5 (Eastern), confirming the spacecraft's return to Earth. The report provided no images, nor information regarding the mission and its landing site. The "success of the experiment demonstrates the growing maturity of China's reusable spacecraft technologies, which will pave the way for more convenient and affordable round-trip methods for the peaceful use of space in the future," the report read.
Viasat secures $153 million U.S. Army contract to modernize 'Blue Force Tracker' network
The five-year contract, managed by the Defense Information Services Agency, will provide technical support for the U.S. Army Project Management Mission Command Blue Force Tracker program, a system used for real-time positioning of friendly forces. This latest agreement extends Viasat's two-decade-long involvement with the BFT network.
Space Force defends plan to buy smaller, cheaper satellites to reinforce GPS
Known as Resilient GPS (R-GPS), these smaller satellites would provide the U.S. military additional sources of positioning, navigation and timing data. Kendall has identified R-GPS as a high priority that should move forward as soon as possible. However, the future of the program is uncertain as lawmakers are questioning its effectiveness and cost.
General Dynamics secures $491 million contract extension from Space Development Agency
The modification nearly doubles the company's existing contract with the Space Development Agency (SDA) to approximately $900 million through 2029. General Dynamics in 2022 was selected to build the ground operations and integration segment for the SDA's Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA), a mesh network of satellites in low Earth orbit designed to support global military operations. | | |
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| | NGA to launch $700 million program to help AI make sense of satellite images NGA's director Vice Adm. Frank Whitworth 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. Whitworth told reporters that a request for industry bids is expected to be released later this month.
U.S. intelligence agency to evaluate trustworthiness of AI models Vice Adm. Frank Whitworth, director of NGA, announced last week that the agency is launching a pilot program aimed at ensuring 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. |
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OPINION | |
|  | By David Finkleman, September 6, 2024
| Identifying anomalous operations of satellites is more than a technical task. It must depend on human intelligence gathering and advance warning.
How do we perceive almost every launch from anywhere when it is so easy to miss many? We use indications and warning; intelligence. In normal times, rocket launches are announced well in advance through Notices to Airmen and Mariners which are issued and understood worldwide. We usually know where and when there will be a launch. We can look in the right place at the right time. Sometimes nations might not make such announcements for reasons of national security. Certainly, launches in anger would not be announced publicly. How would we know where and when to look?
The artificial divide between the space and geospatial sectors
By Laura Delgado López and Kevin D. Pomfret, September 4, 2024
After the plenary of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) in June, the global space community typically looks to the 75th International Astronautical Congress in the fall for the next opportunity to come together to discuss the major issues facing the sector. But this overlooks another major UN-convened forum that took place in early August and that happens to be very relevant to the success of global space efforts: the 14th Session of the UN Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management (UN-GGIM). Beyond the alphabet soup, there is a disconnect between those who follow UN-COPUOS and those who follow UN-GGIM, resulting in an artificial gap between the space and geospatial communities that especially hurts emerging space ecosystems.
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