 | Top Stories
A $5 billion NASA spacecraft is on its way to Jupiter to study if one of its moons is potentially habitable. A Falcon Heavy lifted off from the Kennedy Space Center at 12:06 p.m. Eastern Monday, carrying NASA's Europa Clipper. The spacecraft deployed from the upper stage just over an hour after liftoff after being placed on an Earth-escape trajectory. Europa Clipper will perform flybys of Mars and Earth before arriving at Jupiter in April 2030. It will make dozens of close flybys of Europa, an icy moon with a subsurface ocean, to see if it has the conditions to support life. [SpaceNews]
The U.S. Army has wrapped up a one-year pilot project exploring outsourcing satellite communications services to private companies. Under the pilot, the Army selected satellite operators Intelsat and SES to provide "satcom as a managed service," a model where the provider handles all satellite communications functions through a services contract. Companies said the project demonstrated the effectiveness of a services approach, but it is unclear if the Army will fully embrace this model for future satellite communications procurement. [SpaceNews]
The Army is working to bolster its space warfare expertise. Army officials argue that ground forces must be better equipped to defend against and, if necessary, disrupt an adversary's space capabilities in any future conflict. The Army is taking steps to improve training and potentially establish a formal career field for space for enlisted Army personnel, allowing them to specialize on space issues. Some have argued that those efforts run the risk of duplicating capabilities offered by the Space Force, but Gen. Chance Saltzman, the Space Force's chief of space operations, said there was no competition with the Army: "We're all in this together." [SpaceNews]
ULA is still investigating a solid rocket booster that lost its nozzle on the second flight of the Vulcan Centaur. Speaking at the International Astronautical Conference (IAC) on Monday, ULA CEO Tory Bruno said that the core stage of the Vulcan compensated for the loss of performance from the SRB that lost the nozzle about 35 seconds after liftoff on the Oct. 4 flight. The rocket was still able to perform an orbital insertion that he said was likely more precise than any previous ULA launch. He added it will be up to the Space Force to determine any impacts of the incident on certification of the rocket for national security missions. [SpaceNews]
D-Orbit is entering the GEO satellite servicing field through a partnership with ESA. D-Orbit signed a contract with ESA Monday at IAC valued at 119.6 million euros to help develop the General Expansion Architecture (GEA) spacecraft-servicing vehicle. Satellite life extension will be the first mission for GEA, which also will be designed to relocate and repair satellites. D-Orbit has not yet named the client satellite for the first mission, known as RISE, which is likely to occur in 2027 or 2028. [SpaceNews]
Antarctica Capital has sold geospatial analytics provider Descartes Labs to EarthDaily Analytics (EDA). EDA said Oct. 15 it had bought Descartes Lab for an undisclosed sum to strengthen AI imagery analytics offerings in the insurance, energy, mining and U.S. defense markets. Antarctica formed EDA in 2021 after buying satellite designs, software, customer contracts and intellectual property during UrtheCast's restructuring process; Antarctica also owns Descartes Labs. The deal comes as EDA said a new satellite constellation it planned to launch last year will not be deployed until next year. [SpaceNews]
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| Other News
SpaceX performed a bicoastal launch doubleheader overnight. One Falcon 9 lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 2:10 a.m. Eastern, placing 23 Starlink satellites into orbit. A second Falcon 9 lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base at 4:21 a.m. Eastern, deploying 20 Starlink satellites, including 13 with direct-to-cell payloads. The launches were the first for the Falcon 9 since an anomaly during the upper stage deorbit burn on the Falcon 9 launch of the Crew-9 mission Sept. 28. The FAA allowed SpaceX to resume Falcon 9 launches last Friday after giving approval for a single Falcon 9 launch of ESA's Hera mission early last week. [Spaceflight Now]
China's inland Xichang launch center is set to build a commercial spaceport. Liangshan Prefecture, where the launch site is located, signed a strategic cooperation agreement last week with a company to establish the Sichuan Development International Commercial Spaceport Co., Ltd. That venture will develop a commercial launch facility at Xinchang, although the number and types of launch pads were not disclosed. The new spaceport appears to align with central government policy to promote commercial space and provincial plans to deliver local high-quality growth. [SpaceNews]
OroraTech has raised 25 million euros to expand a network of satellites for wildfire detection. The company announced Tuesday the Series B round led by Korys, the European Circular Bioeconomy Fund (ECBF), and existing investor Bayern Kapital. The company plans to use a third of the funding for expansion of its satellite network from a current two satellites, with two sets of eight satellites set to launch in 2025. The rest of the funding will go to enhancing a data analytics platform for tracking wildfires and to expand into North America. [SpaceNews]
France and Germany have joined a U.S.-led initiative to improve international cooperation in space defense. The two countries joined Operation Olympic Defender, overseen by U.S. Space Command to coordinate efforts among partner nations to protect space assets from potential threats, including cyberattacks, satellite jamming and anti-satellite weapons. Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand had previously joined. [SpaceNews]
It's not clear in some countries which agencies are responsible for responding to a cyberattack on space assets. People working in the same institutions sometimes provided "completely different answers" about the roles of space and cyber commands in defending satellites, said a researcher discussing a study on the topic at IAC on Monday. It is clear, though, that a lack of defined roles and responsibilities could pose problems. [SpaceNews]
A former Australian prime minister is joining a controversial spaceport project. Scott Morrison is the new non-executive chairman of Space Centre Australia, a company proposing to build a spaceport in Australia's Cape York Peninsula. The company's CEO, James Palmer, had told employees that he had lined up $100 million from a government agency, the Northern Australia Infrastructure Facility, but the agency says it never offered that funding. Space Centre Australia has also claimed to have had a "bunch of conversations" with SpaceX about launching there. [Sydney Morning Herald | SpaceConnect]
| |  | Core Argument
"I'm going to give you some really sophisticated, complicated rocket science right now. Is everybody ready? One core is cheaper than three cores."
– ULA CEO Tory Bruno, explaining during a presentation at IAC Monday on how Vulcan Centaur can launch the same payloads as the now-retired Delta 4 Heavy at a lower cost.
| | | A premier press release service designed to elevate your company's visibility and target our audience. Publish your company's press release with Stellar Dispatch today. Announcing DSI's 11th Annual Space Resiliency Summit
By Defense Strategies Institute | | | |
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