| By Jeff Foust
In this today's edition: Atlas launches more Project Kuiper satellites, the Pentagon's challenges with seamless satellite communications networks, NASA spots a lunar lander crash site, and more.
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| | | | | | Top Stories
An Atlas 5 lifted off Monday morning carrying the second set of Amazon Project Kuiper satellites. The rocket lifted off at 6:54 a.m. Eastern from Cape Canaveral, Florida, after a technical problem scrubbed a launch attempt last week. Neither United Launch Alliance nor Amazon provided many details about the launch after the second stage ignited, but ULA confirmed successful payload deployment a little more than an hour after liftoff. The rocket carried 27 Kuiper satellites, the second batch of operational satellites after the first was launched on another Atlas 5 in April. Amazon plans to launch more than 3,200 satellites for the constellation, providing broadband services. [Spaceflight Now]
United Launch Alliance is testing a version of OpenAI to help it with some "tedious" tasks. ULA has deployed what it calls "RocketGPT" to about 150 employees as part of a trial program. The tool uses a government-compliant version of OpenAI's technologies running on a secure cloud computing platform. ULA CEO Tory Bruno said the company is "super excited" about using RocketGPT to help with tasks like writing reports, drafting government proposals and analyzing flight telemetry. He said the technology is not intended to replace employees but instead as a research assistant, noting that AI systems still make mistakes requiring human oversight, meaning employees remain accountable for final work products. [SpaceNews]
Jared Isaacman said he is interested in pursuing, outside of NASA, an initiative he planned to implement if he had become NASA administrator. In comments after accepting a National Space Society award Saturday, Isaacman said one of his goals for NASA was a concept in which NASA would provide support to outside organizations interested in pursuing scientific missions. While Isaacman's nomination to lead NASA was withdrawn three weeks ago, he said he was interested in trying to test that concept "and see if you could fund an interesting robotic mission" with academic organizations. He said that while people are "rightfully" upset about proposed NASA budget cuts, he still believed that this was the best time for human spaceflight since the 1960s. [SpaceNews]
Airbus executives said efforts to turn the company's space business around are going well. In comments at last week's Paris Air Show and a separate Airbus business update event, executives of Airbus Defence and Space said the company's space business was "stabilizing" after cost and schedule problems on some programs that led the company to take $1.5 billion in charges last year. That included work on OneSat, a line of software-reconfigurable GEO communications satellites, the first of which is scheduled for delivery to customers in 2026. Airbus is in talks with Leonardo and Thales Alenia Space to potentially combine their space businesses, with Airbus officials saying such a consolidation is necessary for Europe to more effectively compete globally. [SpaceNews]
Pentagon officials say they are still a long way from their goal of creating seamless, interoperable space communications networks. The goal is creating what the Defense Department calls "enterprise satcom:" a virtualized, software-defined network that could automatically reroute communications between military, commercial and allied nations' satellites if an adversary jams one satellite system. But the reality is an ecosystem full of manual processes, hardware silos and incompatible standards. What's needed, government and industry official said, are standards analogous to those that allow smartphones to operate on different networks. [SpaceNews]
Arianespace said it will work "as soon as possible" to reach its planned Ariane 6 launch rate, but that may take years. At the Paris Air Show last week, Arianespace CEO David Cavaillolès said the company still planned for four more Ariane 6 launches this year, after one launch in March. The company has a goal of 10 Ariane 6 launches per year, but Cavaillolès did not commit to a specific year the company would reach that rate, only that it expected to do so by the time it is scheduled to start launching IRIS² communications satellites in 2029. He added the company is seeing strong interest in the Ariane 6 from government and commercial customers, including those worried about relying on a single launch provider. [SpaceNews]
| | | | | | Other News
China launched a GEO communications satellite Friday. A Long March 3B lifted off at 8:37 a.m. Eastern from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center and placed into a geostationary transfer orbit the ChinaSat-9C (Zhongxing-9C) communications satellite. The 5,500-kilogram satellite is based on a DFH-4E satellite platform, an enhanced version of China's widely used DFH-4 satellite bus, and will provide improved regional coverage for TV and radio, with Ku-band and other frequency band transponders. It will replace ChinaSat-9 at 92.2 degrees East in GEO. [SpaceNews]
SpaceX launched a set of Starlink satellites early Monday after a 24-hour delay. A Falcon 9 lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 1:58 a.m. Eastern Monday, placing 27 Starlink satellites into orbit. The launch was previously planned for early Sunday but the countdown was stopped less than a minute before liftoff because of a poor signal from the rocket's flight termination system. [Spaceflight Now]
Weather has delayed a Blue Origin New Shepard suborbital launch. The company scrubbed the launch of the NS-33 mission Saturday morning about 10 minutes before liftoff because of high winds, and called off another launch attempt early Sunday morning. The company has not set a new launch date for the flight, which is carrying six customers. [Space.com]
NASA's Psyche spacecraft has resumed use of its electric propulsion system after switching to a backup fuel line. NASA said Friday the spacecraft's electric thrusters started operating last week after being turned off since early April. Engineers concluded that a valve malfunction reduced the flow of xenon propellant to the thrusters, and switched to a redundant fuel line. Psyche will fire its thrusters for three months between now and November to keep the spacecraft on its trajectory to the asteroid of the same name, arriving in 2029. [NASA]
NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has spotted the likely impact site of ispace's lunar lander. Images from LRO showed a dark smudge, surrounded by a patch of lighter regolith, that scientists believe marks the impact location of Resilience, ispace's second lunar lander mission. Resilience was attempting a landing June 5 when contact was lost about a minute and 45 seconds before landing. Telemetry indicated that Resilience was traveling far faster than planned at the time contact was lost. The Japanese company will hold a briefing late Monday to discuss its investigation into the mission. [NASA]
| | | | | | The Week Ahead
Monday: Monday-Friday: Tuesday: -
Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand: Rescheduled launch of a Rocket Lab Electron carrying an undisclosed commercial satellite at 3 a.m. Eastern. -
Online: The Schriever Spacepower Series holds a webinar with Kelly Hammett, director of the Space Rapid Capabilities Office, at 9 a.m. Eastern. Tuesday-Wednesday: Wednesday: Wednesday-Friday, July 4: Thursday: Saturday:
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SpaceNext AI: Exploring the intersection of space and artificial intelligence. Delivered Thursday.
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