editorial

SpaceX is preparing to test a new sunshade for its Starlink satellites. Assuming all goes it planned, the new sunshade will make the satellites less visible. While that may sound problematic, it’s actually a good thing because it allows astronomers to peer into space with greater clarity.

Starlink, of course, is a project that involves launching thousands of small satellites into a Very-Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) constellation. SpaceX is hoping to use the network of satellites to provide internet access to businesses and consumers. There are other satellite-based internet services available, but if you’ve ever used one, you may recall their slow speeds and unreliable connections. SpaceX’s Starlink satellites are designed to overcome these problems thanks to their VLEO placement. Since they are closer to Earth, they can receive and transmit data more quickly than satellites used by other internet service providers.

Ever since SpaceX began launching the Starlink satellites into Earth’s orbit, however, professional and recreational astronomers alike have complained about their adverse impact on visibility. While the Starlink satellites are small — when compared to other satellites, at least — there are already over 100 of them in Earth’s orbit. And because of their VLEO placement, they often obstruct astronomers from viewing distant planets. This has prompted SpaceX to develop a new sunshade, which it plans to test in the near future.

SpaceX ultimately wants to make its Starlink satellites invisible. “Our objectives, generally, are to make the satellites invisible to the naked eye within a week, and to minimize the impact on astronomy, especially so that we do not saturate observatory detectors and inhibit discoveries,” explained SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk when describing the new sunshade. While the private aerospace manufacturing company has already created a website where astronomers can track its Starlink satellites, it’s now going one step further by developing a sunshade.

Known as the VisorSat, the new sunshade is designed to prevent sunlight from reflecting off the Starlink satellites’ antennas. The VisorSat essentially works like the sun visors found inside cars, trucks and other automobiles. When raised, it will create a barrier between the Starlink satellite on which it’s used and the sun.

SpaceX has previously tested different coatings in an effort to reduce the glare created by its Starlink satellites. One such project was DarkSat, which unfortunately didn’t perform as intended. Hopefully, SpaceX will experience better results with its VisorSat, however.

MonroeAerospace

Rocket Lab has rolled an Electron launch vehicle out to the Launch Complex 2 pad at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport in Wallops, Virginia for the first time.

The milestone is one of the final steps ahead of Rocket Lab’s first launch from Launch Complex 2 – a dedicated mission in partnership with the Department of Defense’s Space Test Program and the Space and Missile Systems Center’s Small Launch and Targets Division.

Rocket Lab engineers and technicians carried out a range of successful integrated systems tests to verify launch systems on Electron and on the ground systems at Launch Complex 2. The critical checks included raising Electron vertical on the Launch Complex 2 pad for the first time, activating and tuning pad fluid systems, power and communication checkouts, as well as RF testing with the range. The test campaign concluded with a hot ignition test of the nine Rutherford engines on Electron’s first stage.

The STP-27RM mission will launch a single smallsat from the Air Force Research Laboratory’s Monolith program, which is designed to determine the ability of small satellites to support large aperture payloads to monitor space weather. The mission is being coordinated by the U.S. Space Force’s Space and Missile Systems Center and is scheduled to launch no earlier than the third quarter of 2020.

One of the final remaining steps before lift-off from Launch Complex 2 is completion of NASA certification for Rocket Lab’s Autonomous Flight Termination System (AFTS), a system that has already been successfully flown on several missions from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand. NASA expects to complete the certification in time for the Q3 launch window. The STP-27RM mission will mark the first time an AFTS system has flown from the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport and represents a valuable new capability for the spaceport.

AFTS is a GPS-aided, computer-controlled system designed to terminate an off-nominal flight, replacing traditional human-in-the-loop monitoring systems. AFTS is crucial to increasing launch frequency and providing responsive launch capability, while maintaining the highest industry safety standards. It reduces the turnaround time between missions and provides greater schedule control by eliminating reliance on ground-assets and human flight termination operators.

With Launch Complex 2 complete and entering an operational phase, work continues on the construction of a Rocket Lab Integration and Control Facility nearby, which will house a launch control center, payload integration facilities, offices, and a pre-launch integration area for multiple Electron vehicles.

Future missions scheduled for lift-off from Launch Complex 2 include a pathfinding mission for NASA to the Moon called CAPSTONE (Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment). The mission will see a NASA satellite launched to a unique near rectilinear halo orbit around the Moon to determine navigational capabilities for future missions. Data gathered by this mission will inform NASA’s plans for Gateway – a space station planned for lunar orbit that will act as an outpost for astronauts before they descend to the lunar surface. The CAPSTONE mission is currently scheduled to launch in early 2021.

David Pierce, Wallops Flight Facility Director, said that for almost 20 years, NASA and the DoD have been working to develop an AFTS system that is available for use by all Range Users within ITAR (International Traffic in Arms Regulations) that can greatly reduce the cost of access to space. Through the organization’s partnership with Rocket Lab on previous Electron launches and on this historic U.S. Air Force mission, Wallops is able to further the efforts to commercialize AFTS and increase launch responsiveness at U.S. ranges.

Peter Beck, Rocket Lab founder and Chief Executive, stated the upcoming mission from Launch Complex 2 marks the beginning of rapid, responsive smallsat launch capability for U.S. government missions from U.S. soil. He noted the company s proud to be partnering with the U.S. Space Force for the first mission from Launch Complex 2 and honored to be working with them again following previous STP missions out of Launch Complex 1. For more than two years, Rocket Lab has been providing responsive, dedicated and reliable access to space for government missions, and now we’re proud to be building on that strong heritage with our first mission from the United States. Combined, the two launch sites can support more than 130 launch opportunities every year, enabling unmatched schedule control for smallsat operators to respond to unfolding opportunities in LEO and beyond.

Rocket Lab and the Electron Launch Vehicle at Launch Complex 2.

Alba Orbital has unveiled the firm’s first, publicly available Payload Interface / Payload User Guide for Unicorn-2.

The company’s goal is to have an open interface that payload developers can use as a reference for the development of their payload’s missions, opening up space for business.

Unicorn-2 is a flight proven smallsat platform and the first operational 3P PocketQube to be launched into orbit.

Alba Orbital has also released their first Unicorn Interface Control Document / Payload User Guide as a reference to help those who are looking to develop their own payloads for a mission with Unicorn-2. This document guides users through:

• Mechanical interface Electrical
• Software interface Qualification Testing
• Flight Acceptance
• and more

Download this guide at this direct link…

Journalist Chris Forrester is reporting at the Advanced Television infosite that Elon Musk’s SpaceX, as well as Paris-based Eutelsat, have looked at OneWeb Global’s assets.

Chris Forrester

OneWeb is in Chapter 11 protection. Trade news publication Space Intel Report suggests that Eutelsat’s interest is undertaken on behalf of the French government. The UK government has also taken a look at the company’s assets and accounts.

More detail is likely to emerge on April 29th when a hearing is scheduled before the bankruptcy court. What is already known is that a Bidding process has been agreed with the court including a “stalking horse” process. The actual auction (if the business is not sold) is scheduled to start on July 2nd at the offices of Milbank LLP, lawyers for the action, and finalized a week later on July 10th.

If the bidding goes to several rounds, then each potential bidder must participate in each round of the bidding.

Eutelsat’s interest is fascinating given that it has only extremely limited plans for its own LEO plans. Eutelsat is planning a fleet of smallsats for IoT access. Acquiring the OneWeb fleet might be seen as a ‘bargain basement’ option, although winning an auction would also force Eutelsat to fund the building of the rest of OneWeb’s fleet.

SpaceX is also an interesting aspect, given that the company already has 400+ satellites already on-orbit — perhaps it is interested in the Airbus joint-venture which OneWeb has to build satellites in Florida.

This artist’s concept shows the Lunar Flashlight spacecraft, a six-unit CubeSat designed to search for ice on the Moon’s surface using special lasers. The spacecraft will use its near-infrared lasers to shine light into shaded polar regions on the Moon, while an onboard reflectometer will measure surface reflection and composition. Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

As astronauts explore the Moon during the Artemis program, they may need to make use of the resources that already exist on the lunar surface. Take water, for instance: Because it’s a heavy and therefore expensive resource to launch from Earth, our future explorers might have to seek out ice to mine. Once excavated, it can be melted and purified for drinking and used for rocket fuel. But how much water is there on the Moon, and where might we find it?

This is where NASA’s Lunar Flashlight comes in. About the size of a briefcase, the small satellite — also known as a CubeSat — aims to detect naturally occurring surface ice believed to be at the bottom of craters on the Moon that have never seen sunlight.

“Although we have a pretty good idea there’s ice inside the coldest and darkest craters on the Moon, previous measurements have been a little bit ambiguous,” said Barbara Cohen, principal investigator of the mission at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “Scientifically, that’s fine, but if we’re planning on sending astronauts there to dig up the ice and drink it, we have to be sure it exists.”

Managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, the spacecraft is a technology demonstration: It will seek to achieve several technological firsts, including being the first mission to look for water ice using lasers. It will also be the first planetary spacecraft to use a “green” propellant, a new kind of fuel that is safer to transport and store than the commonly used spacecraft propellant hydrazine.

“A technology demonstration mission like Lunar Flashlight, which is lower cost and fills a specific gap in our knowledge, can help us better prepare for an extended NASA presence on the Moon as well as test key technologies that may be used in future missions,” said John Baker, Lunar Flashlight project manager at JPL.

Peering Into the Shadows

Over the course of two months, Lunar Flashlight will swoop low over the Moon’s South Pole to shine its lasers into permanently shadowed regions and probe for surface ice. Found near the North and South Poles, these dark craters are thought to be “cold traps” that accumulate molecules of different ices, including water ice. The molecules may have come from comet and asteroid material impacting the lunar surface and from solar wind interactions with the lunar soil.

“The Sun moves around the crater horizon but never actually shines into the crater,” said Cohen, whose team includes scientists at the University of California, Los Angeles, John Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory and the University of Colorado. “Because these craters are so cold, these molecules never receive enough energy to escape, so they become trapped and accumulate over billions of years.”

Lunar Flashlight’s four-laser reflectometer will use near-infrared wavelengths that are readily absorbed by water to identify any accumulations of ice on the surface. Should the lasers hit bare rock as they shine into the South Pole’s permanently shadowed regions, their light will reflect back to the spacecraft, signaling a lack of ice. But if the light is absorbed, it would mean these dark pockets do indeed contain ice. The greater the absorption, the more widespread ice may be at the surface.

While the CubeSat can provide information only about the presence of ice on the surface, and not below it, Lunar Flashlight seeks to fill a critical gap in our understanding of how much water ice these regions possess. “We will also be able to compare the Lunar Flashlight data with the great data that we already have from other Moon-orbiting missions to see if there are correlations in signatures of water ice, thereby giving us a global view of surface ice distribution,” added Cohen.

The mission is detailed in a new paper published in the April 2020 issue of IEEE Aerospace and Electronic Systems Magazine.

Lunar Flashlight is funded by the Small Spacecraft Technology program within NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate. The program is based at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley. It will be one of 13 secondary payloads aboard the Artemis I mission, the first integrated flight test of NASA’s Deep Space Exploration Systems, including the Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System (SLS) rocket launching from the newly upgraded Exploration Ground Systems at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Under the Artemis program, astronauts and robots will explore more of the Moon than ever before. Robotic missions begin with commercial lunar deliveries in 2021, humans return in 2024, and the agency will establish sustainable lunar exploration by the end of the decade. We will use what we learn on the Moon to prepare to send astronauts to Mars. 

To learn more about Lunar Flashlight

Firefly Aerospace, Inc. and Spaceflight Inc. have signed a Launch Services Agreement (LSA).

The agreement confirms that Spaceflight will secure the majority of the payload mass aboard a Firefly Alpha launch, scheduled for lift off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in 2021.

In addition to being the anchor customer, Spaceflight will sign, manage, integrate, and deploy multiple payloads on the flight, enabling Firefly to maximize its full 630 kilogram launch capacity on the commercial Alpha mission to Sun Synchronous Orbit (SSO).

Firefly Aerospace’s Alpha smallsat launch vehicle.
Image is courtesy of the company.

Also, according to the LSA, Spaceflight will help maximize payload capacity aboard future Firefly Alpha launches.

The Alpha launch vehicle is designed to address the needs and demands of the burgeoning smallsat market, combining the highest payload performance with the lowest cost per kilogram to orbit in its vehicle class. Alpha will provide launch options for both full vehicle and rideshare missions. Spaceflight has launched a record-setting 271 satellites via 29 rideshare missions, establishing itself as a leading rideshare service provider, offering comprehensive launch and integration services across a global portfolio of vehicles.

Spaceflight successfully executed nine missions in 2019, the most rideshare launches the company has performed in one year. The company also completed the first-ever rideshare mission to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) in 2019, launching the first privately funded lunar lander.

Spaceflight enables commercial, non-profit organizations and government entities to get launched, achieving their mission goals – on time and on budget.

Leading up to the maiden flight of the Alpha launch vehicle later this year, final acceptance of the first and second stage will take place over the next several months at Firefly’s test facilities at Briggs, Texas, with hardware deployments to Vandenberg planned for early summer. Firefly teams are also integrating new composite technologies into its overall manufacturing capabilities, with the goal of significantly boosting production of its launch vehicles to align with demand growth over the next few years.

Curt Blake

Curt Blake, President of Spaceflight, said the company has long been committed to providing reliable, cost-effective access to space and the firm is eager to partner with Firefly, as both companies share this exciting vision. In fact, the company has many customers in mind, including some specifically in APAC, which we believe will benefit from this additional capacity and flexibility. Spaceflight is honored to secure the primary payload aboard an Alpha flight in 2021 and looks forward to working closely with the Firefly team to accelerate more small satellite rideshare launches for the industry. ”

Dr. Tom Markusic

Dr. Tom Markusic, Firefly CEO, added that Alpha launches in 2021 will play a key role in establishing the company’s  manifest and production capability, and having Spaceflight’s deep payload integration expertise in the firm’s corner is an important part of the overall launch strategy. Firefly’s Alpha launch vehicle will quickly fill a major market gap with the capability to deliver 1 metric ton to LEO and 630 kilograms to the highly desirable 500 kilogram SSO, about four times the current payload capability of other small satellite launch vehicles.

The first of 165 satellites is being built by Hong Kong Aerospace Technology Group (HKATG) and getting ready to launch the low-orbit high frequency satellite, the “Golden Bauhinia No.1”,  in June from China. The planned launch marks an important milestone in the company’s “Golden Bauhinia” space remote sensing project.

According to the U.S. Satellite Industry Association (SIA), commercial aerospace revenue was US$277.4 billion in 2018 and is expected to increase 10 percent per year. Reinforcing the fact that the rapid development of international commercial aerospace makes it one of the most dynamic industries after the internet, AI and 5G. The strategic value of the aerospace industry has driven investment into commercial aerospace organizations in Europe and America, with the market value of commercial aerospace enterprises listed in the U.S. continually reaching new heights.

Humanity is shifting from needing an aerospace industry to dependency; with the strategic and commercial value of space infrastructure becoming ever more apparent. As the modern aerospace industry takes shape, the value of orbit and spectrum base resources will become highly sought-after “space real estate”.

HKATG is the first International Astronautical Federation’s member in Hong Kong. Mr. SUN FENGQUAN, Chairman of the Board of Directors of HKATG, said that the Greater Bay Area aerospace industry generates tens of billions of dollars in demand each year. The new development direction of HKATG is centred on regional urban agglomeration, and launching the “Golden Bauhinia Constellation”.

Using mobile target monitoring, space AI and dynamic change monitoring, the “Golden Bauhinia Constellation” aims to achieve commercial application and development of communications, navigation, and remote sensing systems with global 24-hour online tracking and the ability to re-visit key areas in under 30 minutes.

The “Golden Bauhinia” project aims to launch 165 low-orbit, high-frequency satellites in 2020 covering the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and serve the world’s fastest-growing urban centres. The satellite to relaunched in June was designed, manufactured and patented by HKATG.