September 3, 2020 at 3:51 am CEST, was an historical date for the Dutch space company Hyperion Technologies, with the launch of Vega VV16, that took 53 small satellites into space.

Arianespace’s Small Spacecraft Mission Service (SSMS) Proof of Concept (PoC) carried, among these, three small satellites of particular interest to the Dutch space company Hyperion Technologies:  ESA’s Picasso mission, the University of Maribor’s TRISAT satellite and D-Orbit’s ION Satellite Carrier.

Increased flight heritage for Star Tracker and integrated ADCS
Two components which have been jointly developed with Berlin Space Technologies have increased their flight heritage count again, thanks to the successful launch: The ST200 star tracker and the integrated ADCS, optimised for 3U satellites. 

The ST200 is part of ESA’s Picasso mission enabling the satellite to determine its attitude accurately, while the integrated ADCS is a key element to the University of Maribor’s TRISAT mission.

In Orbit demonstration for large magnetorquers
Another milestone is the first flight of Hyperion’s large magnetorquers. They are providing D-Orbit’s ION Satellite Carrier with powerful attitude control. Originally developed for D-Orbit, Hyperion will make them available commercially to all its clients seeking for magnetic control for small satellites beyond 12U.

3D printed propulsion module in space
Hyperion’s and Dawn Aerospace’s 1U CubeSat propulsion module PM200 reached space upon the successful Vega launch. The PM200 was the first ECSS compliant 3D printed bi-propellant propulsion system to be allowed to be launched to space. It shared a ride aboard D-Orbit’s first ION Satellite Carrier. 

Bert Monna, CEO of Hyperion Technologies concluded after the Vega launch, “This launch is certainly an important moment for many satellite integrators and their suppliers. Quite a number of launches experienced delays due to the pandemic. Although we at Hyperion were continuously busy, the goal remains to bring our solutions up there, into space, and to contribute to the state of the art, and eventually enable better services for users on Earth.”

Rocket Lab has launched their first in-house designed and built operational satellite, cementing the company’s evolution from a launch provider to an end-to-end space solutions company that offers turnkey satellites and spacecraft components, launch, and on-orbit operations.

The satellite, named ‘First Light,’ is the first spacecraft from Rocket Lab’s family of configurable Photon satellites to be deployed to orbit. Launched as a technology demonstration, ‘First Light’ builds upon the existing capabilities of the Electron launch vehicle’s Kick Stage with additional subsystems to enable long duration satellite operations.

This pathfinding mission is an initial demonstration of the new power management, thermal control and attitude control subsystem capabilities. By testing these systems for an extended period on orbit, Rocket Lab is building up flight heritage for future Photon satellite missions planned to low Earth orbit, the Moon, and Venus.

‘First Light’ was deployed to orbit on Rocket Lab’s 14th Electron mission, ‘I Can’t Believe It’s Not Optical’, which lifted-off from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand on August 31, 2020. Approximately 60 minutes after lift-off, Electron deployed a 100 kg smallsat for Capella Space, an action that would typically signal the successful completion of a standard Rocket Lab mission.

However, shortly after deploying the customer payload, Rocket Lab conducted an entirely new operation for the first time: Rocket Lab engineers sent a command to transition the Kick Stage into Photon satellite mode. This action marked the first, on-orbit demonstration of Rocket Lab’s Photon satellite as a two-in-one spacecraft, first using it to complete its conventional launch vehicle function to deploy customer satellites, then transitioning into a satellite to continue a standalone mission.

Designed for launch on Electron, as well as other launch vehicles, ‘First Light’ paves the way for future, high-energy variations of Photon designed for lunar and interplanetary missions, including the CAPSTONE mission to the Moon for NASA in early 2021.

Lifting off from Launch Complex 2 in Virginia, Rocket Lab will use the Electron rocket and Photon Lunar spacecraft to launch NASA’s Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment (CAPSTONE) CubeSat to Near Rectilinear Halo Orbit (NRHO), the same orbit planned for Artemis.

With the ‘First Light’ mission, Rocket Lab has completed its first full demonstration of its end-to-end mission services, encompassing mission design, component build and spacecraft assembly, integration and test (AIT), launch, ground segment, and on-orbit mission operation. The process of developing the first on-orbit Photon also enabled Rocket Lab to refine and streamline production and testing processes for higher volume Photon production to meet growing customer demand.

Executive Comment

“We started with launch and solved it, releasing small satellites from the time and orbit constraints experienced when flying on larger launch vehicles. Now we’ve simplified satellites too,” said Rocket Lab’s founder and CEO, Peter Beck. “Launching the first Photon mission marks a major turning point for space users – it’s now easier to launch and operate a space mission than it has ever been. When our customers choose a launch-plus-spacecraft mission with Electron and Photon, they immediately eliminate the complexity, risk, and delays associated with having to build their own satellite hardware and procure a separate launch.”

Rocket Lab recently opened a new headquarters and manufacturing complex in Long Beach, California, to accommodate streamlined, rapid production of Photons. The facility is also home to payload integration facilities for Photon missions, as well as a state-of-the-art mission operations center. The production complex is already home to extensive production lines delivering more than 130 Rutherford engines for the Electron launch vehicle every year, along with guidance and avionics hardware.

In addition to expanding its manufacturing complex, Rocket Lab recently acquired Sinclair Interplanetary, a leading provider of high-quality, flight-proven satellite hardware, to strengthen the Rocket Lab Space Systems division. Sinclair Interplanetary products have become key features of the Photon satellite platforms, and Rocket Lab is also dedicating resources to grow Sinclair’s already strong merchant spacecraft components business.

The acquisition enables Sinclair Interplanetary to tap into Rocket Lab’s resources, scale, manufacturing capability, and innovative technologies to make world-leading satellite hardware accessible to more customers.

Astroscale Ltd. (“Astroscale UK”), the UK subsidiary of Astroscale Holdings Inc. (“Astroscale”), has appointed Sharon Parker-Lines as the firm’s UK Operations Director, effective September 1, 2020.

Sharon joins Astroscale with more than 20 years of experience in operations, specializing in human resources, finance, production, commercial, and strategic planning. Most recently, Sharon was Centre Director for the Oxford Centre for Innovation, where she was responsible for supporting SMEs and start-ups to achieve sustainable growth. Prior to that, she was Group Chief Operating Officer of a global publishing company for nine years.

Sharon will work closely with John Auburn, CCO and Astroscale UK Managing Director, to build a world-class multi-skilled engineering and operations team in the UK and ensure the commercial success of the company. She will manage and oversee the support functions of the Astroscale UK business, including finance, human resources, IT, administration and procurement, whilst managing the resource requirements across the wider engineering team.

On her appointment, Sharon said, “Astroscale is an exciting and agile company that’s working on ground-breaking missions to address orbital sustainability, including the growing concern of space debris. To join this talented team is a dream come true for me.”

Since its establishment in 2017, Astroscale UK has grown to over 30 personnel with plans to grow to 80 by 2022. The UK unit includes the ground segment and operations engineering teams, that are leading the development of the In-Orbit Servicing Control Centre – National Facility. This state-of-the-art facility will form the basis for operating missions to clean up space debris and conduct other in-orbit servicing operations, providing Astroscale with a world-leading operational capability. The team is currently in the process of testing the operational procedures for the upcoming End-of-Life Services by Astroscale-demonstration (ELSA-d) mission.

The Space Development Agency (SDA) has awarded two contracts for the first generation of the Transport Layer — these awards represent one of the first major and highly visible steps toward developing the National Defense Space Architecture’s inaugural tranche (called Tranche 0).

This set of contract awards will initiate the design, development, and launch of constellations that will be comprised of tens of satellites with optical intersatellite links capable of sending and receiving wideband data to and from other space vehicles and ground stations. The capability demonstrated in the Transport Layer Tranche 0 will provide our warfighters with periodic regional access to low-latency data connectivity via space-based extensions of existing tactical data links.

York Space Systems awarded a $94,036,666 firm-fixed-price contract for the Space Development Agency Transport Layer Tranche 0. The work to be performed under this contract will include on-time delivery of space vehicles (SVs) and paths to optical intersatellite link (OISL) interoperability success.

Lockheed Martin Corporation is awarded a $187,542,461 firm-fixed-price contract for the Space Development Agency Transport Layer Tranche 0. The work to be performed under this contract will include on-time delivery of space vehicles (SVs) and paths to optical intersatellite link (OISL) interoperability success.

Having been delayed since March of 2020, and using a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket with a 3X, previous flight completion record, SpaceX has now successfully launched — from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida — the SAOCOM-1B Earth Observation (EO) satellite for Argentina plus two rideshare smallsats.

This was a rare southern launch trajectory from Florida as SAOCOM-1B headed for a polar orbit (SSO) with the launch vehicle heading over Miami and Cuba. The last time such a southerly launch occurred from Florida was in 1969.

As rockets on this flight path do cross populated areas (one reason most polar orbit launches occur from Vandenberg AFB in California), an automatic flight safety systems is incorporated into the Falcon 9 that enables the rocket to self-destruct without command from the flight operations center, should anything go amiss with the flight, such as straying too far from the designated path.

This particular Falcon 9 previously launched two cargo missions, one in December of 2019 and one in March of 2020 and registers this launch as the 42nd re-flight and 59th landing for the company with this rocket.

The first stage, ID’s as B1059 by SpaceX, accomplished a landing at Cape Canaveral, being only the second time this year such a re-berthing has occurred on dry land.

The twin fairings for this mission splashed down into the Atlantic and one of the company’s recovery craft went into its “scoop-out-of-the-water” mode for this important hardware.

The SAOCOM 1B satellite is operated by the Argentinian space agency and is the second to reach orbit for that nation. A major capability of the SAOCOM 1B is the satellite’s ability to image the same area of Earth each day at the same time.

The rideshare payloads included Tyvak-0172 and GNOMES-1 for PlanetIQ. The former is a smallsat built by Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems for a customer that remains undisclosed. PlanetIQ, the developer and builder of the GNOMES 1 smallsat, is planning to orbit a fleet of approximately 20 smallsats that will collect data on a variety of atmospheric conditions to assist in weather forecasting.

The FCC has approved OneWeb’s request to deploy an additional 1,280 satellites to provide high-speed broadband services in the US.

The approval increases the number of satellites OneWeb can operate in the US market from 720 to 2,000, offering the company “greater opportunities to deliver satellite-based broadband services to the public,” the agency said in an order released August 26th. The FCC says its ruling will offer OneWeb greater opportunities to deliver satellite-based broadband services to the public.

OneWeb proposes to add a V-band payload to the 720 satellite Ku-/Ka-band constellation previously approved by the FCC and proposes 1,280 additional V-band satellites operating at a nominal altitude of 8,500 km. “The OneWeb constellation will be authorized by the United Kingdom,” stated the FCC, adding, “The additional spectrum bands and satellites proposed in the OneWeb Petition would build upon OneWeb’s Ku/Ka-band Market Access Grant. Such additional capacity would enhance OneWeb’s ability to offer its proposed broadband services in the United States.”

“We conclude that granting OneWeb access to the US market for its proposed V-band satellite system would increase competition for the broadband services proposed to be provided by such systems to American consumers, particularly in underserved areas, offer a greater likelihood that such a large system is able to fulfill its ambitions and deploy the proposed services,” the FCC added.

However, the FCC insists that OneWeb pay a “surety bond” by September 26th this year and also launch 50 percent of the proposed satellites no later than August 26th 2026 and complete the constellation by August 26th 2029.

“We are pleased to hear the FCC granted our V-Band application. The V-band is critical for next generation satellite broadband services. OneWeb looks forward to the future growth opportunities this approval will enable as we commercialize our spectrum and execute on our mission to bring low latency connectivity to communities, governments, businesses, and people in the US and around the world,” a OneWeb spokesperson said.

News stories authored by journalist Chris Forrester,
who posts for the Advanced Television infosite and is also a
Senior Contributor for Satnews Publishers.