Archive for June, 2012

Establishing a Price to GTO

Establishing a Price to GTO

According to an article in SpaceNews,  Asiasat has recently placed a launch order with ILS for a Proton launch as a hedge against possible delays in the introduction of the Falcon 9 V1.1.  Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the article is the fact that it contains pricing information for both launch vehicles. Specifically, SpaceX pricing for both Asiasat launches […]

50 Launches and Going Nowhere

50 Launches and Going Nowhere

United Launch Alliance conducted the 50th launch of the EELV program with an NRO payload carried to orbit by an Atlas V 401.  In a fawning interview conducted by SpaceFlight Now, which failed to mention either the 1 Billion dollar per year subsidy masquerading as the Launch Capability Contract,  or the Atlas V’s Russian main engine,  ULA CEO Michael Gass made an interesting argument for continued monopoly. […]

B612 Foundation Announces First Private Deep Space Telescope

B612 Foundation Announces First Private Deep Space Telescope

Thursday morning, the B612 foundation will formally announce a mission to launch the first privately funded science mission to deep space, a telescope launched into solar orbit and tasked with searching the inner solar system for Near Earth Asteroids. The goal is to identify and map the trajectories of NEA’s in the inner solar system to […]

Welcome to the Heavenly Palace

Welcome to the Heavenly Palace

The accommodations are hardly palatial even by current space station standards, but China has taken a major step in advancing its space ambitions with the first crewed mission to its Tiangong-1  Space Station.  Although this is a short duration mission, and is intended to build the experience to lead towards a next generation  station, following a path much like Soviet […]

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