Although the official introduction of a proposed mission to capture an asteroid and bring it to the Earth Moon L-2 point captured most of the media attention surrounding the unveiling of NASA’s FY 2014 budget request yesterday, arguably the most important item on the agenda remains the future of the Commercial Crew program. In a press conference held after the budget was […]
While SpaceX has been getting the lion’s share of RLV publicity lately with an increasingly ambitious set of tests for the Grasshopper test vehicle, (and a posthumous nod from Johnny Cash) it is by no means the only company pushing the envelope of closed loop control. Working with NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Center and Draper Labs, Masten Space System’s Xombie technology […]
Source: RIA Novosti, Russianspaceweb A Russian built Proton rocket successfully lifted off from Baikonur in Kazakhstan on Tuesday. Operated by International Launch Services, the booster blasted off shortly before midnight at 23:06 Moscow time, (7:06 pm GMT) and placed the Space Systems/Loral SatMex-8 telecommunications satellite into geostationary transfer orbit with 5 burns of the Briz-M upperstage. The flight was the first […]
CASIS is steadily expanding its portfolio of research to be conducted aboard the International Space Station. On March 14, it issued a Request for Information looking for partners to assist with expanding the scope of non-embryonic stem cell research. The RFI specifically seeks organizations with expertise in payload development and integration which can make the process […]
It is definitely space themed weekend in the Lone Star State. After meeting with a Texas House of Representatives committee yesterday to discuss a potential commercial spaceport in Cameron county, SpaceX founder Elon Musk delivered a keynote address at the South By Southwest Festival in Austin. But that wasn’t all, during the speech Musk showed new footage of a Grasshopper test flight, […]
This past week was an unusually eventful several days for “NewSpace,” dominated by both the introduction of the Inspiration Mars Foundation and its flyby mission to Mars, and of course, the launch of the SpaceX / NASA CRS-2 mission to ISS, accompanied by a few hours of high anxiety as the company successfully worked through an initial problem with three of […]
After riding on the coattails of larger satellite launches, the increasing demand for smaller satellites and cubesats are beginning to drive the introduction of a new generation of air launched commercial rockets. Two new ventures, one in the U.S. and the other from Europe, are planning to join Virgin Galactic and Stratolaunch in the rapidly expanding field of air launched rockets. The first, based out of […]
Monday saw the 1,800th launch of the Russian Soyuz booster, a rocket updated, but also still very recognizable, as an immediate successor to the radio guided R-7 ballistic missile which was first planned in 1953. The record-setting launch, conducted from the space launch facility at Baikonur in Kazakhstan, was carried out on the Soyuz-U variety of the venerable rocket, which boosted a Russian Progress freighter to the International Space Station. The […]
Sierra Nevada Corporation’s announcement last week that it is partnering with Lockheed Martin to further develop its Dream Chaser space plane for NASA’s Commercial Crew Competition brings a new twist to the program to succeed the Space Shuttle as America’s ground to LEO space transportation system. With Dream Chaser designed to launch on the United Launch Alliance Atlas V, a rocket designed by […]
When President Bush introduced the Vision for Space exploration 9 years ago, long term prospects for the International Space Station suddenly didn’t look so good. As it turned out, ISS ultimately survived VSE and Project Constellation, with much of the American section of the station’s scientific research handed over to CASIS, the Center for the Advancement of Science, which manages it as a U.S. […]
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