In talking with attendees at the NewSpace 2015 conference which was held in Mid-July in San Jose, California, two emerging themes became clear. The first is that the cubesat revolution is beginning in earnest, and it offers the potential for fundamentally changing how we go about the process of conducting space exploration. From miniaturized cryo-coolers […]
One of the fastest growing NewSpace companies over the last year is Spire Global Inc., the San Francisco based startup which will soon be deploying a fleet of cubesats in Low Earth Orbit. Designed to offer both maritime Automatic Identification Services as well as more accurate weather forecasts through radio occultation of GPS signals, the […]
Spire, the San Francisco based smallsat company which began through the educational cubesat venture Ardusat, announced yesterday that it has been awarded $2.9 million in grants from the Scottish government. The award comes as Spire announced that it is opening a Glasgow, Scotland office to focus on its fleet of GPS Radio Occultation (GPS-RO) cubesats. […]
LauncherOne Factory Launch / Image Credit : Virgin Galactic Virgin Galactic announced on Thursday that its is opening a dedicate factory in Long Beach, California for producing the LauncherOne small booster. Here is an excerpt from the press release, absent the obligatory statements from local officials:: LONG BEACH, Calif. – February 12, 2015 – Virgin […]
Though they may have been considered something of a novelty when cubesats first entered the space industry, today it may be difficult to overstate the potential of these diminutive spacecraft to change the way in which we explore, learn and conduct commerce in the final frontier. While cubesats are finding an initial niche in low […]
At just after 10 AM CST (US) Wednesday morning, November 12, the European Space Agency received confirmation that the Rosetta spacecraft’s Philae lander touched down on its target, comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, currently more than 500 million kilometers away from Earth. The initial jubilation over what appeared to be a perfect descent and touchdown, and a moment of […]
Update: A report in SpaceNews on the NanoRacks cubesat deployment problem includes a statement from the company confirming that the issue is electrical rather than mechanical, and is apparently tied to the deployer’s command box, as a new one will be sent to the station on a future supply flight. Deployments are estimated to resume “in […]
Update: Thunderstorms on Wednesday prevented the roll-out of the Antares booster. As a result, the launch has been delayed to 1:14 pm EDT on Saturday, July 12. Image Credit: OSC Orbital Sciences Corporation is preparing for its next Commercial Resupply Services launch to the International Space Station. Liftoff of the Antares booster carrying the Cygnus […]
Coming on the heels of releasing its “Flock 1” of 28 Earth Observation cubesats into Low Earth Orbit from the International Space Station, Planet Labs announced today that it has confirmed launch orders for 100 more of its tiny spacecraft to be carried out over the next year. The announcement does not specify which boosters […]
Radio Free Internet? The cubesat revolution it would seem, is just beginning. And if a bold plan announced on Monday comes to fruition, it might just lead to revolution of the rather messy kind. The Outernet project, a creation of the non-profit New York based Media Development Investment Fund, seeks to develop and deploy a […]
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