Space Explored

ULA announced last week that it will be building a second cargo ship capable of transporting its Vulcan rocket hardware from its factory in Decatur, Alabama and its launch sites on both the East and West Coasts. The press release also emphasizes the importance Amazon‘s Kuiper satellite constellation plays in Vulcan’s launch services.

Following a long delay in flights, Blue Origin is returning to crewed spaceflight missions for its New Shepard rocket, with a launch date scheduled for May 19. The missions will carry six customers to an altitude just above the Karman Line.

Boeing announced Tuesday morning that they, ULA, and NASA are now no longer targeting a launch for this Friday of Boeing‘s first crewed Starliner mission. Due to a helium leak on the Starliner’s service module, the launch is slated for no earlier than May 21.

Once again the big story this week will be the reattempt of Boeing’s CFT mission to the International Space Station. After a week of analysis, ULA is changing out a valve on the rockets upper stage which is what caused the abort last week.

As the sun began to set Friday evening, I sat on the quad in front of our library playing with friends and observing the sparse clouds glow with an incredible orange bloom. The moon, only a small crescent, began to appear above a large tree. It was cold, but a nice Friday evening after a long week of classes and projects. Throughout the day I posted to Instagram and Twitter, sharing the hope that we, in Exeter, New Hampshire, would see the aurora borealis tonight. Only a few friends took interest as I showed them photos from across Europe. Some took an interest in the science and asked how and when we could see them.

Over the last few weeks, SpaceX has hit the major 20 flight milestone on not one but three separate boosters. The company is moving on and hoping to now get way more launches out of what was supposed to be a ten flight limit.

After an extremely smooth countdown and crew egress, ULA controllers called a scrub Starliner’s Crewed Flight Test a few hours before planned liftoff due to a misbehaving valve. While the problem is a known issue by ULA, it will take a few days to trouble shoot, meaning the next launch attempt won’t be until at least Friday.

After a long road of delays, technical failures, and two inflight tests, Boeing‘s Starliner is finally at the pad and ready to launch later today. The mission will be a major milestone for Boeing, who is desperate for a win right now, but it might show that the world has moved on from legacy providers.

In a report by Reuters, the publication uncovered SpaceX‘s continued high injury rates have yet to come down from years prior. For some locations, SpaceX is over nine times higher than the industry average.

By the end of the week the International Space Station will be fully ready to support Boeing Starliner’s Crewed Test Flight with an opening on the forward docking port on the station’s Harmony Module. This will be completed with the reshuffling of two SpaceX Dragon spacecraft.

This week SpaceX will attempt another three launch week, with two of those mission scheduled from the West Coast. The headline mission for the week will actually come out of China, a Long March 5 rocket is scheduled to liftoff Friday with the country’s next lunar sample return mission, this time from the far side of the Moon.

A staple of the airshow/fly-in season, EAA’s AirVenture is back again in Oshkosh, Wisconsin with headline performers like twin B-29s and the Canadian Forces Snowbirds.

Over the last few weeks NASA has announced a plethora of partnerships and contracts for lunar rovers that astronauts will eventually use on future Artemis missions. Those rovers will of course need a ride to the Moon, which will come in the like of cargo variants of NASA’s HLS landers, Starship and Blue Moon.

Agile Space Industries is set to deliver advanced propulsion technologies to True Anomaly, enhancing the capabilities of the Jackal autonomous orbital vehicle (AOV) for the U.S. Space Systems Command’s Victus Haze demonstration. Slated for 2025, the Victus Haze mission’s objective is to showcase the potential of commercial technologies to support future tactically responsive space operations. 

As humanity continues its relentless pursuit of the cosmos, engineers at NASA‘s Jet Propulsion Laboratory are working on an ambitious concept for a journey to one of the most promising locales for extraterrestrial life within our solar system – Jupiter‘s moon Europa. A potential Europa lander would be designed to delve into the secrets hidden beneath its icy exterior. 

Last week Boeing and ULA rolled a Starliner spacecraft from the former’s facilities on Kennedy Space Center to the latter’s launch site on Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. With that, final checkouts are underway before two NASA astronauts climb inside and fly it to the ISS and back.

The United States space industrial base is currently facing significant challenges due to a surge in demand for small satellites, which are crucial for national security space programs. This rising demand is revealing vulnerabilities in the supply chain as the military seeks rapid deployment of satellite constellations. 

This week we’re looking to be a rather busy one with a launch everyday from either SpaceX, China, and Rocket Lab up to Friday. China will be launching its next crew rotation to their space station and SpaceX might have a four launch week.

The FAA has made a new rule that any spacecraft that plans to reenter after launch must obtain its reentry license from the administration prior to launch. This was created out of safety concerns and experiences learned during granting Varda Space the first ever Part 450 reentry license.

One year ago SpaceX launched its first fully integrated Starship rocket, which in my opinion is the start of the Starship era of spaceflight. While that mission was far from 100% successful, this new era is truly changing the way people look at the future of heavy lift rockets.

This week Seth is joined with former NASA astronaut Terry Virts to discuss their experiences witnessing April’s total solar eclipse. To finish the discussion, Virts goes into detail about what it’s like taking photos from space and the workflow of getting them to NASA and out on social media.

Subscribe:

• Spotify
• Apple Podcasts
• Google Podcasts
• RSS

In what I’ve always viewed as a bold move by NASA, since 2021 Perseverance has been collecting Martian core samples for future return. The issue is a return plan wasn’t finalized or paid for before launch, which in recent years has been under attack by Congress who wants a lighter budget. On Monday NASA conceded to complaints that it’s too expensive.

In an era defined by rapid technological advancements and escalating global tensions, the U.S. Department of Defense is strategically diversifying its solid rocket motor suppliers to mitigate risks associated with a concentrated supply chain. This move aims to revitalize domestic production capabilities for solid rocket motors, essential components in the arsenal of hypersonic weapons, conventional weapons, and nuclear missiles.