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6/14/13: Stratolaunch Systems unveils a new design concept for its revolutionary space transportation system. Watch the video or visit http://www.stratolaunch.com to learn more.
LONDON (VIRGIN GALACTIC PR) – Sir Richard Branson, founder of the Virgin Group and Virgin Galactic, announced Monday, June 17, that the company’s 600th Future Astronaut is Marsha Waters, the owner of an accounting services company based in Blackpool, United Kingdom. Waters, 42, embodies the next generation of women in space: private individuals who are passionate about experiencing space travel for themselves. Waters first took an interest in Virgin Galactic in 2010 and has been following its progress ever since.
Commercial operations at an asteroid? Asteroid prospecting and eventually mining? Trillionaires in space? Is this all new? No. Fifteen years ago this week, plans for the first serious effort targeting commercial mission operations at a near Earth asteroid came to a head at a comprehensive, three-day peer-review meeting held at a beachside hotel in Southern California. Now that such mission concepts are in the news again—involving multiple companies—the genesis, heritage and insights from this first attempt are worth a retrospective look.
Jeff Feige, CEO of the spacesuit company, Orbital Outfitters talks with Moonandback about the company, its flagship product, how the suit is a safety subsystem that requires extensive integration with safety and other systems in a vehicle, and the emergence of the NewSpace industry from the economic downturn and its effect on Orbital Outfitters.
With the development phase well under way, Swiss Space Systems is announcing today a new partnership - with Thales Alenia Space, a leading developer and manufacturer of pressurised modules, notably for the international space station. These partnerships will enable S3 to move ahead with the plan to launch small satellites and enter the next stage of developing a manned version of its suborbital shuttle. The latter will enable the company to offer a very high speed mode of passenger transportation.
The latest version of our 'Dreams' film
Much is being made of Wang Yaping, who is described as “China’s first teacher in space.” The Chinese space program is all about public relations and scoring “firsts.” Yet, no one seems to ask if this claim is accurate.
Only about 500 people have traveled to space, and few have traveled to space commercially. You can expect that to change — and Texas could be involved in a big way. The last decade has seen the first leisure travelers go to space. Since 2001, seven individuals have purchased eight orbital flights — one passenger flew twice — for up to $35 million per flight. The development of suborbital reusable vehicles — commercially developed reusable space vehicles that can carry humans or cargo — offer a slew of space experiences (weightlessness, view from space and of the curvature of the Earth) combined with the rare opportunity to cross the threshold of space at a price point significantly lower than commercially purchased orbital flights.
Dropped, the spacecraft falls toward Earth — one … two … three … four — before a burst of smoke and flame rockets it away from a mothership, forward and upward into a blue desert sky. Watching video of the recent test flight from thousands of miles away in Central Florida, Marc Hagle imagined the G-forces pressing against his chest as the rocket motor ignited and the spaceship accelerated, just as he’d experienced in a simulator. His wife, Sharon, felt a surge of excitement, thinking, “Wow, this is really going to happen.” Six years after the Winter Park couple was among the early buyers of $200,000 tickets to fly on Virgin Galactic, their opportunity to become astronauts feels closer than ever.
"I have flown so many times in a different aircraft and I was looking for the ultimate flight experience. That’s when my chief pilot told me that I should embark on a space flight and that it was now possible. I always thought I would not be able to undertake such a journey in this lifetime, and now look at me, I will be doing it! It’s great!"
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As president and COO of SpaceX, Gwynne Shotwell is responsible for the company's day-to-day operations, as well as managing all customer and strategic relations needed to support company growth. She joined SpaceX in 2002 as vice president of business development and built the Falcon vehicle family manifest to more than 50 launches, representing over $5 billion in revenue. Previously, she worked at the Aerospace Corporation and at Microcosm's Space Systems Division.
Shotwell has authored dozens of papers on a variety of subjects, including standardizing spacecraft/payload interfaces, conceptual small spacecraft design, infrared signature target modeling, space shuttle integration, and reentry vehicle operational risks. In recognition of her work, she received the 2011 World Technology Award for Individual Achievement in Space and was inducted into Women In Technology International Hall of Fame in 2012. Earlier this year, she was elected as a Fellow to the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.
The House Appropriations subcommittee that funds the FAA's Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST) will meet tomorrow to markup the draft FY2014 Transportation-HUD (T-HUD) appropriations bill. As drafted, the bill would reduce AST from its requested level of $16.01 million to $14.16 million.
In Space News we have China's Shenzhou-10 launch and docking, ATV-4 docking, sending your own message to space, Planetary Resources and Congress has no love for NASA asteroid missions.
George Schellenger joins us to talk about his new book and gangs around in After Dark to also talk about Project Blue Pride.
LE BOURGET, France — Franco-Italian satellite builder Thales Alenia Space has selected a Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) Falcon 9 rocket to launch Turkmenistan’s first telecommunications satellite after being blocked by U.S. export rules from shipping the satellite to China for launch, European officials said. The decision, which was expected, signals at least the temporary end of what has become known as Thales Alenia Space’s “ITAR-free” communications satellite design, which has been used in the past decade to launch about a half-dozen Thales-built satellites and satellite electronics payloads aboard Chinese Long March rockets. This hardware was touted as devoid of U.S. components and thus beyond the reach of U.S. export policy, which bars the shipment of U.S. space technology to China.
Swiss Space Systems -- S3, the young Swiss aerospace company, was officially launched on 13 March this year. Its goal is to develop, manufacture, certify and operate unmanned suborbital shuttles to launch small satellites up to 250 kg by 2018. With the development phase well under way, the firm is announcing today a new partnership - with Thales Alenia Space, a leading developer and manufacturer of pressurised modules, notably for the international space station. These partnerships will enable 3S to move ahead with the plan to launch small satellites and enter the next stage of developing a manned version of its suborbital shuttle. The latter will enable the company to offer a very high speed mode of passenger transportation.
Le Bourget, 17 June 2013 – Today, at the International Aeronautics and Space Show in Le Bourget (Paris), Thales Alenia Space announces the signing of the agreement with Swiss Space System (S3) for the development of the pressurized compartment intended to house scientific experiments and astronauts of the SOAR (Sub-Orbital Aircraft Reusable) suborbital vehicle. Swiss Space Systems is a young Swiss aerospace company whose goal, from now until 2018, is the development, construction, certification and operation of suborbital spacecraft for launching small satellites up to a weight of 250 kg. This agreement will allow S3 to further develop the project, also proposing research applications in the areas of microgravity and suborbital passenger transportation. The S3 project also takes advantage of the prestigious collaboration of ESA’s Astronaut Center and of other important aerospace industries
"AMSTERDAM (SXC PR) — The Universe is not the only thing that is expanding. "So is SXC! This month we will be opening two new offices in New York and Hong Kong. That way we will be able to fulfill the specific needs for our customers from Asia and the Americas."
Can lightning strike twice in the same place? Lightning struck our region's economy in 1961 when President John F. Kennedy proposed that the United States land a man on the moon. That daring challenge brought unprecedented growth to our region. However, it also left the area vulnerable to sudden shifts of government policy, such as the downturns that followed the end of the Apollo and space shuttle programs. Fortunately, there is a solution. A new wave of commercial aerospace companies is emerging, scouting locations to set up shop, and seeking skilled employees to hire. Florida needs to raise a lightning rod to attract this fast-growing "New Space" industry.
Rupert Murdoch’s always entertaining and occasionally reliable British tabloid, The Sun, reports the latest celebritynaut rumor: Ashton Kutcher and main squeeze Mila Kunis will honeymoon aboard Sir Richard Branson’s SpaceShipTwo next year after getting married this September, probably on a beach in St Tropez. All this according to an anonymous pal of the Hollywood power couple:
New pilots for Virgin Galactic’s Spaceline have completed a series of check rides from Mojave, Calif, as preparations continue towards the next supersonic envelope expansion flight of the rocket-powered SpaceShipTwo (SS2) sub-orbital vehicle. Flights were in WhiteKnightTwo (WK2), built by Scaled Composites, which has been flown on at least 11 training sorties since dropping SS2 for its first powered test flight (PF01) on April 29. The two are former space shuttle astronaut and Top Gun graduate, Frederick “CJ” Sturckow, and former U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School and U-2 veteran, Michael “Sooch” Masucci. Both completed check rides on June 6.
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