Posted on August 29, 2011, at 7:00 am .
While many of the competitors for the Google Lunar X Prize are building rather small vehicles to keep costs down, Astrobotic Technology has gone in the other direction in order to maximize revenues.
In addition to delivering a rover, Astrobotic’s lander can carry up to 110 kg of third-party payload to the lunar surface. At a cost of between $1.8 million to $2 million per kilogram, a fully sold out mission would earn Astrobotic around $200 million in revenues – more than enough to pay for the mission.
Continue reading ‘To Win Google Lunar X Prize, Astrobotic Technology Goes Big’
Posted on August 29, 2011, at 5:30 am .
The Tiangong-1 space station with a Shenzhou spacecraft. Credit: CNSA
The People’s Daily reports:
According to an unnamed source in a position of authority in Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, the remarkable Chinese unmanned space module Tiangong 1 will be launched soon.
However, because the experimental orbiter SJ-11-04, which was launched last week, failed to enter Earth’s orbit, the launch of Tiangong 1 has been postponed until early September.
Posted on August 29, 2011, at 4:15 am .
The director of Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research (INPE), Gilberto Câmara, has announced that he will step down from his post later this year, about two years before the end of his term.
“I left the space agency is due to the exhaustion caused by the daily struggle with legislation and institutional structures totally inadequate to institutions of S & T. Adding to the frustration at the lack of renewal of the staff by INPE,” Câmara said in a statement.
The newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo attributes Câmara’s decision to “differences with the leadership of the Brazilian space program and a break with the president of the AEB (Brazilian Space Agency), Marco Antonio Raupp” over the future of a joint rocket project with Ukraine and a proposed merger of AEB and INPE.
Continue reading ‘Frustrated Brazilian Space Research Director Stepping Down’
Posted on August 28, 2011, at 1:53 pm .
Russia has until late November to determine a fix for the problem that caused a Soyuz rocket and Progress freighter to crash last week or the crew will have to temporarily abandon the International Space Station, a NASA official has told Spaceflight Now. The problem, ironically, involves not station operations but rather harsh winter weather at the Soyuz landing site in Kazakhstan.
Continue reading ‘NASA: ISS Might Need to Be Temporarily Abandoned in November’
Posted on August 28, 2011, at 1:50 pm .
LAS CRUCES, NM – NMSA PR – For the second consecutive year, Spaceport America has received a federal grant award to help fund new spaceport infrastructure. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grant is worth $249,378 toward the cost of a roll-back vehicle integration building at Spaceport America.
Continue reading ‘Spaceport America to Add Vehicle Integration Building for Larger Rockets’
Posted on August 28, 2011, at 11:28 am .
Dear employees of the company, our dear veterans,
We heartily congratulate you on the 65th anniversary of the S.P. Korolev Rocket and Space Corporation Energia!
Our company, founded by an outstanding engineer, scientist, manager, the farther of space flight academician Sergei Pavlovich Korolev has a glorious history and lasting traditions, and has always been striving towards new horizons in advanced rocket and space technology and meeting difficult challenges of space flight.
The history of RSC Energia is inextricably liked to the development of our country’s long-range missile systems, opening up the space era for mankind, and steady advance and improvement of cutting-edge rocket and space technologies.
Continue reading ‘RSC Energia Turns 65′
Posted on August 27, 2011, at 12:22 pm .
Soyuz/Progress M-12M launches into the skies above Baikonur. It was lost 5 minutes later. (Credit: NASA TV)
An interesting update from Anatoly Zak at RussianSpaceWeb.com:
Progress M-12M was carrying 2,670 kilograms of supplies to the ISS including 257 kilograms of food, 420 kilograms of water and 50 kilograms of oxygen. The spacecraft also carried 10 paintings by the son of the Russian artist Aleksandr Shilov, infamous for his politically convenient portraits of Russia’s powerful and corrupt officials. The collection was reportedly sent to the station for the “psychological support” of the crew, however, some reports suggested that the artist planned to use the occasion to drastically hike up prices for the display of his work back on Earth. Some posters on Russian web forums characterized the destruction of paintings as “the only good news coming out of the accident.”
Ouch!
Posted on August 27, 2011, at 7:17 am .
Science Minister David Willetts has announced the external membership of the UK Space Agency Steering Board. Rob Douglas will chair the Steering Board and other confirmed members are David Southwood, Sally Cantello and Baljit Dhillon.
The Steering Board’s role is to advise Ministers on the strategies to be adopted by the UK Space Agency. The Board also provides advice and guidance from a commercial standpoint to the Chief Executive and the senior management team on the UK Space Agency’s performance, operation and development, including its management of risk.
Posted on August 26, 2011, at 1:12 pm .
Study Endorses Senate Launch System as Affordable Near-Term Pork
The Space Frontier Foundation today agreed with U.S. Senators Kay Bailey Hutchison and Richard Shelby in their claim that Booz Allen Hamilton’s “Independent Cost Assessment (ICA)” of the Space Launch System shows that SLS “can be initiated within our currently constrained fiscal limitations” and therefore “halt the further loss of skilled aerospace workers now poised to be laid off from the NASA manned spaceflight program.” But that is the end of where we agree with the Texas and Alabama Senators.
Continue reading ‘SFF Hammers Hutchison, Shelby on Heavy-Lift Program’
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