Gregg Easterbrook takes issue with NASA’s “Who, us?” attitude toward protecting the Earth against errant asteroids in a piece titled, “The Sky is Falling,” in The Atlantic. “The odds that a potentially devastating space rock will hit Earth this century may be as high as one in 10. So why isn’t NASA trying harder to prevent catastrophe?” Easterbook’s answer? NASA is obsessed with putting humans on the moon.
A Russian Progress vehicle was launched from Kazakhstan on Wednesday with fresh supplies for astronauts aboard the International Space Station. And what will the fastest men alive be receiving in additional to their regular shipment of clothes, oxygen and fuel? Snails. Ninety of them. (No, they’re not going to eat them; it’s all part of a biology experiment. Really.)
In other news, SpaceX’s Elon Musk is saying that he could launch astronauts to ISS aboard his Dragon spacecraft by 2011 if NASA gives the OK to develop a human-rated version of the vehicle this summer. This date is at least two years (or four or five) before NASA would be able to launch its Orion vehicle.
This is an ambitious goal given that SpaceX has yet to successfully launch anything into space. It failed in both attempts to launch its small Falcon I rocket; a third attempt is scheduled for next month. Dragon will be launched atop the company’s larger Falcon 9 rocket, which has yet to fly.
Officials in Hawthorne, California are hoping that SpaceX will help bring the city back its aerospace glory days, the Daily Breeze reports. Elon Musk’s company is now building Falcon rockets and Dragon spacecraft in the same building where Boeing once assembled 747 fuselages.
“I think SpaceX will basically bring Hawthorne back to the aerospace heydays,” Hawthorne councilman Gary Parsons tells the newspaper. “You have a major anchor like SpaceX, and then you’ll have other smaller companies coming to Hawthorne to serve SpaceX. It’s sort of returning to the aerospace renaissance of the good old days when Hawthorne was a central hub of aerospace activity.”
Bloomberg.com has an interesting profile of SpacX founder Elon Musk, the California-based entrepreneur who is trying to make access to space cheap and routine with his Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 rockets.
“I personally wonder if Musk doesn’t want to be Time Man of the Year,” says Strategic Space Development CEO James Cantrell. “He wants recognition for changing the destiny of man.”
The main thing standing in his way is a couple of successful launches. Both Falcon 1 flights failed; a third is scheduled for June from the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Falcon 9 has yet to fly.
In addition to trying to conquer space, Musk is making his mark in the automotive industry through his investment in Tesla Motors, which is making a $98,000 electric car that runs on laptop batteries. The main obstacle there has been the inability to find a decent transmission. Tesla is now producing one vehicle per week at a plant in England using an interim gearbox.
Taylor Dinerman examines the current state of the reusable launch vehicle industry over at The Space Review. He is particularly intrigued by a test of a sub-scale space plane that Lockheed Martin conducted in New Mexico last December.
Rob Coppinger of Flight Global takes a look at the success of SpaceX, the El Segundo, Calif. rocket company that has secured a NASA launch services contract that could be worth up to $1 billion without ever having launched anything into orbit. The contract involves the company’s Falcon 1 vehicle, which has failed in its only two launch attempts, and the larger Falcon 9, which has yet to fly.
Coppinger also examines new rocket and spacecraft concepts under consideration by Japan and Europe on his Hyperbola blog. JAXA is considering a VTOL concept that looks a lot like the vehicle that Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin is working on. Meanwhile, ESA and Russia are jointly examining various designs for a crew transport.
A major initiative has been launched to improve quality control for the Proton launcher, which has suffered two failures in eight months, Coppinger reports. Russia’s Khrunichev State Research and Production Space Center and its partner, International Launch Services, will be working closely with subcontractors to prevent future problems.
In American space news, the Rocketsandsuch blog has a new post claiming that costs on NASA’s Orion program have risen again by about $3 billion.
Celestis will launch the ashes of 208 people into orbit aboard SpaceX’s Falcon 1 rocket in June. The flight, which will be launched out of the Marshall Islands, will be the seventh and largest memorial flight undertaken by the Houston-based company. There is more information at the Space Frontier Foundation website.
SpaceX, based in El Segundo, Calif., is hoping that the third time is a charm for their low-cost rocket. Two previous Falcon 1 launch attempts have failed; the first exploded shortly after takeoff, while the second reached space but failed to put its payload into orbit.
NASA PRESS RELEASE
WASHINGTON — NASA has awarded Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX, a NASA Launch Services contract for the Falcon 1 and Falcon 9 launch vehicles.
The NASA Launch Services contracts are multiple awards to multiple launch service providers. Twice per year, there is an opportunity for existing and emerging domestic launch service providers to submit proposals if their vehicles meet the minimum contract requirements.
The contract is an Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity (IDIQ) contract where NASA may order launch services through June 30, 2010, for launches to occur through December 2012. Under the NASA Launch Services IDIQ contracts, the potential total contract value is between $20,000 and $1 billion, depending on the number of missions awarded.
Continue reading ‘SpaceX Wins NASA Contract for Falcon Launches’
Investor’s Business Daily has an interview with SpaceX’s Elon Musk. The PayPal founder reports that his space company is profitable despite having failed to place anything into orbit thus far.
“We have been cash flow positive for the last six quarters,” Musk boasts. “We were profitable last year. Revenue was over $100 million. I won’t say how profitable we were, but it was a pretty healthy number.”
SpaceX failed in its two previous attempts to launch its Falcon 1 rocket. The first exploded shortly after takeoff; the second reached space but failed to obtain orbit. Musk and his team will try again in June. SpaceX hopes to significantly undercut its competitors.
“Our nearest competitor there is the Pegasus by Orbital Sciences, although the Falcon 1 has greater capability to orbit than Pegasus. The Pegasus has a NASA list price of $35 million, though I hear you can get it for $30 million commercially. Ours is $8 million,” Musk said.
SpaceX is also developing the larger Falcon 9 rocket and the Dragon spacecraft under NASA’s COTS program. Dragon is being designed to carry cargo and crew to the International Space Station after the space shuttle retires in 2010.
SpaceDev Press Release via Market Wire
March 10, 2008
POWAY, CA – SpaceDev, Inc. announced today that it has been selected to provide the first commercial satellite to be readied for the Department of Defense Operationally Responsive Space Office’s (ORS) new Jumpstart Mission.
Jumpstart is a multi-pronged effort that will fly a responsive payload on the SpaceX Falcon 1 Flight 003 mission, currently scheduled for a June 2008 launch from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.
Continue reading ‘SpaceDev satellite chosen for next Falcon 1 launch’
SpaceX will launch a DOD satellite aboard its Falcon 1 rocket in June. The Falcon will carry the Operationally Responsive Space Office’s first jumpstart mission.
The ORS payload will be SpaceDev’s Trailblazer spacecraft bus, originally developed under a Missile Defense Agency contract. Trailblazer will demonstrate a flexible, modular commercial bus design using off the shelf components.
Continue reading ‘SpaceX to launch DOD payload; hopes third time is a charm’
Despite failing to reach orbit, SpaceX has declared that the second flight of its Falcon 1 launcher was a success nevertheless. Unlike the first rocket, which exploded shortly after leaving the pad, the second one made it into space but failed to achieve orbit. Space-X officials claimed that most objectives were met.
SpaceX hopes to develop the Falcon 1 launcher and its successor, Falcon 9, as low-cost alternatives to traditional launch vehicles. The company is based in El Segundo, Calif.
