VSS Enterprise on its first test flight. (Photo: Mark Greenberg)

VG PR — Virgin Galactic, the world’s first commercial spaceline, owned by Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group and Aabar Investments PJS, has been selected by NASA to provide flight opportunities for engineers, technologists and scientific researchers to fly technology payloads into space. This arrangement marks the first time that NASA has contracted with a commercial partner to provide flights into space on a suborbital spacecraft, and represents another important endorsement of the value of regular commercial space access for a wide range of science and educational applications.

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Are you getting married?

Do you want something utterly UNIQUE to celebrate your marriage?

Take part in the Contest organized by SpaceWed and win a set of Space Wedding Rings.

GRAND PRIZE – ONE SET OF GENUINE 18K GOLD
SPACE WEDDING RINGS
VALUED AT $17,000

Entering is easy – all you have to do is tell us why you want to win.

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Armadillo Aerospace has issued a statement clarifying remarks made by John Carmack last week:

A recent comment made by Armadillo Aerospace’s President and CTO, John Carmack, at Quakecon 2011 has been misconstrued and we need to correct a widespread misconception. John indicated that he was not “… accepting any more contract work, because he doesn’t want to get trapped as a small company that does government work.”

John’s fear, and justifiably so, is that our small team becomes distracted from the primary goal of developing space capable vehicles initially for scientific payloads but also as a foundation for subsequent manned space capable vehicles for both the scientific and “space tourism” markets. As many are aware, Armadillo has a very small team by comparison with others in this industry and the government work undertaken to-date has been somewhat of a “time sponge” that we can ill afford.

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Washington, D.C., Tuesday, August 9, 2011 (CSF PR) – The Commercial Spaceflight Federation is pleased to congratulate member companies Armadillo Aerospace, Masten Space Systems, Virgin Galactic, and XCOR Aerospace for winning the latest round of contracts today to integrate and fly payloads to space as part of NASA’s Commercial Reusable Suborbital Research (CRuSR) program.  The CRuSR program is part of NASA’s Space Technology Program under the leadership of NASA’s Chief Technologist, Dr. Bobby Braun.

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How does one get from working on an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) for the U.S. military to nearly doubling the fuel efficiency of a Prius?

Just ask Greg Mungas. He and his team at Firestar Technologies, LLC have done precisely that, putting the small Mojave-based aerospace company into a potentially lucrative business that could change the way that millions of people drive.

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This week in The Space Review…. An enduring value proposition for NASA human spaceflight (part 1) The end of the shuttle program has created uncertainty about NASA’s long-term future. In the first part of her analysis of the situation, Mary Lynne Dittmar says the lack of a compelling and enduring value proposition for human spaceflight is at the root of this problem. Still eyeing the lunar prize It’s been nearly […]

A P3 Navy aircraft with Hangar One at NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California. (Copyright 2009: Douglas Messier)

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. (NASA PR) – NASA and the Swedish National Space Board (SNSB) are collaborating to develop powerful low-cost satellites for advanced space missions.

Miniaturization is a recent trend in space exploration, as smaller and smaller spacecraft demonstrate that they can do things that once required enormous‹and expensive‹spacecraft. NASA is interested in determining the feasibility of small spacecraft doing the work of large ones, either by themselves or in spacecraft constellations.

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SpaceShipTwo glides downward on its first test flight. (Photo: Mark Greenberg)

WASHINGTON (NASA PR) — NASA has selected seven companies to integrate and fly technology payloads on commercial suborbital reusable platforms that carry payloads near the boundary of space. The selected companies are:

— Armadillo Aerospace, Heath, Texas
— Near Space Corp., Tillamook, Ore.
— Masten Space Systems, Mojave, Calif.
— Up Aerospace Inc., Highlands Ranch, Colo.
— Virgin Galactic, Mojave, Calif.
— Whittinghill Aerospace LLC, Camarillo, Calif.
— XCOR, Mojave, Calif.

As part of NASA’s Flight Opportunities Program, each successful vendor will receive an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity contract. These two-year contracts, worth a combined total of $10 million, will allow NASA to draw from a pool of commercial space companies to deliver payload integration and flight services. The flights will carry a variety of payloads to help meet the agency’s research and technology needs.

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DARPA PR — How do you learn to fly at 13,000 miles per hour—a speed at which it would take less than 12 minutes to get from New York to Los Angeles? Or, how do you know whether a vehicle can maintain a long-duration flight while experiencing temperatures in excess of 3,500 degrees Fahrenheit—hotter than a blast furnace that can melt steel? And if you can fly, and withstand the extreme heat, how do you know if the vehicle can be controlled as it rips apart the air? How? You try it.

DARPA’s second flight test of the Falcon Hypersonic Technology Vehicle 2 is scheduled to launch Wednesday. The flight window is between 7:00am – 1:00 pm PDT from Vandenberg AFB, Calif., aboard an Air Force Minotaur IV rocket.

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Sometime during the next 3 years, a rocket will sit on a launch pad in Florida or elsewhere in the world containing a lunar lander and rover built to win the Google Lunar X Prize. Only, the team launching it might no longer be in the competition.

Why would a team turn down a minimum of $20 million in prize money for a mission that costs many times that amount?

That’s an excellent question. And a fascinating tale. Read on.

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