Space Florida's Launch Complex 36

Aviation Week has a bit more on Bigelow Aerospace’s pitch to Florida to become the main launch complex for the company’s commercial space stations:

One of the keys to Bigelow’s success is an exemption from International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) restrictions. “Our aerospace company is the only aerospace company in the United States that is ITAR-exempt. That was not easy. We achieved that a while back,” [Robert] Bigelow told about 150 community leaders and journalists gathered to hear his pitch for the Space Coast. The event was organized by Space Florida, a state-backed agency.

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NASA MISSION UPDATE

NASA astronaut Mark Kelly will resume training as commander of the STS-134 space shuttle mission on Monday, Feb. 7. With the exception of some proficiency training, Kelly has been on personal leave since Jan. 8 to care for his wife, congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, who was critically wounded in a Tucson, Ariz. shooting.

“I am looking forward to rejoining my STS-134 crew members and finishing our training for the mission,” Kelly said. “We have been preparing for more than 18 months, and we will be ready to deliver the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) to the International Space Station and complete the other objectives of the flight. I appreciate the confidence that my NASA management has in me and the rest of my space shuttle crew.”

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Courtney Stadd

Former NASA Official Bound for W. Va. Prison
Space News

Former NASA chief of staff Courtney Stadd is due to report Feb. 4 to a federal correctional institute in Morgantown, W.V., to begin serving a 41-month sentence for a conspiracy conviction.

Stadd, 55, of Bethesda, Md., was convicted in federal court last August and sentenced in November for conspiring with Liam Sarsfield, then NASA’s deputy engineer of programs, to steer money to his consulting firm and submitting false invoices. Sarsfield was separately convicted on a conflict of interest charge and sentenced last September to three years probation….

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International Space Station

NASA PROGRAM UPDATE

The International Space Station partner agencies met Thursday, Feb. 3, by video conference to discuss coordinating the increased use of the space station as a research laboratory. The agencies want to continue using the station as a test-bed for exploration and find innovative ways to reduce costs while increasing use.

The Multilateral Coordination Board (MCB) meeting included senior representatives from NASA; the Canadian Space Agency (CSA); the European Space Agency (ESA); the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos); and the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). As the senior management board, the MCB meets periodically to ensure coordination of station operations and activities among the partners.

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Pad OA at Wallops Island. (Credit: Orbital Sciences Corporation)

Jack Kennedy reports that a bill that direct tax revenues from Virginia companies engaged in commercial human spaceflights or commercial spaceflight training to the Virginia Commercial Space Flight Authority has been reported out of the Senate Finance Committee.

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Former New Mexico Spaceport Authority Executive Director Rick Homans has fired back at Gov. Susana Martinez’s claim that he was uncooperative with her transition team:

In your Sunday story, Governor Martinez declares that the Board of the New Mexico Spaceport Authority and me, its Executive Director, withheld information from her and the transition team.

This allegation is wholly untruthful.
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Space shuttle Atlantis lands on runway 33 at NASA Kennedy Space Center's Shuttle Landing Facility concluding the STS-129 mission. Photo credit: NASA Jack Pfaller

Some interesting news from Rob Coppinger:

NASA is considering a plan to keep the space shuttle Endeavour in flight-like condition after its last scheduled mission, a move that could lead to its transformation into a privatized spaceship rather than a museum piece.

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Bigelow Aerospace's planned Sundancer space module

CAPE CANAVERAL, FL (February 3, 2011) – Yesterday, Space Florida President Frank DiBello and Robert Bigelow, president of Bigelow Aerospace, signed a Memorandum of Understanding, agreeing to work together to pursue and identify foreign and domestic companies that could benefit from utilization of Bigelow’s expandable, orbital space complexes.

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A Boeing CST-100 crew module docks at a Bigelow Aerospace space station. (Credit: Boeing)

A bit more on the Bigelow-Space Florida MOU, which was signed at an event yesterday at Cape Canaveral. It looks as if the actual cooperative venture is relatively modest in the near term, but potentially quite lucrative in the long run — providing state officials play their cards right and ante up.

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Here’s some hair-raising news on the space weapons/debris front:

The United States threatened to take military action against China during a secret “star wars” arms race within the past few years, according to leaked documents obtained by The Daily Telegraph.

The two nuclear superpowers both shot down their own satellites using sophisticated missiles in separate show of strength, the files suggest.

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Mars500 crewmembers testing the Russian Orlan suits before their mission started in early June 2010. Credits: IBMP/ Oleg Voloshin

Mars500 ‘arrives’ in orbit around Mars
ESA Press Release
2 February 2011

The first full-duration simulation of a manned voyage to Mars has reached a major milestone: the ‘spacecraft’ yesterday ‘arrived’ at Mars after 244 days of virtual interplanetary flight. Three crewmembers will ‘land’ on Mars on 12 February and make three sorties onto simulated martian terrain.

Mars500, a pioneering international study of the complex psychological and technical issues that must be tackled for long spaceflights, has been running for more than eight months in hermetically sealed modules imitating a Mars spacecraft at the Institute of Biomedical Problems (IBMP) in Moscow.

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The UK space industry continues to excel in satellite communications and remote sensing technologies, with experts expecting strong growth in the years ahead. However, the nation is facing two major problems: a shortage of skilled personnel for its commercial efforts, and a flat budget and a slow start for the new United Kingdom Space Agency (USKA).

The Engineer takes a look at some of the positives:

However, according to Prof Martin Sweeting, head of space science at Surrey University and chairman of small satellite pioneer Surrey Satellites, the sector is growing faster than most other parts of the UK’s economy. ‘Studies in the UK now show that the space sector is one of the highest value-adding economic sectors,’ he said.

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