This week on The Space Show with David Livingston: Monday, May 31, 2010, 2-3:30 PM PDT: We welcome Diane Murphy to talk about the Rocket Racing League. CLASSROOM: Tuesday, June 1, 2010, 7- 8:30 PM PDT: The Space Show Classroom Lesson 9 features Dr. Henry Hertzfeld about civil, government, private, and foreign launch systems, rockets, and more. Co-hosted with Dr. Jim Logan and Dr. John Jurist. Friday, June 4,, 2010, […]
Europe's Vega launcher, set to lift-off from Kourou in 2011.
By next year, Europe will be able to launch not one but three rockets — Ariane 5, Soyuz and Vega — from its spaceport in French Guiana. It will also bear the increased costs of building, maintaining and operating such a capability, Space News reports:
Confronting a budget crisis that likely will take years to resolve, European governments have begun debating how to manage the increased operating costs associated with three separate launch vehicles and launch installations at Europe’s spaceport in French Guiana.
Space News has more evidence of the damage that restrictive export laws are having on U.S. high technology companies:
The European Space Agency (ESA) is promoting the creation of European expertise in certain propulsion technologies to avoid technology-transfer roadblocks associated with U.S. components even if the U.S. hardware is substantially less expensive, ESA officials said.
Season 1 Ep. 19 — Atlantis home – perhaps permanently, Neil Armstrong speaks out, Final preps for Falcon 9 – and Elon Musk weighs in on Armstrong’s position, Delta IV and Ariane 5 aloft, black holes merge with a bang, and news from Mars’ North Pole.
Excerpts from: FAA 2010 Commercial Space Transportation Forecasts
Orbital Facilities Assembly and Service Launch Demand Summary
Demand for launch OFAS payloads will begin during the forecast period with an average annual launch rate of four launches. Delays in development of OFAS launch services could push uptake further into the future. Alternatively, around 2014, developed of a commercial crew transfer vehicle could lead to an increasing launch rate. Figure 21 provides a representation of OFAS launch history and forecast demand.
The FAA’s newly released 2010 Commercial Space Transportation Forecasts report indicates that Bigelow Aerospace’s two planned Sundancer space stations would generate substantial demand for commercial launch services over the next 10 years.
These new stations could create significant additional demand for commercial launches: in excess of 150 launches through 2020 according to company projections.
With the initial launch of station modules in 2014, that would amount to an average of more than 20 launches annually over a seven year period. The number of launches would ramp up during the later years as both the Sundancer 1 and 2 stations became operational.
Indian Rockets To Soon Use Atmospheric Oxygen As Fuel IANS In an attempt to make its rockets lighter and carry heavier satellites, the Indian space agency is planning to flight test by the end of this year its own air-breathing engine that will use atmospheric oxygen as fuel. Air-breathing engines use atmospheric oxygen and burn it with the stored on-board fuel to generate the onward thrust. Conventional rockets carry both […]
NZ engineers work on space plane
The Press
Canterbury University’s role in international space exploration has been boosted by three academics helping to develop the next generation of space vehicles.
Mechanical engineering department associate professor Susan Krumdieck will be a lead investigator working on high-temperature materials for the next hypersonic vehicle, which will travel at up to 15 times the speed of sound and replace the space shuttle.
ESA PRESS RELEASE
Investors looking for promising opportunities in space spin-offs used ESA’s Investment Forum in Stuttgart, Germany, this month to meet 28 young entrepreneurial companies looking for financing to start their businesses.
Organised by ESA’s Technology Transfer Programme Office (TTPO) and managed by Europe Unlimited, this was the fourth Forum. Most of the companies were from the four ESA Business Incubation Centres in the Netherlands, Germany and Italy.
India and Russia will begin testing a hypersonic version of the BrahMos cruise missile by the middle of the decade, according to BrahMos Aerospace CEO and Managing Director Dr. A Sivathanu Pillai.
Masten Space Systems founder Dave Masten gave an update on his company’s progress at ISDC yesterday. Jeff Foust (@jeff_foust) Tweeted the following: Masten: we’re in really good financial shape, have a lot of cash in the bank. Our sales pipeline is full. Dave Masten on #isdc entrepreneurial panel: excited about NASA’s new direction. We see a lot of opportunities for us. Masten: working now on AeroXoie, their LLC Lvl 2 […]
Delivering ISDC’s luncheon speech on Friday, XCOR CEO and Augustine Committee member Jeff Greason expressed his exasperation over the policy debate going on in Congress, his hope that Congress would kill an unaffordable Constellation program, and gave some prescriptions for how the United States should move ahead in exploring the cosmos.
A compilation of Tweets from Jeff Foust (@jeff_foust) and the FAA’s Ken Davidian (@cswicki):
Augustine Committee & Congressional Debate
- Greason, talking about Augustine Cmte: to my surprise some people paid attention to the report this time. (@jeff_foust)
- Greason: utterly dismayed by space policy debate so far. Need discussion based on facts, but that is not happening in Congress. (@jeff_foust)
- The discussion to date is “baby wants his rattle back.” The budget for Constellation was just made up. (@cswiki)