NASA PRESS RELEASE

NASA is partnering with the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory to develop a technology roadmap for the commercial reusable launch vehicle, or RLV, industry.

“NASA is committed to stimulating the emerging commercial reusable launch vehicle industry,” said Lori Garver, deputy administrator at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “There is a natural evolutionary path from today’s emerging commercial suborbital RLV industry to growing and developing the capability to provide low-cost, frequent and reliable access to low Earth orbit. One part of our plan is to partner with other federal agencies to develop a consensus roadmap of the commercial RLV industry’s long-range technology needs.”

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IT Could Make Difference in Korean Space Tech
Korea Times

South Korea, as a late starter in the global space competition, must seek to leverage its strength in information and communication technology to create a niche, according to the head of a leading space industry organization.

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ATK PRESS RELEASE

Alliant Techsystems (NYSE: ATK – News), broke ground yesterday on a 25,000 square foot expansion of the company’s facility in Goleta, California. The expanded operations will support NASA’s human space flight program, as well as global weather satellites and possible future spacecraft missions.

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Paul Spudis, Senior Staff Scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, doesn’t think much of the recently concluded LCROSS mission. In a essay titled, “LCROSS: Mission to HYPErspace,” he outlines its scientific shortcomings: (more…)

Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport on Wallops Island, Virginia

Meeting to focus on long-term Wallops vision
Delmarvanow.com

A diverse group of politicians, professors and aerospace industry representatives is meeting Wednesday in Richmond to formulate a long-term vision for Wallops’ space complex.

A draft version of that vision includes the idea that it will become “the aerospace provider of choice for the Northeast region.”

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Some interesting news out of the 60th International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon:

South Korea is considering joining international programs aimed at exploring the moon, as part of efforts to build up the country’s space development capabilities, President Lee Myung-bak said Monday.

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NMSA PRESS RELEASE

New Mexico Spaceport Authority (NMSA) officials announced a successful launch of a test flight vehicle for Lockheed Martin by UP Aerospace from Spaceport America on Saturday, October 10. The brief test flight was a non-public, unpublished event at the request of Lockheed Martin, who is testing proprietary advanced launch technologies.

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WhiteKnightTwo

Virgin Galactic adds satellite launches to space tourism
NewScientist

The company, which mooted the idea in February, has established a division that will both develop a launch rocket and seek satellite customers for it. Satellite propulsion and launch expert Adam Baker from Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL) in Guildford, UK, has been hired to run Virgin’s satellite venture. He has previously overseen the design and launch of many microsatellites at SSTL, including its Disaster Monitoring Constellation.

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LCROSS impact crater as viewed with near infrared and ultra violet spectrometers.

Surrounded by medical personnel, seated from left to right are spaceflight participant Guy Laliberte, Expedition 20 Commander Gennady Padalka and Expedition 20 Flight Engineer Michael Barratt.They had landed minutes before at 12:32 a.m. EDT aboard the Soyuz capsule near the town of Arkalyk, Kazakhstan, on Sunday, Oct. 11, 2009.

Guy Laliberte will assess global impact of his two-hour space extravaganza
The Canadian Press

Back from his trip in space, Circus magnate Guy Laliberte said Sunday he’ll soon be ready to follow up on the outcome of the two-hour extravaganza of poetry, science and dance that he orchestrated from orbit.

“As you know, I was on a personal mission which was to create an event to talk about the situation of water in the world,” he said in an interview broadcast Sunday on NASA TV.

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Monday, Oct. 12, 2009; 2-3:30 PM PDT: Don Lincoln, author of “The Quantum Frontier: The Large Hadron Collider.” Tuesday, Oct. 13, 2009, 7-8:30 PM PDT: OPEN LINES. Friday, October 16, 2009, 9:30-11:30 AM PDT : Dr. Jim Logan, a veteran aerospace medicine doctor with a 19 year career at NASA. Sunday, October 18, 2009, 12-1:30 PM PDT: Ralph Nansen, author of the new Apogee book, “Energy Crisis: Solution From Space.” […]

Blasted into space from a giant air gun
NewScientist

When Jules Verne wrote about a gigantic gun that could be used to launch people into space in the 19th century, no one expected it to become a reality. Now physicist John Hunter has outlined the design of such a gun that he says could slash the cost of putting cargo into orbit.

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