MOSCOW (Roscosmos PR) — Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky, film director Klim Shipenko and actress Yulia Peresild returned to Earth on October 17, 2021 on the “Yu.A. Gagarin” (Soyuz MS-18). Now they are undergoing post-flight rehabilitation at the Cosmonaut Training Center, where one of the sites for an online press conference was organized.

WASHINGTON (NASA PR) — NASA released a request for information from American industry capable of providing safe, reliable, and cost-effective human space transportation services to and from the International Space Station to ensure a continuous human presence aboard the microgravity laboratory.

Two microphones aboard the six-wheeled spacecraft add a new dimension to the way scientists and engineers explore the Red Planet.

PASADENA, Calif. (NASA PR) — Thanks to two microphones aboard NASA’s Perseverance rover, the mission has recorded nearly five hours of Martian wind gusts, rover wheels crunching over gravel, and motors whirring as the spacecraft moves its arm. These sounds allow scientists and engineers to experience the Red Planet in new ways – and everyone is invited to listen in.

HELSINKI, October 20, 2021 (ICEYE PR) – ICEYE, a leader in persistent monitoring and provider of flood hazard data today announced a partnership with Descartes Underwriting, the largest independent parametric-specialized firm. The collaboration will push the frontier of flood risk modelling and parametric insurance by combining Descartes’ ability to incorporate state-of-the-art technology into its parametric insurance product design with ICEYE’s innovative synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) flood data and monitoring capabilities. Leveraging ICEYE’s multi-source flood insights, Descartes will be able to establish precise parametric triggers for a larger global client-base and make swift claims payment based on exact client locations within a flood event.

Floods rank among the most costly and recurrent natural hazards across all regions of the world. Compounded by climate change, flood risk has also proven increasingly challenging to model and insure. Accurate assessment and data coverage for areas with granular elevation changes, or rapidly expanding impervious surfaces, pose technical hurdles for insurers. Data loss and inaccuracies during flood events, due to the inherent vulnerabilities of physical flood gauges and sensors, can also prove especially challenging for insurance pricing and claims processing. The partnership between Descartes Underwriting and ICEYE seeks to address these pain points.

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. (NASA PR) — Social media users are invited to take part in another global virtual NASA Social for NASA’s SpaceX Crew-3 mission set to launch on Oct. 31 at 2:21 a.m. ET, now cohosted along with our partners at European Space Agency (ESA). This is the third crew rotation flight with astronauts on the Crew Dragon spacecraft as part of the Commercial Crew Program.

TORONTO, October 18th, 2021 (Kepler Communications PR) — Kepler Communications announced today that ÆTHER, Kepler’s recently announced solution for in-space connectivity, is continuing to build momentum and has been validated with a contract win with the European Space Agency (ESA).  The value of the contract, which will see the delivery of hardware terminals capable of connecting other space assets to Kepler’s LEO communication network, is €500,000 [CAD $717,297/USD $582,725].  This contract was awarded under a programme of and funded by the European Space Agency.

Critical Asia Pacific Location Enhances Timeliness and Coverage in the Southern Hemisphere

MENLO PARK, Calif., October 19, 2021 (LeoLabs PR) — LeoLabs, Inc., the world’s leading commercial provider of Space Domain Awareness (SDA) and Space Traffic Management (STM) services for low Earth Orbit, today announced Australia as the site for its next space radar. The West Australian Space Radar represents a critical addition to LeoLabs growing global constellation of S-band, phased-array sensors. When completed in 2022, it will expand LeoLabs’ total number of radar sites to six, and total number of space radars to ten.

• The mission is the latest in Rocket Lab’s program to make Electron the first reusable orbital launch vehicle dedicated to small satellites.
• After splashing down in the ocean, Electron’s first stage will be recovered by ship and transported back to Rocket Lab’s production complex for analysis.
• For the first time, a helicopter will track and observe Electron’s descent in preparation for future missions which aim to use helicopters to intercept and capture returning rocket boosters mid-air as they return to Earth under parachute.

Long Beach, California. 19 October 2021 (Rocket Lab PR) – Rocket Lab USA, Inc (“Rocket Lab” or the “Company”) (Nasdaq: RKLB) has today revealed it will attempt a controlled ocean splashdown and recovery of the first stage of an Electron rocket during the company’s next launch in November. The mission will be Rocket Lab’s third ocean recovery of an Electron stage; however, it will be the first time a helicopter will be stationed in the recovery zone around 200 nautical miles offshore to track and visually observe a descending stage in preparation for future aerial capture attempts. The helicopter will not attempt a mid-air capture for this mission but will test communications and tracking to refine the concept of operations (CONOPS) for future Electron aerial capture.

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

Boeing said on Tuesday that it will delay the second uncrewed flight test of its Starliner spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS) until sometime in the first half of next year due to ongoing problems with stuck oxidizer valves on the vehicle. A crewed flight test would follow about six months later, with the first commercial mission carrying NASA astronauts in 2023.

NASA, along with the European Space Agency, is developing a campaign to return the Martian samples to Earth.

GREENBELT, Md. (NASA PR) — On Sept. 1, NASA’s Perseverance rover unfurled its arm, placed a drill bit at the Martian surface, and drilled about 2 inches, or 6 centimeters, down to extract a rock core. The rover later sealed the rock core in its tube. This historic event marked the first time a spacecraft packed up a rock sample from another planet that could be returned to Earth by future spacecraft.

by Douglas Messier
Managing Editor

A new report recommends “immediate, well-funded, comprehensive, and collaborative work” to implement a series of measures to mitigate the negative impacts that large satellite constellations on ground-based astronomy.

The report, whose executive summary was published last week, includes 10 recommendations for observatories and constellation operators that include the development of software to identify and mask satellite trails and designs changes to lessen the reflectivity of satellites. (The full list of recommendations are below.)

• Confirms company’s leadership in weather satellite technology
• Study will accelerate production of advance satellite sensors for severe storm tracking
• Follows NOAA’s recent imager design study award

MELBOURNE, Fla. (L3Harris Technologies PR) — NASA has selected L3Harris Technologies (NYSE:LHX) to conduct a second advanced study to significantly improve the accuracy and timeliness of U.S. weather forecasting.