Category: Commercial
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Weekly Space Blog 12/7
SpaceX third try a success Following two delays because of technical issues during countdown SpaceX successfully launched the SES-8 spacecraft on Tuesday. This was a critical mission for SpaceX as it was there first to GTO and also the first to require a re-light of the second stage engine to ensure the spacecraft arrived at…
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Weekly Space Blog 11/16
Beyond Earth: Removing the Barriers to Deep Space Exploration round table This week NASA’s Bill Gerstenmaier moderated a panel discussion to consider the challenges facing the U.S. space exploration program. Panelists include: • Julie Van Kleeck, Vice President, Space Programs, Aerojet Rocketdyne • Charlie Precourt, Vice President & General Manager, ATK Space Launch Division •…
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Weekly Space Blog 11/9
India’s first Mars Orbiter Mangalyaan launched successfully This week India successfully launched their first Mars Orbiter called Mangalyaan, the spacecraft was launched by a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket (PSLV) from India’s launch site, Satish Dhawan Space Center. If all goes well the spacecraft is due to arrive in Sept 2014 and will make India only the fourth nation…
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Weekly Space Blog 11/2
We are back after a rather long delay due to upgrading to Windows 8.1 and losing everything that was installed on the machine :(… Cygnus completes COTS demo mission The Orbital Sciences Cygnus spacecraft completed it’s final test mission under the C.O.T.S program with a fiery end during re-entry to earth’s atmosphere. Following a week…
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Weekly Space Blog 10/12
With the shutdown continuing there isn’t much news from NASA this week LADEE enters lunar orbit Dispite the government shutdown the recently launched LADEE spacecraft entered into orbit around the moon this week. The spacecraft launched last month has been traveling to the moon since it launch and after a series of burns to refine…
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Weekly Space Blog 10/5
This week has been another busy week in space. Cygnus berths to station Following a week delay, due to a data glitch, Orbital Sciences Cygnus spacecraft successfully berthed with the International Space Station last Sunday. See my previous post here. Falcon 9 v1.1 Successfully Launched On Sunday SpaceX successfully launched there modified Falcon 9 rocket. …
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US Commercial Space 2 for 2 today
Following on from the Cygnus berthing to the space station this morning SpaceX successfully launched its modified Falcon 9 rocket this afternoon in the process achieving several firsts for the company. The launch which came exactly five years after their first successful Falcon 1 launch was the first from their Vandenburg launch pad, the first…
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And then there were two
With the arrival of the Cygnus spacecraft at the International Space Station the US now has two commercial suppliers to deliver cargo to the station. Since the retirement of the shuttle and before SpaceX and Orbital Sciences the US was reliant on International Partners Russia, ESA and Japan to deliver cargo. There are now five…
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Weekly Space Blog 9/28
This week in space… Soyuz Launched to ISS This week saw another Soyuz launch to the space station on board the Soyuz TMA-10M were Russian Cosmonaut’s Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy as well as NASA Astronaut Michael Hopkins. Following a flawless countdown the three launched at 4:58:50 pm EDT, eight minutes later they were in…
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Weekly Space Blog 9/21
Another amazing week in space… Cygnus Successfully Launched With the exception of one issue with the fuel system that caused a slight delay in the launch time Orbital successfully launched there Antares Rocket with the Cygnus spacecraft. The Cygnus is currently on route to the International Space Station and once a number of demonstration steps…