You really want to take the time to read this. It is an inexpressibly cool story, made even more so by the knowledge that a) it is true, and b) the author is writing it floating in zero gravity far above the Earth on the International Space Station. As I … Continue reading
Category Archives: Orbital
Bigelow announces 3-crewmember “Sundancer” space station to launch in 2010
Blogging from the AIAA Space conference, Rand Simberg of Transterrestrial Musings reports: Bigelow announced at lunch that he will be putting up a three-person space station in late 2009 or early 2010, about fifty percent bigger than an ISS module. He is putting up a destination in hopes that the … Continue reading
Ansari, Expedition-14 crew arrive at the International Space Station
Anousheh Ansari, X-Prize backer and private astronaut, has arrived at the ISS, along with the station’s new crew. In downlink video of the hatch opening, she could be seen smiling broadly, and wearing an X-Prize cap. You can read about her adventures in near-real time: she is blogging from the … Continue reading
Tourist Schmourist
Congratulations to Anousheh Ansari, who has just realised her lifelong dream of travel into space. She has worked hard, trained hard, accepted real risk, and conducted herself professionally to get there. And in the mainstream media, she’s the first ‘female space tourist’. Anousheh is no more a ‘space tourist’ than … Continue reading
New SpaceX update available
(via Clark at HobbySpace RLV and Space Transport News) Elon Musk has posted a new update at the SpaceX website. There’s plenty to read, including some information about the company’s recent COTS win, pictures of the Falcon-9 with a Dragon crew capsule – showing, for the first time, a launch … Continue reading
Anousheh Ansari to replace Daisuke Enomoto as next space tourist to ISS
It looks like X-Prize sponsor Anousheh Ansari is poised to become the first paying female space tourist. (We shouldn’t forget Helen Sharman, though – she almost qualifies). Ansari was the backup crewmember for Japanese businessman Daisuke Enomoto, who was recently disqualified from the next Soyuz flight to the International Space … Continue reading
NASA picks SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler for COTS
Congratulations to SpaceX and Rocketplane Kistler for successfully winning funded Space Act Agreement contracts with NASA for the demonstration of cargo delivery to the International Space Station. Under the agreements announced at a NASA press conference late on Friday afternoon, Rocketplane Kistler could receive up to $207 million, and SpaceX … Continue reading
NASA to announce COTS winners on Friday
NASA will hold a press conference on Friday to announce the winners of the Commercial Orbital Transportation Systems contracts. The conference will be held at 4pm EDT on Friday the 18th, and will be broadcast live on NASA TV. The six finalist companies are SpaceHab, Andrews Space, Space Exploration Technologies … Continue reading
Rocketplane Kistler teaming with Orbital Sciences Corportation
Orbital Sciences Corporation has joined forces with the Rocketplane Kistler team, to support them in their COTS bid. Read about it on the Rocketplane website. The Rocketplane Kistler guys are so busy with the COTS work, it’s starting to impact their timeframe for the development of the suborbital Rocketplane XP. … Continue reading
Hi-res pictures from Genesis 1
There are several hi-res pictures of the interior of Genesis 1 available now over at the Bigelow Aerospace website. It’s good stuff. The fuzzed out parts are logos that they haven’t yet received permission to display. On that theme, Alan Boyle over at Cosmic Log has a good piece entitled … Continue reading
The Space Frontier Foundation has issues with Project Orion (updated)
According to this report from Leonard David at Space.com, the Space Frontier Foundation has just released a fairly comprehensive white paper about NASA’s efforts to implement the vision for space exploration (now named – still unofficially at this point – Project Orion). They’re not too happy with it.
Space Adventures now offering a “Space Walk” option
On July 21st, Space Adventures Ltd., announced a feature to its line of services. These are the folks who have arranged for three tourists to visit the international space station, and now you can add a space walk to your tourist package. The current duration of a Space Adventures’ orbital … Continue reading
Awww nuts!! A corroded nut caused Falcon 1 launch failure
According to this AP story, the review board into the Falcon 1 failure has announced its findings. Despite earlier speculation that the problem was a procedural error, this report identifies the cause as a corroded nut. The review determined that “the only plausible cause” of the fire was a corroded … Continue reading
Space shuttle’s happy return
Congratulations to the STS-121 crew for a very successful mission and a safe return. In NASA’s launch schedule August 28th is the date set for the next shuttle launch. Flying Space Shuttle Atlantis, STS-115 crew will deliver a truss and other key components during the Space Shuttle Program’s 19th mission … Continue reading
Genesis 1 photo available
The graphic above is an artist’s concept of the Genesis 1 module after deployment. Image Credit: Bigelow Aerospace.  This image (Available on Bigelow Aerospace’s website) shows the module, inflated and drifting along in low Earth orbit. I took the liberty of rotating the image 90 degrees clock-wise, for better … Continue reading
A nominal flight day for Genesis I
It’s one thing to have your prototype space module lofted to low earth orbit, it’s quite another to have it function in the space environment, under control from the ground, and with all systems performing as predicted. So far so good for Genesis I, as this update from Bigelow Aerospace … Continue reading
New Space is in space! Bigelow Aerospace’s Genesis I prototype is in orbit and communicating with mission control
Congratulations to the team at Bigelow Aerospace, who have successfully orbited their first prototype space habitat today. As far as I am aware, this makes them the first New Space company with a satellite in orbit. May it be the first of a great many. From the BA website: BREAKING … Continue reading
SpaceX provides update on activites
Elon posted a brief update on his company’s website not only promising some interesting data but covering news worthy developments on several fronts. July 6, 2006 Update My apologies for the long delay in providing an update. Between the Falcon 1 return to flight, Falcon 9 development and the NASA … Continue reading
STS-121 gains “Fourth of July” launch date
The Fourth of July in the United States, is always a time for picnics, parades and fireworks. Now we can add shuttle launches to that mix. Sunday’s scheduled launch of STS-121 was scrubbed for the second time in as many days. The next launch attempt for Discovery’s STS-121 mission to … Continue reading
Ariane 5 launches record payload
Crowing slightly, Arianespace announced today the successful launch of its Ariane 5 rocket and the subsequent deployment of two satellites. The payload of two communications satellites, (one from Mexico and the other from Thailand) made for a combined weight of 8,200 kg. Despite the rainy conditions for today’s liftoff, Ariane … Continue reading
COTS finalists picked
NASA hasn’t announced anything formally yet, but according to Alan Boyle and Michael Belfiore, the finalists for the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services contracts have been notified that they have made the cut. They are: Andrews Space Rocketplane Kistler SpaceDev Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) SpaceHab Transformational Space Corporation (t/Space)
First flight test nears for inflatable space module
They say it’s the quiet ones that you need to watch. Well, Bigelow Aerospace has always been fairly low-key with their publicity, giving a favorable impression of a New Space company too busy summoning the future to spend much effort on talking about it. While they have made no secret … Continue reading
This week at The Space Review
The latest batch of articles is out at the Space Review, and once again Jeff Foust has assembled a fine collection of thoughtful commentary. Before we get to that, I have to add my voice to the others who have marvelled recently at the one-man space publishing phenomenon that is … Continue reading
News “private citizen” astronaut announced
In a press release yesterday Space Adventures announced; Space Adventures, Ltd., the world’s leading space-experiences company, announced today that Charles Simonyi, Ph.D. has signed a contract for a future orbital spaceflight. This is the same company that brought about the visits to the International Space Station (ISS) by private citizens, … Continue reading
Space access topic of the day on The Space Show
Our friend David Livingston will be hosting a round-table discussion which will include the topics of rockets, engineering, and cost effective space access on his Radio/Podcast program, The Space Show. The LIVE broadcast will take place Sunday, April 9. 2006, from noon-1:30PM PDT (yeah, that pesky daylight savings time has … Continue reading