| | JSC TODAY CATEGORIES - Headlines
- Ellen Ochoa in PBS Documentary Tonight
- SpaceX-4 Meets ISS This Morning - Watch it Live
- Orion Monthly Trivia Question
- Correction: Flight Controllers/Instructors Wanted - Organizations/Social
- Today: Recovery Awareness Month
- JSC HSI ERG September 2014 Meeting
- Calling All Foodies and Travel Enthusiasts - Jobs and Training
- JSC Exec on Loan to the Houston Technology Center
- Engineer to Entrepreneur
- NESC and NEN Webcast Tomorrow - Community
- 2014 Humans in Space Art Video Challenge Now Open
- Texas High School Juniors Needed |  |
| Headlines - Ellen Ochoa in PBS Documentary Tonight
From the time of its birth, the baby boomer generation (1946-1964) has significantly and uniquely changed our world. This year, 2014, marks an important shift in American culture as the last boomers turn 50. American Masters: The Boomer List, premieres nationwide today, Sept. 23, from 8 to 9:30 p.m. CDT on PBS (check local listings). This documentary, which features our own JSC Director Ellen Ochoa representing the year 1958, tells the story of this influential generation through the lives of 19 iconic boomers—one born each year of the baby boom. Intimate interviews focus on these individuals' exceptional achievements, struggles and identities, sharing the experiences of these extraordinary Americans and the history they lived through and often created. Subjects illuminate key movements and changes that shaped the world during the baby boom years, discussing the environment; arts and entertainment; science; civil, LGBT and women's rights; law; politics; public service; sports; the military; technology and media. JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x35111
[top] - SpaceX-4 Meets ISS This Morning - Watch it Live
The fourth SpaceX cargo mission is underway to the International Space Station (ISS) under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services The company's Falcon 9 rocket, carrying its Dragon cargo spacecraft loaded with more than 5,000 pounds of scientific experiments and supplies, will arrive at station this morning. NASA TV will provide live coverage today, Sept. 23, of the arrival of the Dragon cargo ship to the space station. Grapple and berthing coverage will begin at 4 a.m. CDT, with grapple at 6:04 a.m. Berthing coverage begins at 8 a.m., with the start of installation at 8:15 a.m. First-time users will need to install the EZTV Monitor and Player client applications: - For those WITH admin rights (Elevated Privileges), you'll be prompted to download and install the clients when you first visit the IPTV website
- For those WITHOUT admin rights (Elevated Privileges), you can download the EZTV client applications from the ACES Software Refresh Portal (SRP)
If you are having problems viewing the video using these systems, contact the Information Resources Directorate Customer Support Center at x46367 or visit the FAQ site. Event Date: Tuesday, September 23, 2014 Event Start Time:4:00 AM Event End Time:10:00 AM
Event Location: NASA TV
Add to Calendar
JSC External Relations, Office of Communications and Public Affairs x35111
[top] - Orion Monthly Trivia Question
It's time to test your knowledge of the Orion spacecraft! Answer the trivia question correctly, and you are automatically entered into the drawing for a prize. The prize winner will be announced in JSC Today Thursday, Sept. 25. Email your answers to JSC's Orion Outreach mailbox. September Trivia Question: How long (in hours) will Orion's first mission, Exploration Flight Test-1, last from launch to splashdown? Join the monthly trivia and discover more about Orion! Visit NASA's Orion page to read and learn more about the spacecraft. - Correction: Flight Controllers/Instructors Wanted
Test Subject Screening (TSS) is seeking flight controllers AND flight instructors (including those in training flow) to evaluate a self-guided, multimedia stress management and resilience training computer program called SMART-OP, in comparison to watching videos and reading information on stress management. Volunteers will: - Complete one information/consent session (via telephone - 10 minutes)
- Attend two assessments (pre and post 60-90 minutes each) involving questionnaires, neuropsychological tasks, physiological data and stress biomarker samples in 4N
- Attend six weekly computer-based stress management training sessions (30-60 minutes) in 4N
- Complete a three-month follow-up questionnaire (15 minutes)
- Total of 10 session contacts
Volunteers must be healthy non-smokers taking no medications and have a current Category I physical. Volunteers will be compensated. (Restrictions apply to NASA civil servants and some contractors. Individuals should contact their Human Resources department.) Please contact both Linda Byrd, RN, x37284, and Rori Yager, RN, x37240. Organizations/Social - Today: Recovery Awareness Month
In its 25th year, Recovery Awareness Month promotes the societal benefits of the prevention, treatment and recovery for mental and substance-use disorders. This year's theme, "Join the Voices for Recovery: Speak Up, Reach Out," encourages people to openly speak up about mental and substance-use disorders and the reality of recovery, and promotes ways individuals can learn to recognize behavioral-health issues and reach out for help. Recovery Awareness Month helps to promote education that addiction treatment and mental-health services can enable those with a mental and/or substance-use disorder to live a healthy and rewarding life. We will be discussing treatment options, community resources and tools to support those with an addiction. You are also invited to learn how to support those in recovery. Please join Anika Isaac, LPC, LMFT, LCDC, NCC, CEAP, as she presents "Recovery Awareness Month." - JSC HSI ERG September 2014 Meeting
Mission Ops for Mars Robotics The Human Systems Integration (HSI) Employee Resource Group (ERG) is pleased to host a remote presentation by the Jet Propulsion Lab's Andy Mishkin. Mishkin was the team chief for the Mars Science Lab (MSL/Curiosity) Integrated Planning and Execution Team, and is now the MSL mission manager. He will discuss the operations challenges of robotic deep-space missions and describe the operations design for MSL's surface mission. Mishkin will also discuss how human factors challenges were addressed, as well as the continuing evolution of MSL mission operations. See the HSI ERG website for telecom information. - Calling All Foodies and Travel Enthusiasts
As part of Hispanic Heritage Month/Mes de la Herencia Hispana, the Hispanic Employee Resource Group (HERG) is hosting ¡Festival!, a celebration of Hispanic Heritage, on Oct. 14. We are looking for individuals (civil servants and contractors) to host informational tables to celebrate Hispanic countries and cultures. Table hosts will need to have their table ready by 11 a.m. and staff it from noon to 1:30 p.m. Some ideas for each table: - Food samples
- Candies and sweets
- Photos and artwork
- Collectibles and sculptures
- Tourist attractions (or places that you've visited)
We want to showcase the richness of Hispanic culture. If interested, please contact the HERG and let us know which country you'd like to represent. Decorate, celebrate, participate! Jobs and Training - JSC Exec on Loan to the Houston Technology Center
Effective Oct. 1, Walt Ugalde is assigned as the NASA executive on loan to the Houston Technology Center (HTC). In this capacity, Ugalde will serve as the NASA executive on loan and director, Aerospace Sector, representing JSC in all HTC activities related to the center. He will also use his 20-plus years of experience in the public and private business sectors to assist both JSC and HTC in bringing technologies from ideas to reality. Ugalde will continue to report to the Partnership Development Office within the Strategic Opportunities and Partnership Development Office and our new Exploration Integration and Science Directorate. - Engineer to Entrepreneur
The Houston Technology Center is pleased to host a 10-week lunch-n-learn course series entitled "Engineer to Entrepreneur." If you've ever thought about launching your own business, this is the program for you. You will learn how to establish a corporate entity, develop a business strategy, pitch your strategy and market your products. Join us for a fun-filled program instructed by some of Houston's most accomplished business executives. Classes will be held for 10 consecutive Thursdays, Aug. 21 to Oct. 30, from 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 in Building 45, Room 451. For enrollment information, contact Evelyn Boatman at 281-244-8271. - NESC and NEN Webcast Tomorrow
The NASA Engineering and Safety Center (NESC) and NASA Engineering Network (NEN) will host the webcast, "Lightweight, High Performance Acoustic Suppression Technology Research and Development," tomorrow, Sept. 24, at noon CDT for approximately two hours. Registration is easy. Click here and click the "Sign in to Register" button. You will be redirected to LaunchPad to enter your user name and password. After a successful authentication, click the "Register Now" button. You will receive a confirmation email. If you cannot attend the live webcast, please register anyway and we will notify you when the recorded (on-demand) version is available online for you to view. Registration is not available outside of the NASA firewall. Community - 2014 Humans in Space Art Video Challenge Now Open
Join NASA's International Space Station Program and Humans in Space Art in a journey of exploration. Interested college students and early career professionals worldwide are invited to influence the future of life on Earth and human space exploration. Individuals and teams should submit a three minute video capturing their visions of "How will space, science and technology benefit humanity?" Video artwork may be any style. Younger participants may submit a video, but artwork from artists of all ages will be judged together. Winning artwork will be given worldwide visibility and flown in orbit on the International Space Station. Entries are due Nov. 15. Please share this information with interested artists, teachers, parents and more. A printable poster is also available on the website. - Texas High School Juniors Needed
High School Aerospace Scholars (HAS) needs Texas high school juniors. The application is currently open. HAS is an interactive, online experience highlighted by a six-day residential summer experience at JSC. Students will explore science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) concepts, with an emphasis on space exploration, during the online experience. Students who are selected to come to JSC will continue their STEM studies with hands-on team activities while mentored by NASA engineers and scientists. HAS is a great STEM opportunity for Texas high school juniors. | |
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| JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles. Disclaimer: Accuracy and content of these notes are the responsibility of the submitters. |
NASA and Human Spaceflight News
Tuesday – September 23, 2014
HEADLINES AND LEADS
Dragon Arrives at Space Station With 3-D Printer
Marcia Dunn – Associated Press
The International Space Station accepted another SpaceX shipment Tuesday, this one containing the first 3-D printer ever launched into orbit.
SpaceX Dragon arrives at space station
James Dean – Florida Today
SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship safely reached the International Space Station this morning, two days after blasting off from Cape Canaveral.
SpaceX Dragon Supply Ship Delivers Mice, 3D Printer to Space Station
A private Dragon cargo ship built by SpaceX arrived at the International Space Station today (Sept. 23) to deliver more than 2 tons of astronaut supplies and experiments for NASA, including the first 3D printer in space and an intrepid crew of 20 lab mice.
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Texas Rocket Launch Site
Christopher Sherman – Associated Press
The commercial rocket launches that could begin as early as 2016 in the southernmost tip of Texas will be a critical step toward one day establishing a human presence on Mars, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said Monday.
SpaceX breaks ground on Texas orbital launch facility
Jim Forsyth – Reuters
Privately owned SpaceX started construction in south Texas on Monday for what the company said will be the first private commercial orbital launch facility in the world.
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Texas Spaceport
Jeff Foust – Space News
Space Exploration Technologies Corp. held a groundbreaking ceremony Sept. 22 for its new Texas commercial launch site, but the company's chief executive said work to build the facility will not ramp up until the second half of 2015.
SpaceX breaks ground for Texas spaceport
Aaron Nelsen – Houston Chronicle
Over the next decade SpaceX will pour hundreds of millions of dollars into its commercial spaceport on the Texas Gulf Coast, transforming the region into a hub of the space industry, the founder of the aerospace company said Monday.
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Private Spaceport in Texas
The private spaceflight company SpaceX has begun construction on a new launch site in Texas, a seaside spaceport that will be used to blast commercial satellites into orbit a few years from now.
Q&A: George Takei on spaceflight, selfies, social media and more
One of Hollywood's great second acts could hardly take a step through the Pike Place Market last week without someone asking to take a selfie with him
Brier Dudley – Seattle Times
Security guards and publicity agents tried to hustle him through the crowd, but George Takei stopped and smiled every time he was asked, posing for pictures with flower sellers, tourists and babes in arms.
To Explore or Pioneer?
Daniel R. Adamo – Space News
On May 29, NASA released a white paper titled "Pioneering Space: NASA's Next Steps on the Path to Mars." The paper's first page makes an important distinction: "Explorers go with the intent of returning to tell their story and point the way for future forays. Pioneers go with the intent to establish a permanent presence."
Will ET Be Here Soon? NASA Brings Scientists, Theologians Together To Prepare
Looking for extraterrestrial life is akin to a search for a cosmic needle-in-a-haystack, as evidenced by the above incredible Hubble Space Telescope image showing approximately 10,000 galaxies.
ISS Expected To Take Back Seat to Next-gen Ariane as Space Ministers Meet in Zurich
Peter B. de Selding – Space News
The space ministers of France, Germany and Italy are scheduled to meet Sept. 23 in Zurich to assess how far they are from agreement on strategy and funding for Europe's next-generation Ariane rocket, upgrades to the light-lift Vega vehicle and — as a lower priority — their continued participation in the international space station.
Are solar power satellites sitting ducks for orbital debris?
Al Anzaldua, David Dunlop, and Brad Blair - The Space Review
Even conservative estimates of the energy needed in coming years to meet surging world demand are staggering. Energy use, currently over 120,000 billion kilowatt-hours annually, is forecast to double by 2030 or 2040 and to quadruple by 2090 or 2100.1 To meet this growing demand, many space enthusiasts are promoting the idea of space solar power for terrestrial use. Unfortunately, a fierce and growing spoiler lies in wait: orbital debris.
Editorial | Actions Speak Louder than Words
SpaceNews Editor
U.S. government officials are correct to dismiss the latest space weapons ban proposed by China and Russia as unacceptable, particularly in light of the fact that China, U.S. officials say, continues to test anti-satellite weaponry.
COMPLETE STORIES
Dragon Arrives at Space Station With 3-D Printer
Marcia Dunn – Associated Press
The International Space Station accepted another SpaceX shipment Tuesday, this one containing the first 3-D printer ever launched into orbit.
Two days after blasting off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, the SpaceX cargo ship, Dragon, arrived at the space station. German astronaut Alexander Gerst used the robot arm to grab the capsule.
"Well done capturing that Dragon," Mission Control radioed.
The Dragon is delivering more than 5,000 pounds of supplies. The 3-D printer — an experimental model — is the headliner payload. Also on board: mice and flies for biological research, fresh spacesuit batteries so NASA can resume routine spacewalks, and a $30 million instrument to measure ocean wind.
NASA is paying SpaceX to stock the space station. Last week, the California-based company won the right to transport astronauts, too. That's still a few years off.
The Dragon will remain at the orbiting outpost for about a month. It will be filled with science experiments for return to Earth. The Dragon is the only unmanned cargo capsule capable of returning items.
This was the fifth Dragon to visit the space station.
"We're happy to have a new vehicle on board," Gerst said.
Another spacecraft is due to arrive in another couple days. Russia is poised to launch a Soyuz spacecraft from Kazakhstan on Thursday with a three-person crew. That will bring the number of astronauts at the space station to the usual six.
SpaceX Dragon arrives at space station
James Dean – Florida Today
SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship safely reached the International Space Station this morning, two days after blasting off from Cape Canaveral.
Astronauts steering a 58-foot robotic arm snared the Dragon and its nearly 5,000 pounds of cargo at 6:52 a.m. EDT, slightly ahead of schedule.
"This was indeed a great flight of the Dragon towards the station, and we're happy to have a new vehicle on board," German astronaut Alexander Gerst radioed to mission controllers in Houston and SpaceX's headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif.
He said the three-person station crew -- to be joined Thursday by three more astronauts -- looked forward to moving "a lot of science out of this vehicle into our ISS and performing a lot of science in the next month."
NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman supported Gerst during the grapple operation. They'll proceed to attach the Dragon to a docking port later this morning before opening its hatch and beginning to unload cargo.
The cargo includes rodent habitats holding 20 mice, the first 3-D printer in space, food and spacesuit batteries. The spacecraft's unpressurized trunk holds a radar instrument that will measure ocean surface winds to improve weather and climate forecasts, which will be installed robotically.
The Dragon is expected to remain berthed at the outpost for a month before returning to Earth with 3,800 pounds of cargo. It is the only spacecraft flying today that is capable of returning large amounts of cargo to the ground.
This is the fourth of 12 planned Dragon flights under a $1.6 billion NASA resupply contract.
"All of the rendezvous activities went very smoothly this morning," said NASA TV commentator Kyle Herring.
With mice as cargo
Humans will eventually get their turn in SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft, which NASA last week selected as one of two capsules that could ferry its crews from Florida to the International Space Station by 2017.
But the robotic cargo capsule arriving at the station this morning, two days after blasting off from Cape Canaveral, is already carrying its first live mammal passengers: 20 black mice.
Packed in the Dragon's belly along with 5,000 pounds of food, supplies and other experiments, the Rodent Research Habitat System marks the start of a new ISS program using mice and rats to study the long-term effects of microgravity, with potential health applications on Earth.
NASA performed such experiments during 27 shuttle missions, and mice have been on the station before, but the new equipment will enable longer studies.
"We have a lot of basic knowledge in the short-term about how mice and rats respond to spaceflight, but very little information about long-term," said Ruth Globus, the project scientist from NASA's Ames Research Center in California.
Rodent research was identified as a critical need in a 2011 report recommending the most important life and physical sciences research to pursue in space.
The report called the station's lack of a rodent facility at the time "a major research impediment that will hamper the ability to obtain information important for maintaining astronaut health and fitness for duty."
With typical lifespans of about two years, mice and rats show in a relatively short period of time aging processes similar to what humans experience over decades, and some of those processes are accelerated in microgravity.
That makes them valuable subjects for studies of bone mass loss, muscle atrophy and the cardiovascular and immune systems.
The research could help prepare astronauts for much longer exploration missions to Mars — two or more years, compared to six-month stays on the station — and speed development of medical treatments on the ground.
This flight, for which SpaceX designed a special life support system in the Dragon, will check out the hardware and procedures involved in the rodent system, which was upgraded from the old shuttle model.
Half of the adult, female mice are NASA's and half are part of a muscle wasting experiment by the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research, sponsored by the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space, the local organization that operates the station's National Lab.
People naturally start to lose muscle mass once they reach about age 65, a condition worsened by illness like cancer or by bed rest, said Jason Gilbert, scientific associate at Novartis.
"Maintaining a person's muscle mass is really important in these situations because it will lead to a better quality of life and maybe a faster recovery," he said. "So we're really looking forward to this exciting opportunity to explore different methods and mechanism behind muscle loss, and how this could potentially help patients in the future."
Most everything about the rodent habitat, including feeding, is automated. Video cameras built into the habitats will allow researchers on the ground to monitor their subjects' health and behavior daily.
"Rodents don't just kind of float around and have fun in the free space, they tend to hold on to the walls," said Globus. "They're very physically active. If you observe them during a sleep period, they hunch together."
The Rodent Research-1 mission won't end well for the mice: Astronauts will euthanize and dissect them in three to four weeks. Their bodies, hind leg tissues, livers and spleens will be returned to the ground for analysis.
Live samples may fly home in the future, as experiments extend in duration up to six months and possibly to include multiple generations. Another 40 mice are slated to fly on a Dragon early next year for a two-month experiment.
SpaceX Dragon Supply Ship Delivers Mice, 3D Printer to Space Station
A private Dragon cargo ship built by SpaceX arrived at the International Space Station today (Sept. 23) to deliver more than 2 tons of astronaut supplies and experiments for NASA, including the first 3D printer in space and an intrepid crew of 20 lab mice.
After a two-day chase, the Dragon spacecraft caught up to the orbiting laboratory at 6:52 a.m. EDT (1052GMT). European astronaut Alexander Gerst used the space station's huge robotic arm to grab the capsule with help from NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman. The spacecraft is packed with 5,000 lbs. (2,268 kilograms) of experiments and supplies.
"This was a great flight of Dragon toward the space station," Gerst radioed Mission Control after capturing the Dragon capsule with the robotic arm.
Dragon launched into space early Sunday (Sept. 21) in a liftoff described by mission managers as "perfect." The capsule launched atop SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida just before 2 a.m. Sunday, one day later than planned due to a weather delay. After Dragon reached orbit, it spent two days catching up to the station through a series of carefully timed thruster firings.
The flight marked SpaceX's fourth resupply mission to the space station under a $1.6 billion contract with NASA. The Hawthorne, California-based company has agreed to provide at least 12 Dragon supply flights to the astronaut outpost.
Mice, 3D printer and other cargo
Dragon will remain berthed to the space station for about 30 days to allow astronauts to unload the new cargo and refill it with equipment to be returned to Earth. Among the novel cargo inside this morning's shipment is a NASA rodent habitat for biological research with an initial group of 20 tiny tenants. Astronauts quickly lose muscle and bone density during spaceflight. Scientists hope that studying the same phenomena in mice will help them understand more about how the human body degrades during long-term missions in space.
Sometime before Dragon flies back to Earth, the robotic capsule will pop open its trunk so that controllers on the ground can reach in and grab a new instrument called RapidScat. The scatterometer will measure the speed and direction of ocean winds on Earth once it is installed on the outside of the space station.
Some of the cargo onboard Dragon is booked for a round trip. A student-designed fruit fly experiment is slated to come back to Earth after 30 days; the researchers want to know how a group of mutant, stress-resistant fruit flies fares in microgravity. And the 3D printer built by Made in Space will churn out a few initial test parts and send them back with Dragon. Researchers with the California-based Made in Space and its partners at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, want to learn as soon as possible how the quality of items printed in microgravity compares with the quality of parts made on Earth.
Dragon will also return with a small crop of lettuce harvested from NASA's Veg-01 experiment, nicknamed "Veggie," which was first brought to the space station during SpaceX's last resupply mission in April. Scientists on the ground will analyze frozen lettuce samples to determine whether they're safe to eat, though researchers probably won't take a nibble themselves, said Marshall Porterfield, director of NASA's Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Applications Division.
"After it gets frozen in a minus 80-degree freezer, it's not too palatable," Porterfield told reporters last week.
Busy week in space
The delivery comes amid a big week for SpaceX. The company, which was founded in 2002 by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, just won a lucrative NASA contract to transport American astronauts to and from the space station. Last Tuesday (Sept. 16), NASA announced that it was giving SpaceX $2.6 billion of its Commercial Crew Transportation Capability award. Under the deal, SpaceX will fly an enhanced seven-passenger version of the Dragon capsule to the space station from U.S. soil by 2017. Boeing also won a $4.2 billion chunk of the award to provide the same space-taxi service using its CST-100 capsule.
In another milestone, SpaceX officially broke ground on its seaside Texas spaceport near Brownsville at the southern tip of the state yesterday (Sept. 22). The company plans to launch commercial satellites into orbit from the private facility in a few years.
It's also a busy week for the space station, as a manned Russian spacecraft is expected to arrive in just a few days. The Soyuz capsule carrying three new crew members — NASA astronaut Barry Wilmore and Russian cosmonauts Elena Serova and Alexander Samoukutyaev — is slated to launch from Kazakhstan on Thursday (Sept. 25). They will join Gerst, Wiseman and cosmonaut Maxim Suraev as part of Expedition 41.
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Texas Rocket Launch Site
Christopher Sherman – Associated Press
The commercial rocket launches that could begin as early as 2016 in the southernmost tip of Texas will be a critical step toward one day establishing a human presence on Mars, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said Monday.
With waves from the Gulf of Mexico crashing just over the dunes and crabs skittering around a tent erected for the groundbreaking, Musk said he expects SpaceX to invest $100 million in the world's first commercial orbital spaceport during the next three to four years.
The commercial satellite launch revenue Musk anticipates generating at the Boca Chica Beach site east of Brownsville will fuel California-based SpaceX's real objective. "The long-term goal is to create technology necessary to take humanity beyond Earth," Musk said. "To take humanity to Mars and establish a base on Mars. So it could very well be that the first person that departs for another planet will depart from this location."
Beginning as early as the third quarter of 2016, Musk said he expects the spaceport to handle at least 12 rocket launches per year. SpaceX will continue using government launch sites in Florida and California, but Musk said its manifest would outpace the available launch windows at those existing sites.
Gov. Rick Perry, on hand for the ceremony, announced a $4.4 million grant from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund to the University of Texas at Brownsville that will be matched by the University of Texas System to test and commercialize a new communications system at laboratories at the SpaceX Boca Chica complex.
"The future of South Texas takes off right behind me," Perry said.
Perry is also providing $2.3 million from the Texas Enterprise Fund toward the spaceport and an additional $13 million from the Spaceport Trust Fund.
The U.S. Department of Commerce announced Monday that it had awarded $1.2 million to the University of Texas at Brownsville for a high-tech business incubation facility that could foster a cluster of space industry businesses.
SpaceX is expected to create 300 jobs at the site, and Musk said he expected other companies to settle there.
SpaceX already provides resupply missions for the International Space Station with its unmanned Dragon capsule, most recently on Sunday. Last week, SpaceX and Boeing won contracts to carry U.S. astronauts to the space station beginning in 2016 or 2017. Musk said he expects those NASA missions to continue to launch from Florida. NASA has not launched its own crews since the end of the shuttle program in 2011.
Musk said he would like to fly to Mars one day but that his goals are not about tourism. He said the question is whether humans become a less vulnerable multi-planet species.
"I think the important thing is to develop the technology that will enable ultimately anyone to move to Mars if they really want to," he said.
SpaceX breaks ground on Texas orbital launch facility
Jim Forsyth – Reuters
Privately owned SpaceX started construction in south Texas on Monday for what the company said will be the first private commercial orbital launch facility in the world.
Space Exploration Technologies Corp, the company's formal name, last year entered the commercial satellite launch market. It broke ground at the site near Brownsville, not far from the Mexican border.
The Hawthorne, California-based company, owned and operated by technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, also flies cargo to the International Space Station under a $1.6 billion contract with NASA. Its Texas launch site, which will be its fourth in the United States, will be supported with investment from the state.
SpaceX chose Texas from among several candidates for the space port, which it said will be operating by 2016, conducting an expected 12 launches a year.
The state offered about $15 million in incentives and investment for the rocket center. It will also fund more than $80 million in capital improvements to Boca Chica Beach, a Texas state park at the mouth of the Rio Grande, the office of Governor Rick Perry said.
"With today's groundbreaking at Boca Chica Beach, we will begin an investment in South Texas that will create hundreds of jobs, and over time, contribute hundreds of millions of dollars to the local economy," Musk said.
The state legislature allowed SpaceX to close the public beach during launches, a controversial move for a state where private beaches are not allowed and public access to beaches is enshrined in the constitution.
SpaceX regularly flies from a leased and renovated launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. It also has flown once from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and has an agreement with NASA to lease one of the mothballed space shuttle launch pads at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Perry's office said SpaceX will bring 300 direct jobs to the southwest border region, which recently has been in the news as one of the locations where large numbers of children from Central America cross from Mexico into the United States.
SpaceX already has a facility in central Texas that does rocket testing.
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Texas Spaceport
Jeff Foust – Space News
Space Exploration Technologies Corp. held a groundbreaking ceremony Sept. 22 for its new Texas commercial launch site, but the company's chief executive said work to build the facility will not ramp up until the second half of 2015.
SpaceX held the groundbreaking, attended by local officials and Texas Gov. Rick Perry, on the site of the planned spaceport at Boca Chica Beach on the Gulf of Mexico east of here. The site is planned to host launches of the company's Falcon 9 and future Falcon Heavy rockets, primarily carrying commercial satellites to geostationary orbit.
"We thank you for having the vision to see that this is where you needed to be," Perry said to SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk at the event. "The future of South Texas takes off right behind us."
The groundbreaking ceremony took place a month and a half after Perry announced that SpaceX had agreed to establish its commercial launch facility in Texas, after considering other sites in Florida, Georgia and Puerto Rico. That, in turn, came a month after the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration's Office of Commercial Space Transportation signed off on an environmental impact statement for the proposed launch site that would allow its development to proceed.
In his August announcement, Perry said the state government would be providing $15 million to support construction of the spaceport. However, SpaceX will be providing the bulk of the money needed to build the launch facility. "We expect to spend on the order of about $100 million" during the next three to four years to build the site, Musk said in his remarks at the groundbreaking.
In a press conference after the event, Musk said that even though the groundbreaking was taking place now, construction of the spaceport will not begin until next year. "There will be some advance preparation work here in Boca Chica, but we'll probably start more significant activity in the third quarter of next year," he said.
Musk said SpaceX is focused on refurbishing Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida after the company finalized an agreement with KSC this year to take over operations of the historic launch site. "Once we are finished with the upgrades on Pad 39A, we're going to take our development team and move them to Boca Chica and work on the launch site here," he said.
Under that development schedule, Musk said, the first launch from the Texas site could take place as soon as late 2016. SpaceX would like to move launches of commercial geostationary orbit satellites here as soon as the facility is ready in order to reduce the congestion on the range at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, where SpaceX currently launches those satellites, and to take advantage of the slightly favorable latitude of the Texas site.
Musk reiterated that although SpaceX is developing a Texas site, it has no plans to abandon Florida. SpaceX, he said, will continue to use those facilities primarily for government launches, including commercial crew missions to the international space station under a contract the company won from NASA Sept. 16.
Musk, though, did not rule out using the Texas launch site for non-NASA crewed missions at some point. "I would expect commercial astronauts, private astronauts, to be departing from South Texas," he said.
SpaceX breaks ground for Texas spaceport
Aaron Nelsen – Houston Chronicle
Over the next decade SpaceX will pour hundreds of millions of dollars into its commercial spaceport on the Texas Gulf Coast, transforming the region into a hub of the space industry, the founder of the aerospace company said Monday.
The company's future commercial orbital spaceport at Boca Chica Beach, near Brownsville, could also be a key player in the race to one day colonize Mars, said CEO Elon Musk during a groundbreaking event.
"The thing that's going to fundamentally affect humanity's future is are we multi-planet species or are we a single planet species?" Musk said about the future of mankind. "A single planet species is much more vulnerable."
But to establish a self-sustaining viable base on Mars will require the development of advanced technology, and thousands of orbital rocket launches every year to supply the outpost, Musk said.
"It could very well be that the first person that departs for another planet will depart from this location," Musk said. "I'm an optimist, I wouldn't have gotten into the rocket business otherwise."
SpaceX is one of a number of cutting-edge enterprises, many based in or moving to Texas, known as "new space," and which are helping to establish a new generation of space exploration.
Construction on the Boca Chica location is expected to begin around mid-2015, with at least one commercial orbital flight per month to begin by late 2016, Musk said.
The company will spend around $100 million in capital investment over the next three to four years to develop the site, he said.
Sites in Florida, California
SpaceX will continue to launch its spacecraft from Cape Canaveral, Fla., and Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., mainly for its government contracts to supply the International Space Station. The frequency of commercial launches of satellites from South Texas will gradually increase over time to meet demand from the company's growing manifest, Musk said.
The California-based SpaceX, which has a rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas, selected the Brownsville area over other prospective sites in Florida, Georgia and Puerto Rico for its spaceport largely because of the willingness of state and local governments to support the endeavor, according to Musk.
"We want to be in a place where we're truly wanted," Musk said. "The fundamental point that swayed SpaceX for Boca Chica was the tremendous outpouring of support from local residents."
The company will receive a combined $20 million in state and local incentives, including $2.3 million from the Texas Enterprise Fund, $13 million from the state's Spaceport Trust Fund, and an additional $5 million from the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corp.
Musk was joined by Gov. Rick Perry who announced an investment of $4.4 million from the Texas Emerging Technology Fund toward the creation of a research and technology commercialization partnership called STARGATE.
The STARGATE facility will be a radio frequency technology park, next to the SpaceX launch site command center, used by University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley students and faculty researchers for training, scientific research and technology development.
UT System pitching in
The University of Texas System will invest $4.6 million in the project, and $500,000 will come from the Greater Brownsville Incentives Corp.
"The pavement ends in a 1,000," said Perry, referring to a road sign near the future launch site. "But the future of South Texas takes off right behind me."
Initially, UT-Brownsville's Center for Advanced Radio Astronomy will partner with SpaceX to create STARGATE, with future participants to include the Texas Advanced Computing Center in Austin, the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, Cal Tech's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory, Cornell University's Department of Astronomy and the Arecibo Radio Observatory.
"This is more than a once-in-a-generation or once-in-a-lifetime moment; this is history in the making," said UT System Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa. "The research partnerships we are establishing hold the promise to catapult the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley to the leading edge in the study of astrophysics - that is a matchless experience that offers incredible possibilities for research."
The company is expected to create 300 jobs in the Rio Grande Valley, some will be generated by efforts to reuse previously launched spacecraft, such as its Dragon capsule.
"Because we're aiming for reusability … when the rockets come back to the launch site we would expect to refurbish and upgrade the rocket technology for future flights," Musk said. "So we expect to have a fairly significant engineering, R&D presence at the site."
One early concern with the proposed launch site was the potential impact to sensitive natural areas that surround the future spaceport.
Musk pledged to address environmental concerns should any arise, noting that other launch sites near refuge land had successfully mitigated impacts to wildlife.
"This feels good," Musk said, the dunes of Boca Chica Beach in the distance. "It feels like the future."
SpaceX Breaks Ground on Private Spaceport in Texas
The private spaceflight company SpaceX has begun construction on a new launch site in Texas, a seaside spaceport that will be used to blast commercial satellites into orbit a few years from now.
SpaceX officially broke ground on the facility, on Monday (Sept. 22) in Brownsville, Texas. The new launch site will be located near Boca Chica Beach, at the far southern tip of the Lone Star State.
"We appreciate the leadership of [Texas] Governor Rick Perry and numerous other federal, state and local leaders who have helped make it possible for SpaceX to build the world's first commercial launch complex designed specifically for orbital missions," SpaceX's billionaire founder and CEO, Elon Musk, said in a statement.
"With today's groundbreaking at Boca Chica Beach, we will begin an investment in South Texas that will create hundreds of jobs and, over time, contribute hundreds of millions of dollars into the local economy," Musk added.
Texas offered SpaceX about $15 million in incentives to build the spaceport within the state's borders. The facility should be operational by 2016, SpaceX representatives said.
The Hawthorne, California-based SpaceX currently launches its Falcon 9 rockets from pads at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, as well as California's Vandenberg Air Force Base. The company also has a lease to use NASA's historic Launch Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, and launched its first Falcon 1 rockets from a remote launch site on Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacific Ocean.
SpaceX holds a $1.6 billion deal to fly 12 robotic cargo missions to the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA using the company's Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket. And last week NASA announced that it had awarded SpaceX $2.6 billion to ferry astronauts to and from the space station with an upgraded version of Dragon, beginning in 2017. (NASA also gave Boeing $4.2 billion in another astronaut-taxi contract.)
But SpaceX's ISS cargo and crew missions won't blast off from the new Texas spaceport, which is designed just for commercial satellites. Resupply flights to the orbiting lab — three of which SpaceX has already completed, with a fourth underway at the moment — will continue to launch from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, while crewed missions will lift off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center, which is right next door.
Texas State Senator Eddie Lucio, Jr., who worked with the governor's office to get the $15 million allocated for the SpaceX incentives, said he has high hopes for the new spaceport.
"I hope the new launch site will propel a dramatic culture change in our region of the state, encouraging more of our children to pursue careers in engineering and science," Lucio said in a statement. "Future generations of South Texas residents will look to this site and know that not even the sky is the limit for where their dreams may take them."
Q&A: George Takei on spaceflight, selfies, social media and more
One of Hollywood's great second acts could hardly take a step through the Pike Place Market last week without someone asking to take a selfie with him
Brier Dudley – Seattle Times
Security guards and publicity agents tried to hustle him through the crowd, but George Takei stopped and smiled every time he was asked, posing for pictures with flower sellers, tourists and babes in arms.
Takei is best known as Commander Sulu, helmsman on the USS Enterprise in the original "Star Trek" TV series and movies.
Actors like Takei became icons for a generation that went on to build the modern tech industry, which continues to draw inspiration from futuristic gadgets that Sulu, Spock, Capt. Kirk and other characters used to explore strange new worlds.
Now 77, Takei has become a superstar in the new galaxy of social media, where he has an audience of 10 million across Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube and other channels broadcasting his commentary.
Takei's popularity leapt in 2005 when he publicly disclosed that he is gay and spoke out against Arnold Schwarzenegger, then-governor of Takei's native California, for vetoing the state's marriage-equality bill.
Since then, Takei has become a prominent advocate for gay rights, expanding on political activism stirred in part by his family's internment during World War II.
Takei has also become an honorary Seattleite. He visits regularly with his husband, Brad Takei, and served as grand marshal of this summer's Pride Parade. He also has done events at EMP's Science Fiction Museum, even though he thinks the zany building looks "like a Klingon ship that crash-landed in Seattle."
Last week Takei was here filming an episode of "Takei's Take," an online series sponsored by the AARP that looks at new technology and trends. He'll beam back up in October to visit Amazon.com, which will be selling the documentary "To Be Takei."
Takei took a break from the action to have a few cups of tea and talk about the lasting influence of "Star Trek," space travel and more. Here are edited excerpts of our conversation:
Q: How many selfies have you been in?
A: Today, it's been controlled because we've had minders around us to make sure we keep moving. Ordinarily, if we showed up at a place like Pike Place we would be doing constant selfies, occasional autographs.
We're now in the age of selfies.
Q: Seattle has a number of entrepreneurs who grew up watching you and sci-fi in the 1960s. That generation went on to create today's tech industry, and some — like Jeff Bezos, Paul Allen, plus California's Elon Musk — are now building spacecraft. Did you have any inkling back then that you might be inspiring kids this way?
A: Well, Gene Roddenberry, the creator of "Star Trek," was a great sci-fi fan and himself a sci-fi writer. He wanted to use sci-fi as a metaphor for contemporary issues. So a lot of our writers were top-notch sci-fi writers at that time.
I think the future is created by these imagineers who imagine the seemingly impossible, and that places a benchmark in our imagined future. The scientists, the technicians, the innovators take that as a goal and start working toward it.
So I think in that way "Star Trek" did stimulate a lot of thinking. …
We still haven't got there yet but people are working toward it. They're making attempts at teleporting molecules.
Q: And you've got a Communicator in your pocket, right?
A: We had a thing called a Communicator that was amazing back in the '60s. It's like a tricorder now, the Communicator. We talk on it, it takes pictures, we text on it, we find out what the weather's going to be.
It's an amazing device that has far surpassed anything we had on "Star Trek."
Q: As the face of the show, you and the others became icons.
A: We're the beneficiaries of the visionaries that worked on "Star Trek," like Gene Roddenberry and Harlan Ellison.
(Brad Takei interjects: "George is now Mr. Technology to the AARP audience … He's destroying the myth that old people don't know anything about technology.")
Obviously, the "Star Trek" demographic is my generation — the baby boomers — but we have gone past that to embrace the millennials as well because, well, for one thing I did the "Heroes" series and then I did a Nickelodeon series for preteens called "Supah Ninjas."
But we live in an age where the grandchildren's parents get jobs elsewhere, far away, and via technology the grandparents can watch their grandchildren grow up, whether the parents are working in London or Tokyo or Buenos Aires. So they become technologically fluent as well.
Q: They also bond as one generation asks the other for help with technology.
A: Right, and everybody benefits.
Q: What's the coolest thing you've seen so far doing the AARP show on new technology?
A: This season we're going out of the studio to places where there are interesting innovators or technological trends happening. So we went to Austin, Texas, we went to Boston and here we are in Seattle this week.
We also went to Japan in June and there we met Asimo, the robot that greeted President Obama when he visited Japan.
What they're developing are robots that are humanistic, for lack of a better word — (robots) that have expressions in their eyes, that read your emotions, or are being created to become companions to isolated elderly people.
They were playing disco music and Asimo started dancing, so I danced along with it. Dancing with a robot. When I changed the movement, it changed with me, just like in a real disco.
Q: How did you build such a huge audience on social media?
A: The important thing is regularity; we're there every day. We backlog the various posts, and we have interns that do the posting because I might be on a set. I might be on a speaking tour throughout the country. I can't be there every day so we backlog the memes.
Through trial and error I discovered it was the funnies, the humor — particularly "Grumpy Cat" — that gets the people.
So you hold the people with honey, then periodically I sock it to 'em with issues or current events, events that are of importance to society that they should know about and my take on it.
Q: Do you think your legacy as an advocate for gay rights will be greater than your legacy as an actor on "Star Trek"?
A: I think it will be both. I am an actor and all my life I've been active in civil rights.
I've been active in the political process, but throughout that (early) period I was silent on the issue that was organic to me — the fact I was gay — because I passionately loved and wanted to continue to be an actor.
And it was delusion for me to think I could have an acting career and be open at the same time. No producer would hire me — you're box-office poison, ratings poison.
So I was closeted most of my life. At 68 years old — when Arnold Schwarzenegger vetoed the marriage bill — I felt my voice needed to be authentic for the first time.
Q: Do you ever want to go up in a real spaceship? There are people around here who have done it and could probably take you up one of these days.
A: I do. People like Elon Musk (CEO of SpaceX and Tesla Motors) are real inspirations now. The Starship Enterprise was called enterprise, and now we are going for space exploration via government to the entrepreneurial, private sector.
That's precisely what happened (last week) with the contracts being given to Boeing and SpaceX.
Q: Would you like to take one of the private space flights?
A: I absolutely do but it's initially very costly. But like so many technological advances, with competition between Boeing and SpaceX, the cost is going to be brought down to where it's affordable for me.
I know that at my age — I'm 77 — time is important, but I think technological advances are accelerating, too.
So I think that within my lifetime I will be able to make that 'trek' into space at a rate where I won't be destitute.
Q: Maybe they'd let you go for free if you drive.
A: I have experience as a helmsman, and a captain.
To Explore or Pioneer?
Daniel R. Adamo – Space News
On May 29, NASA released a white paper titled "Pioneering Space: NASA's Next Steps on the Path to Mars." The paper's first page makes an important distinction: "Explorers go with the intent of returning to tell their story and point the way for future forays. Pioneers go with the intent to establish a permanent presence."
U.S. history abounds with examples of this distinction, but consider an early one. From 1804 to 1806, Meriwether Lewis and William Clark led their Corps of Discovery on an exploration of regions drained by the Missouri and Columbia Rivers. If their objective was to pioneer, the corps could easily have stopped in present-day Missouri and reported to President Thomas Jefferson from there while they put down roots and lived off the land, having never seen the Rocky Mountains or the Pacific Ocean.
In June, the National Academies Press issued a report titled "Pathways to Exploration: Rationales and Approaches for a U.S. Program of Human Space Exploration." As part of their congressional charter, the report's authors were to develop "enduring questions" to be addressed by human spaceflight. Such questions "provide motivations immune to external forces and policy shifts," and the report poses only two:
n How far from Earth can humans go?
n What can humans discover and achieve when they get there?
The "Pathways" report advocates open-ended lunar surface operations as a possible prerequisite leading to a "horizon goal" of martian surface operations.
This student of history and interplanetary human spaceflight architecture suggests NASA can go farther from Earth and achieve more in space by exploring rather than pioneering.
To maximize human space exploration entails a strategy devoting more effort to interplanetary human transport (including cargo logistics with supporting infrastructure) and less to operating on planetary surfaces. Surface operations, particularly those requiring specialized elements for access and habitation on major bodies like the Moon and Mars, are best left to commercial partners.
If NASA remains fixated on the martian surface as its horizon goal, it will ultimately succeed in placing humans up to 2.7 astronomical units (AU, equivalent to Earth's mean distance from the sun) from Earth. Doing so will require all manner of specialized hardware and techniques to achieve Mars entry/descent/landing and habitation. If open-ended lunar surface operations are a prerequisite to this milestone, still more specialized hardware and techniques are necessary. All this specialized technology takes great amounts of sustained funding over a protracted interval to develop, deploy and operate.
Now imagine NASA is unshackled from the martian surface as its horizon goal and freed to explore Mars from its moons and explore asteroids as far from Earth as possible. Although these small bodies constitute a diverse and prolific breed of potential destinations, they all pose nearly identical environments for approach, "landing" and habitation because their gravity fields and atmospheres are virtually nonexistent. Interplanetary transport technology required to reach the vicinity of Mars is therefore easily adapted and scaled to access myriad small bodies near and far from Earth.
A bewildering number of metrics exist with which to critically assess a destination's accessibility for human spaceflight. In the interest of brevity, consider only the roundtrip change-in-velocity (delta-v) required to depart a circular Earth orbit 400 kilometers in height, arrive/depart at the destination, and enter Earth's atmosphere at no more than a manageable 12 kilometers per second upon return. This metric relates primarily to how far from Earth humans can go. For a roundtrip to the martian surface, delta-v is typically about 16 kilometers per second.
Without having to descend into and ascend out of the martian gravity well, how far from Earth could humans go with a delta-v of 16 kilometers per second? Assuming a circular destination orbit about the sun in a plane close to that of Earth's orbit, distances from Earth up to 3.7 AU would be achievable. If NASA is not burdened with developing and operating special-purpose infrastructure required to access and inhabit the surfaces of the Moon and Mars, increased focus and specialization would likely permit still greater distances from Earth to be achieved in less time and with less funding than reaching the surface of Mars would entail.
It would then be conservative to stop at 3.7 AU from Earth, equivalent to a mean distance of 2.7 AU from the sun (the mean distance of Mars from the sun is 1.52 AU), and take stock of known asteroids lying within this frontier. To render these asteroids accessible, only those in orbits about the sun at least as circular as that of Mars and whose planes are inclined to Earth's by less than that of Mars are considered. Furthermore, each inventoried asteroid must have an intrinsic brightness such that it is virtually certain to be at least 0.15 kilometers in diameter. A poll of NASA's asteroid catalog on Aug. 17 tallies 3,153 known asteroids meeting these criteria. And with 60 of these asteroids discovered in the first 7.5 months of 2014, the inventory is far from complete.
The asteroid tally does not include Phobos and Deimos, the two moons of Mars, with delta-v about 7.9 and 7.5 kilometers per second, respectively. These small bodies can also be accessed by systems capable of visiting asteroids because Phobos is about 22 kilometers in diameter, while Deimos is about 13 kilometers.
From its higher orbit, humans on Deimos could control telerobotics nearly anywhere on Mars in real time, conducting any conceivable surface exploration at far less cost and risk than human "boots on the ground."
Direct and telerobotic exploration by humans based on small bodies in interplanetary space and near Mars will produce a bonanza of scientific knowledge. It will also uncover opportunities for commercial partners to pioneer.
But NASA should participate in that pioneering only through logistics support and as a customer. Specialized hardware development by NASA should never be carried past feasibility demonstrations considered too risky by commercial partners, and it must be justified by its pioneering potential beforehand. Costs to establish and maintain pioneering infrastructure should be borne by commercial partners and their investors.
If NASA can focus on establishing routine interplanetary human transport and resist distractions posed by pioneering in space, it will enable that pioneering by those in commercial enterprises doing it best. The Corps of Discovery served in the same capacity to open Western U.S. territory to pioneers. This focus is also consistent with the National Aeronautics and Space Act, wherein NASA is only chartered to explore.
Answering the "Pathways" report's enduring question of what humans can do in space will remain highly speculative for years to come. But if NASA's human spaceflight strategy is primarily to explore, what can be discovered on thousands of small bodies (including ones orbiting Mars) is beyond even collective human imagination.
Brilliant individual imaginations, like those of Edgar Rice Burroughs circa 1912 and Wernher von Braun in the 1950s, have instilled throughout our culture the surface of Mars as a horizon goal in human exploration. But these individuals were almost totally unaware of the prolific population of small bodies in our solar system and their exploration potential using telerobotics.
It is time to move beyond their vision to one reflecting a better reconnaissance of the unexplored territory awaiting us out there.
Will ET Be Here Soon? NASA Brings Scientists, Theologians Together To Prepare
Looking for extraterrestrial life is akin to a search for a cosmic needle-in-a-haystack, as evidenced by the above incredible Hubble Space Telescope image showing approximately 10,000 galaxies.
In large part, thanks to NASA's Kepler spacecraft, more than 1,400 planets have been identified beyond Earth.
A few days ago, NASA tried closing the gap between life on Earth and the possibilities of life elsewhere. The space agency and the Library of Congress (image below left) brought together scientists, historians, philosophers and theologians from around the world for a two-day symposium, "Preparing For Discovery." Their agenda: To explore how we prepare for the inevitable discovery of extraterrestrial life, be it simple microbial organisms or intelligent beings.
"We're looking at all scenarios about finding life. If you find microbes, that's one thing. If you find intelligence, it's another. And if they communicate, it's something else, and depending on what they say, it's something else!" said astronomer, symposium organizer and former chief NASA historian, Steven J. Dick.
"The idea is not to wait until we make a discovery, but to try and prepare the public for what the implications might be when such a discovery is made," Dick told The Huffington Post. "I think the reason that NASA is backing this is because of all the recent activity in the discovery of exoplanets and the advances in astrobiology in general.
"People just consider it much more likely now that we're going to find something -- probably microbes first and maybe intelligence later," he added. "The driving force behind this is from a scientific point of view that it seems much more likely now that we are going to find life at some point in the future."
Among the many speakers at last week's astrobiology symposium, one has raised a few international eyebrows in recent years.
"I believe [alien life exists], but I have no evidence. I would be really excited and it would make my understanding of my religion deeper and richer in ways that I can't even predict yet, which is why it would be so exciting," Brother Guy Consolmagno, a Jesuit priest, astronomer and Vatican planetary scientist told HuffPost senior science editor David Freeman.
Consolmagno has publicly stated his belief that "any entity -- no matter how many tentacles it has -- has a soul," and he's suggested that he would be happy to baptize any ETs, as long as they requested it.
"There has to be freedom to do science. Being a good scientist means admitting we never have the whole truth -- there's always more to learn." Consolmagno also doesn't think the public would panic when or if it's revealed that alien life has been found.
"I really think it would be a three-day wonder and then we'd go back to worrying about reality TV or the crazy things going on in Washington -- that's the way human beings are. Because I think most people are like me: we expect it's out there. And our reaction would be, 'Wow, thank heavens. It's about time."
Earth is no longer the center of the universe, nor is it flat -- at least that's the currently accepted thinking among most scientists. And we now know, conclusively, that there are a lot more planets than the ones in our own solar system.
"The number of habitable worlds in our galaxy is certainly in the tens of billions, minimum, and we haven't even talked about the moons. And the number of galaxies we can see, other than our own, is about 100 billion," Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at California's SETI Institute told HuffPost.
At the NASA/Library of Congress symposium, Shostak gave out some startling numbers about how many stars there are in the part of the universe that we can see. "It's a big number: 10,000 billion, billion. And we know that most of those stars have planets -- 70 or 80 percent. If all of those planets are sterile, and you're the only interesting thing happening in the cosmos, then you are a miracle. That would be exceptional in the extreme. So, the middle-of-the-road approach is to say, 'You're not a miracle, you're just another duck in a row of ducks.'"
"The bottom line of this," Shostak said, "is something like one in five of all stars may have an analog to Earth. That's a lot of habitable worlds, and, indeed, the number of Earths in our own galaxy might be on the order of 50 billion."
Those are big numbers to ponder.
The D.C. conference included a great deal of discussion about the upcoming mission of the Hubble's long-anticipated successor: the James Webb Space Telescope. As large as a tennis court, this deep space observatory is scheduled for a 2018 launch and will orbit beyond our moon. The Webb telescope will focus on new planetary discoveries and collect data from the atmospheres of those planets, looking for certain things that might point to what we would consider possible indicators of life.
HuffPost asked Dick, an astrobiologist, for his opinion on the continuing output of UFO reports around the world.
"I try to keep an open mind on this. Ninety-some percent can be explained by natural phenomena, etc. The question is what to do with the other 3 or 4 percent," Dick said. "My opinion is that they should be studied further, on the one hand. By definition, they're something that we don't know what they are. They could be some physical, psychological or social phenomena that we don't know about. But I think it's jumping to a conclusion that they're extraterrestrial. I don't see that evidence.
"I haven't looked at the evidence close enough to say that there's intelligence behind it. But I've seen enough to know that there are unexplained things that we should look at more, and right now, the U.S. government is not doing that."
ISS Expected To Take Back Seat to Next-gen Ariane as Space Ministers Meet in Zurich
Peter B. de Selding – Space News
The space ministers of France, Germany and Italy are scheduled to meet Sept. 23 in Zurich to assess how far they are from agreement on strategy and funding for Europe's next-generation Ariane rocket, upgrades to the light-lift Vega vehicle and — as a lower priority — their continued participation in the international space station.
The meeting should give these governments a better sense of whether a formal conference of European Space Agency ministers scheduled for Dec. 2 in Luxembourg will be able to make firm decisions, or will be limited to expressions of goodwill.
France, Germany and Italy account for most European space spending, and they are the three biggest backers of Europe's launch vehicle and space station programs.
After working through the summer, officials from the three governments and from the 20-nation ESA — pushed by an emerging consensus among industrial contractors and Ariane rocket customers — appear to have settled on an Ariane 6 design that meets the strategic and financial requirements.
Ariane 6, like the Ariane 4 rocket retired in the late 1990s and replaced by the heavy-lift Ariane 5, will start with one version — a common core with a first stage powered by the Vulcain 2 cryogenic engine, an upper cryogenic stage powered by the Vinci engine, and flanked by as many as four solid-rocket boosters, depending on mission requirements.
It is not an entirely new rocket. The Vulcain 2 engine was developed for Ariane 5. The Vinci upper-stage engine was developed for an upgraded Ariane 5, called Ariane 5 Mid-life Evolution, that now appears less likely to win final funding approval at December's ministerial conference.
The Ariane 6 solid-rocket stages, each carrying 120,000 kilograms of propellant, will share development costs with the Vega rocket. The new stages, called P120, will power the first stage of the Vega Consolidated (Vega C) vehicle awaiting government approval.
With so many elements borrowed from other programs, the Ariane 6 could be operational as soon as 2019 or 2020 — just a year or two later than the Ariane 5 ME — at a cost that government officials said would be around 3 billion euros ($3.9 billion).
Ariane 5 ME's development cost has been estimated at 1.2 billion euros. With self-imposed spending limit on rockets of 8 billion euros over 10 years, ESA likely cannot afford to build both Ariane 5 ME and Ariane 6 at the same time. The 8-billion-euro ceiling includes all launcher spending at ESA, including ESA's share of Ariane 5 and Vega operations.
Ariane 6's operating cost, once production reaches its cruise-phase, would be some 90 million euros with four strap-on boosters, and be able to lift 11,000 kilograms of payload into geostationary orbit, the destination of most telecommunications satellites.
The lighter Ariane 6, with per-vehicle production costs estimated at 80 million euros, would be used for European government missions, ultimately replacing the Europeanized Russian Soyuz rocket that is operated from Europe's Guiana Space Center on the northeast coast of South America.
The differences of opinion about Ariane 6, whose design configuration has changed at least twice in the past year, have so preoccupied French, German and Italian government discussions that they have had little time to think about the international space station.
"The station has really not been on the agenda at these meetings," one government official said. "Set alongside the debate over launch vehicles, it doesn't exist. But obviously it needs to be addressed, once the launcher issues are settled."
Pleading empty pockets, Italy sharply reduced its space station contribution in 2012. Germany picked up the tab, with a small assist from Britain. German officials, who in recent years have been the station's biggest European supporters, have insisted they will not do so again.
If other governments cannot commit to operating the station, German officials have said, then so be it.
Government officials have said it is all but inconceivable that ESA ministers will opt out of the station before 2020, especially since they have already started investing in a service module for NASA's Orion crew-transport vehicle.
The service module is designed to cover ESA's share of the station's common operating costs at least to 2020. But only half the funds needed for it have been allocated. The remaining half awaits the ministerial conference.
Space station proponents in Europe are counting on the push of embarrassment that would follow a European departure, rather than the pull of enthusiasm for the space station, to force ESA governments to find the necessary resources to remain in the station partnership to 2020 and beyond.
Are solar power satellites sitting ducks for orbital debris?
Al Anzaldua, David Dunlop, and Brad Blair - The Space Review
Even conservative estimates of the energy needed in coming years to meet surging world demand are staggering. Energy use, currently over 120,000 billion kilowatt-hours annually, is forecast to double by 2030 or 2040 and to quadruple by 2090 or 2100.1 To meet this growing demand, many space enthusiasts are promoting the idea of space solar power for terrestrial use. Unfortunately, a fierce and growing spoiler lies in wait: orbital debris.
Individuals and governments around the globe are becoming aware of the danger that orbital debris presents both to our modern life and to future plans for the utilization of space. According to NASA, there are over 21,000 Earth-orbiting objects larger than a softball (10 centimeters) and 500,000 shrapnel fragments between 1 and 10 centimeters. The number of shrapnel smaller than 1 centimeters exceeds 100 million.2
Because of their high relative velocity on impact, typically 10 kilometers per second in low Earth orbit (LEO), orbiting shrapnel as small as 5 millimeters can disable a spacecraft.3 The debris is an ever-growing hazard to the International Space Station, future space flights, and the approximately 1,100 operational satellites.4 Indeed, Jer-Chyi Liou, Chief Scientist for NASA's Orbital Debris Program Office, using estimates drawn from six space agencies, recently declared that even without a new catastrophic collision or explosion in orbit, and with 90% compliance with the 25-year deorbiting-after-use guideline, debris will continue to grow over the next 200 years.5 Moreover, it seems reasonable to expect that the increase in debris, by knocking out stationkeeping capabilities of impacted satellites, will worsen Liou's current estimate6 that there will likely be a major catastrophic collision every five to nine years.
Although most of the debris is in LEO, with the greatest concentration found at altitudes of 750–1000 kilometers, there is a considerable amount in medium Earth orbit (MEO) and geostationary Earth orbit (GEO).7 Within two LEO altitude bands, the density needed to initiate the "Kessler Syndrome," i.e., a cascading chain-reaction of collisions leading to uncontrollable growth of debris, may have already been reached.8 High debris density LEO bands should therefore be some of the first targets for remediation and parallel mitigation efforts.
Precious targets in the sky
The risk to present assets
Orbital debris, by threatening our satellites and related spacecraft, is also threatening to shred the very fabric of modern life. Satellites are intimately involved with our everyday activities. Anyone using Google maps, checking the weather forecast, watching TV, listening to the radio, flying on a plane, using an ATM while traveling, accessing certain Internet sites, taking a cruise, or calling on a cell phone makes use of satellite technology.
The risk to future developments
Worse yet, future space technologies and missions are threatened. For example, Solar Power Satellites (SPS) for terrestrial use, an energy technology with enormous potential to improve lives, is also at stake. In 2009, retired astrophysicist Donald Kessler, who started NASA's work on orbital debris more than 30 years ago, stated, "large structures such as those considered… for building solar power stations in Earth orbit could set up a situation where a single satellite failure could lead to cascading failures of many satellites."9 Solar power satellites are not the only future spacecraft that will be threatened. Bigelow Aerospace plans to have its BA 330 habitats serve as crew habitats in orbit starting as early as 2016.10 Add to this the untold satellites and other spacecraft scheduled to go into Earth orbits well into the future.
Risk reduction strategies
But would a hyper-modular system, such as proposed by John C. Mankins, also be vulnerable? Mankins admits that micrometeoroids and orbital debris might impact the SPS and cause damage, but then he argues, "Fortunately, with a hyper-modular architecture such as SPS-ALPHA11 there are no 'single' points of failure. Impacts will cause damage, but it will be mostly inconsequential and will only occasionally require repairs."12
This statement bears skeptical examination. Much shrapnel debris exists below current detection limits, so quantification of risk remains problematic. Further studies of risk and greater detection capacity are needed to reduce uncertainty and to encourage potential investors that the risks to capital invested in solar power satellites (SPS) are acceptable.
Admittedly, the hyper-modularity of the SPS-ALPHA system would mitigate damage from orbital debris. But Mankins proposes multiple SPS-ALPHAs to solve our energy concerns, each measuring approximately three by five kilometers.13 These structures would be very large targets—"sitting ducks," in the case of a Kessler-type runaway debris growth in GEO—and the damage would likely go beyond "inconsequential." Even if the satellite remained structurally intact, maintenance costs would sharply rise. Keep in mind also that to build such a large SPS in the first place, many SPS module-carrying spacecraft would have first to pass through shrapnel-cluttered LEO bands before carrying modules to GEO for construction by telerobotically operated spacecraft.14
Perhaps SPS-ALPHAs require, not only hyper-modularity, but hyper-permeability, such that the modular elements can each separately move to avoid debris. Ideally, the modules would describe an array of SPS-ALPHA elements flying in precise formation and with the ability to self-adjust to avoid danger, reminiscent of a school of fish avoiding the lunge of a predator.
Large debris collisions make spacecraft-killing shrapnel
Large debris, i.e. larger than ten centimeters in diameter and one kilogram in mass, can range in size all the way up to nine-ton rocket bodies and five-ton satellites. These multi-ton bodies make up much of the mass of approximately 6,300 tons of orbital debris, with approximately 2,200 tons in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) alone, and collisions among them are the source of millions of shrapnel fragments.15 For example, China in 2007 intentionally destroyed its Fengyun-1C weather satellite, and in 2009 the non-functioning Russian Cosmos 2251 satellite collided with the American Iridium 33 satellite. One-third of all orbital shrapnel can be traced to just these two collisions.16 Worse yet, orbital shrapnel smaller than ten centimeters and one kilogram is currently untrackable, and because of the high collisional velocities, even shrapnel as small as five millimeters can take out a spacecraft.17
Potential remedies: The large-objects-first strategy
A consensus is building among persons studying the orbital debris problem that the greatest danger will come from inevitable catastrophic collisions between large debris objects, which will produce immediate and subsequent financial loss due to untrackable shrapnel. And because the subsequent financial loss will dwarf the immediate loss, Jerome Pearson and his colleagues Joe Carroll and Eugene Levin in a recent article argued strenuously for dealing with such large objects as soon as possible. 18
But which large debris objects should be the priority? Launching countries are naturally sensitive about the nature of their satellites. Therefore, to induce international cooperation to remove, recycle, or rehabilitate large debris objects, it is best to start with the much less sensitive, but still dangerous, upper stages (i.e. basically aluminum tanks.) They make up about half of the debris mass in LEO. Capturing aluminum tanks would also be a lot less complicated than grabbing satellites with solar arrays, antennas, and nuclear reactors. Because most of the large debris is of Russian origin, a bilateral treaty with Russia would be a good place to start, as discussed below.
Large debris remediation in GEO
Cellularization
The DoD's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), under a demonstration project called Phoenix, is teaming up with the private sector to harvest and "repurpose" still functional components of nonworking satellites in GEO to create new space systems at greatly reduced cost. Beginning in 2016, the project proposes to attach nanosatellites to parts of retired US government and commercial satellites, making the debris a resource. In a process called, "cellularization," nanospacecraft separately carrying out functions such as power, communications, and attitude control would be launched into orbit as secondary payloads. A service-tender spacecraft would then be telerobotically directed to attach such miniature devices to large antennas or other large parts of dead satellites to produce working satellites at a fraction of the cost of new ones launched from Earth.19
Refueling
Another way that defunct satellites in GEO can be rehabilitated, if not already too damaged by orbital debris, is through refueling. The 2010 Space Infrastructure Services (SIS) project by Canadian company MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates (MDA) envisioned both refueling and otherwise servicing satellites in orbit telerobotically. Although MDA and Intelsat in 2012 cancelled their collaborative agreement in which MDA was to develop a satellite capable of servicing Intelsat's 50 operating satellites, MDA remains interested in the concept and is waiting for a possible DARPA contract. 20
In this connection, it is important to note that in May 2013, NASA carried out a series of telerobotically operated "propellant transfer experiments" on an exposed platform of the International Space Station (ISS).21 Although the ISS is in LEO, the refueling technology being developed is intended for use in GEO.
Remediation of large debris in LEO
Various ideas and technologies are being developed potentially to remove, recycle, or reuse (through rehabilitation or repurposing) large debris objects in LEO as well. For example, three companies—Star Technology and Research, Inc., Tether Applications, Inc., and Electrodynamic Technologies, LLC—have been developing a technology called ElectroDynamic Debris Eliminator (EDDE), wherein a long conductor is energized using solar energy to thrust against the Earth's magnetic field. Operating without propellant, EDDE can repeatedly change its altitude by hundreds of kilometers per day and its orbital plane by degrees per day.22
Assuming effective EDDE or other non-propellant debris remediation technologies23 are developed, which LEO orbits are ripe for remediation? About half of the mass of orbital debris in LEO is at inclinations of 71–74°, 81–83°, and sun-synchronous orbits. According to Jerome Pearson, President of Star Technology and Research, Inc., and Joe Carroll, President of Tether Applications, Inc., disposing of upper rocket stages in these inclinations, which would remove 79 percent of the collision-generated debris potential, is a crucial first step to stopping the growth of shrapnel.24
The ISS as the demo site for debris remediation technologies
There are good reasons for testing and developing EDDE and other debris remediation technologies at the ISS. In the first place, the ISS generates ten tons of waste annually and money and effort is already being spent to remove it.25 The ISS also has features that can facilitate early demonstrations of debris removal technologies: its own electrical power supply, a redundant international supply chain, human extravehicular capabilities, robotic grappling and docking, a Ka-band microwave transmission antenna, and a potential for servicing and refueling other spacecraft. Joe Carroll maintains that EDDE vehicles could bring another 100 tons of orbital debris to the ISS for either de-orbiting or salvage.26 Testing and developing EDDE and other technologies, such as energy-beaming and solar electric propulsion (SEP), at the ISS could inform the space development community on techniques and technologies for capturing and handling orbital debris for subsequent de-orbiting, metal recycling, or repurposing.
Once we have learned to deal with this smaller amount of debris in connection with the ISS, we will be better prepared to deal with the estimated 2,200 tons of dangerous large debris objects in LEO and elsewhere. The ISS occasionally has to dodge space debris, and this involves moving its million-pound mass with rocket engines using chemical propellants. Perhaps the ISS-connected debris remediation demonstrations, done with free flyers operating within power beaming-distances,27 could evolve into technologies specifically to protect the ISS and thus obviate the need to burn precious chemical propellant.
Considerations for a debris-remediation economic model
A) Transportation and removal costs
Assuming that SpaceX does indeed manage to get the payload price to LEO down to $2,200/kilogram28 using the Falcon Heavy and eventually half that cost with routine first-stage reuse, debris remediation at LEO and higher using only rockets would remain prohibitively expensive. Fortunately, using EDDE and other propellant-less vehicles to carry out the actual removal of at least a thousand tons of large debris from LEO will make a noticeable difference at a more reasonable cost. In this regard, Jerome Pearson, et al., in considering an orbital debris removal campaign removing only upper stages from LEO, estimate that in seven years of operation "1,000 tons of upper stages and 79% of the collision-generated debris potential can be removed at an average cost of less than $500 per kg and an average annual cost of about $70 million."29
B) Salvaged raw materials and their market value
To the above considerations, we must add the salvage value of 2,000 metric tons of refined metal. Aluminum scrap on Earth is currently around $1,730 per metric ton.30 So, at a minimum, large debris in LEO represents at least $3,460,000 in raw materials. Finished products would have many multiples of that value in orbit. However, as shown below, getting to finished products would involve heavy production costs.
C) Production cost for value-added end products
Salvaged metal can only be worth something to a company ready and able to process it into new tools, devices, or spacecraft for a profit. To get that profit, the potential buying company will have to figure in capitalization costs necessary to transform the metal into final products. Then, the buyer must either sell the new tools, devices, or spacecraft, or use them to provide a service for which there is demand. All these actions within the cislunar market will determine the actual value of the salvaged metal to the first buyer. Also keep in mind that it is unlikely that all those tons of salvaged metal will be bought for space construction in the foreseeable future; a good number of the smaller upper stages and "zombie" satellites will likely be deorbited.
Beyond these preliminary market figures and considerations, on-orbit recycling of materials for construction and manufacturing would counteract the throwaway culture that has made space operations largely beyond the reach of the commercial economy, with the exception of commercial communications and GPS satellites.
On the other hand, lowering or removing the odds of large debris collisions, by whatever means, which threaten a satellite industry grossing over $200 billion annually, is a valuable service that must be quantified. The community of satellite users must remove large debris objects safely and thus lower the risk of catastrophic collisions or face customer anger and loss, coupled with much higher costs for satellite replacement. Retiring this risk of collision will avoid subsequent much larger losses. Market-based insurance and salvage quantification-models could be used to provide economic incentives to remove, reuse, or recycle space debris, and thus save this industry.
Space debris and orbital mechanics
Serious thought should be given to where orbiting scrapyards would best be located and what sorts of vehicles should emplace them. Most orbital debris resides at altitudes of less than 1,500 kilometers, although there is a significant band of debris around GEO. The orbits of scrapyards below 600 kilometers would degrade, depending on the particular altitude, within a few years or months because of atmospheric drag and deorbit.
At around an altitude 650 kilometers, however, orbital debris is relatively sparse and scrapyards there would need only infrequent boosting to maintain altitude. EDDE vehicles could therefore carry large debris objects to cross-truss scrapyards at that altitude. Also, carrying defunct upper stages to 650 kilometers for collection would make the raw aluminum more accessible for subsequent construction in LEO31 and would be quicker than carrying them to deorbiting altitudes.
Orbiting scrapyards could also be located within other sparse debris bands in higher orbits or even around Earth-Moon Lagrange points. Scrapyards embedded in cross-frames in meta-stable halo orbits near Earth-Moon L1/L2 (EML1/ L2), with a little stationkeeping, could serve as a metal-resource site and a nexus for cislunar infrastructure, facilitating the later growth of staging sites, fuel depots, spacecraft construction sites, communications satellites, and habitats with telerobotic capabilities.
Keep in mind that it takes a bit less chemical propellant from LEO to reach EML1/2 than to reach and circularize on orbit in GEO.32 On the other hand, in comparison to going to GEO, reaching EML4 or L5 would take a little more chemical propellant. Scrapyards in these latter locations, however, could remain in stable bean-shaped orbits without stationkeeping for many years. When dealing with low-thrust SEP from LEO to Lagrange orbits in comparison to GEO, the propellant cost is not as favorable.33 With SEP, however, we would be dealing with much less propellant in the first place.
Of course, every proposed salvage operation should entail reducing the risk of orbital debris collisions, not increasing it. Moreover, the act of grappling, controlling, or moving debris should not generate more of the material. Any international system monitoring such salvage operations should operate transparently and give notice of voluntary space "clean up" activities by sovereign nations or parties registered with those countries to do business. Opportunities for third-party review, comments, filing of objections, and unilateral "holds" should all be part of the process. Finally, liability assignment under various scenarios will have to be agreed upon by all parties before orbital remediation can begin.
Editorial | Actions Speak Louder than Words
SpaceNews Editor
U.S. government officials are correct to dismiss the latest space weapons ban proposed by China and Russia as unacceptable, particularly in light of the fact that China, U.S. officials say, continues to test anti-satellite weaponry.
The updated "Treaty on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and of the Threat or Use of Force Against Outer Space Objects" is, like previous versions, all but impossible to verify, primarily because any maneuverable satellite could double as an anti-satellite weapon. The same goes for long-range ground-based missiles, which aren't even addressed in the proposed treaty and which, according to U.S. government officials, pose the greatest threat today to satellites in Earth orbit.
Moreover, the proposed treaty puts no restrictions on the development and stockpiling of space-based weaponry, meaning a signatory could position itself to rapidly deploy such capabilities and simply withdraw from the pact.
Russia and China — China earned international opprobrium in 2007 when it deliberately destroyed one of its own satellites with a ground-launched missile — are of course fully aware of these realities. Yet they continue to propose the treaty, perhaps for no other reason than to put the United States in the position of having to reject it.
All three countries have demonstrated anti-satellite capabilities, but it appears that only China has an active testing program. In July, U.S. government officials assert, China conducted a nondestructive demonstration of a ground-launched anti-satellite missile.
China characterized the event as a successful missile defense intercept test, but U.S. officials, who have access to the world's most capable space and missile-launch surveillance assets, beg to differ. If their assessment is correct, then China is, at the very least, guilty of talking out of both sides of its mouth when it comes to weapons in space.
Because of the military advantages that superior satellite capabilities provide, the United States has the most to lose should Earth orbit become a combat zone. But China has rapidly built up its own space capabilities over the last decade or so, meaning it now has a major, and growing, stake in keeping space free from weapons and warfare.
So does the rest of the world, which relies on satellites for communications, navigation, weather forecasting and other critical functions.
It might be possible to reduce man-made threats to satellites, but the space weapons ban that China and Russia repeatedly offer up before the United Nations is not the answer. A more realistic and effective approach would be to adopt a so-called code of conduct, as proposed by Europe and the United States, that would reduce the chances of accidental collisions in space or misunderstandings that could escalate into deliberate attacks on satellites.
If China and Russia are truly serious about making space a safer place, they should publicly endorse the code of conduct, or some variant thereof. In doing so they would score points in the global diplomatic arena while putting pressure on the United States and Europe to redouble their efforts, which seem to have stalled of late, to get other nations on board.
In the meantime, China, which clearly aspires to be a leader in space, should refrain from anti-satellite demonstrations that only undermine its credibility while putting the rest of the spacefaring world on edge.
END
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