Europe

The Drag Augmentation Deorbiting System (ADEO) breaking sail was successfully deployed from the ION satellite carrier in late December 2022. A sail area of 3.6 square meters autonomously deployed from a small packing size of 10 x 10 x 10 cm to demonstrate deorbiting satellite technology.

In this Space Café Radio, SpaceWatch.Global publisher Torsten Kriening spoke with Simonetta Cheli, Director of Earth Observation Programmes and Head of ESRIN (D/EOP) at the European Space Agency (ESA) at the 15th European Space Conference in Brussels. This conference is one of the very important yearly high-level gatherings of the key stakeholders of the European space domain in the Egmont Palace in Brussels under the 2023 theme “Securing the Future of Europe in Space”.

AstroForge Inc. has announced that it has signed a contract with Orbital Astronautics Ltd (OrbAstro), a satellite and in-orbit service provider, to fly a 100kg-class spacecraft into deep space for an asteroid survey mission. The spacecraft will tentatively launch in late 2023 with Intuitive Machines, a space exploration, infrastructure, and services company, using a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The mission serves as a prospecting activity and stepping-stone towards AstroForge’s ambitions for asteroid mining.

In this German Space Café Radio – Space Café Germany Host Andreas Schepers spoke with Dr. Kai Noeske, Communication Programme officer for science at the European Space Agency (ESA). The interview was conducted during this year’s ILA Berlin which is the largest aerospace trade show in Germany which took place June 22 – 26, 2022.

This Space Café Italy will feature Gino Bucciol , Officina Stellare’s Co-Founder and Chief Business Development Officer, in conversation with Dr. Emma Gatti, Editor-in-Chief and correspondent of SpaceWatch.Global for Italy. The seventh episode of Space Café Italy, an original Space Café series dedicated to the Italian space market, will feature a unique company in the space panaroma. Well known internationally for its opto-mechanical systems and cutting-edge telescope lenses, Officina Stellare has become a symbol of that unique Italian craft that merges state-of-the art technology with design and top-level manufacturing.

In this German Space Café Radio – Space Café Germany Host Andreas Schepers spoke with Prof. Dr. Matthias Sperl, Group head at the DLR's Institute of Material Physics in Space,  and Professor for Physics of granular materials at the University of Cologne. The interview was conducted during this year’s ILA Berlin which is the largest aerospace trade show in Germany which took place June 22 – 26, 2022. 

The coming of the end of the ISS era brings forward a series of fundamental questions: what will happen after the ISS is discontinued? Is a new epoch of privately-owned, low orbit on the rise?

In this German Space Café Radio – Space Café Germany Host Andreas Schepers spoke with Dr. Melanie Heil,  Space Weather Space Segment Coordinator at the European Space Agency (ESA). The interview was conducted during this year’s ILA Berlin which is the largest aerospace trade show in Germany which took place June 22 – 26.

Airbus has signed a contract with the Belgian Ministry of Defense to provide tactical satellite communications services for a 15-year period. The Armed Forces will utilize channels of the Airbus UHF (Ultra High Frequency) military communications hosted payload on board a commercial telecommunications satellite manufactured by Airbus.

Myanaric has announced an order for a small number of CONDOR Mk3 terminals by Japan-based WARPSPACE. WARPSPACE will use the terminals to establish a commercial optical data relay network for Earth observation satellites, with product deliveries scheduled for 2023, 2024, and 2025.