North America

In this session of Space Cafè “Moriba’s Vox Populi 07” Dr. Moriba Jah talked about Space threats or hazards? Can cultural differences explain space actor behavior(s)? Threats require the concurrent existence of opportunity, capability, and intent to cause harm. Physical sensors can help us measure and know the opportunity and capability. But not the intent. How do we infer intent?

On Monday, UBS analyst Myles Walton downgraded Virgin Galactic (ticker: SPCE) from Hold to Sell as the company is delaying commercial space flights. The news disappointed investors who had expected revenue-generating, commercial operations to start early next year. Last week Virgin said they would reorganise their development and test flight schedule.

Following a successful launch on Saturday, analysis showed that Lucy’s second array had not fully latched. NASA is currently investigating what caused the failure and how they could achieve full deployment of the solar array. The solar panels were successfully deployed 91 minutes after a smooth launch.

In this Space Café Radio – on tour in Geneva, SpaceWatch.Global event coordinator Chiara Moenter spoke with Almudena Azcárate Ortega, Associate Researcher at UNIDIR during the UNIDIR Outer Space Security Conference 2021 about her research, the work at UNIDIR, and the work that went into the organization of the conferences.

NASA’s Lucy mission to Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids successfully launched on Saturday on a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41. Over the next 12 years, Lucy will fly by one main-belt, and seven Trojan asteroids. The spacecraft will investigate “fossils” of planetary formation.

The 2021 Wernher Von Braun Symposium, October 12 - 14, an annual event that brings together the rocket, propulsion and aerospace part of the NASA community, has just ended in Huntsville, Alabama. This year’s priorities were linked to the upcoming launch of Artemis I, the first unmanned phase of the long-term Artemis project,

In the past few months, the space industry experienced some new milestones. Civilian astronauts launched into space. Richard Branson flew Virgin Galactic on July 11, 2021. Jeff Bezos flew with Blue Origin on July 20, 2019, and a second flight on October 13, 2021, with the iconic William Shatner. SpaceX’s Inspiration4 launched on Sept 15, 2021,

SpaceLink announced it has chosen OHB Systems as the preferred tenderer for the initial constellation of four high-capacity optical relay satellites after a comprehensive tender process. The parties are currently in advanced contract negotiations about the manufacturing and delivery of the initial constellation.

Planet Labs announced the launch of Pelican, a new line of imagery satellites to upgrade the company’s existing constellation of the 21 SkySat spacecraft. With the new, higher-resolution satellites the company can provide faster and near-real time data to customers, Planet said.

Since the dawn of the first ‘Space Age’ in 1957, space-related technologies have transformed our lives, revolutionising communications, medicine, navigation, finance, agriculture and computing, to name but a few. Space is an important element of critical infrastructure to support the world economy, international trade and investment, strategic thinking, military strategy, national security,