ISU MSS 2024

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Independent Enquiry Commission Concludes Vega-C VV22 Failure

The Arianespace and ESA-set up independent inquiry commission has disclosed its conclusions on the reasons for the loss of the Vega-C VV22 mission after its launch in French Guiana on Tuesday, 20 December 2022. According to the Commission, after the nominal functioning of the Vega-C first stage P120C and nominal ignition of the second stage (Zefiro 40), a progressive decrease in the chamber pressure 151 seconds after lift-off led to the loss of the mission.

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#SpaceWatchGL Opinion: On Chinese Balloons And Other Devices – A Space perspective

The past four weeks have been eventful for the US Air Force. On Wednesday, February 1st 2023 an unknown floating balloon, the size of three school buses, was spotted flying over Billings, Montana, at around 18 km above the ground. On Friday, February 3rd, Mao Ning, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) Foreign Minister’s spokesperson, released a note claiming that the airship was  “of a civilian nature, used for scientific research such as meteorology. Affected by the westerly wind and its control ability is limited, the airship seriously deviated from the scheduled route. China regrets that the airship strayed into the United States due to force majeure”.

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Spaceflight Inc. Readies BlackSky Satellites for Launch

Spaceflight Inc. has announced it will launch two BlackSky satellites aboard Rocket Lab’s next mission called “The Beat Goes On,” from Mahia, New Zealand. U.S.-based satellite maker LeoStella manufactured the satellites, which are now in New Zealand for the final stage of integration, with co-engineering from with BlackSky. The two spacecraft onboard the mission will be the 15th and 16th satellites in BlackSky’s growing constellation.

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constellr and Exolaunch Sign Multi-Launch Agreement to Deploy Microsat Constellation

Exolaunch's CarboNIX separation system

Two Germany NewSpace companies - constellr, a technology company enabling space-based water, temperature and carbon measurement for the agricultural sector, and Exolaunch, a global provider of launch, deployment and in-space logistics services, have announced the signing of the multi-launch agreement (MLA) for constellr’s high precision versatile ecosphere monitoring (HiVE) microsat constellation. 

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CesiumAstro Wins SDA Award to Advance AESA Development

Shey SabripourCesiumAstro has announced that it won a contract through the Department of Defense’s (DoD’s) Space Development Agency (SDA) to advance the company’s multi-beam L-band active electronically scanned array (AESA) antenna. Building upon prior efforts, CesiumAstro will continue developing the Link 16–compatible AESA ahead of the agency’s migration to the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA) global satellite network, the LEO-based satellite constellation built to enable key DoD space capabilities.

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Register Today for our Space Café ,,33 minutes with Maya Glickman-Pariente” on 14 March 2023

This Space Café WebTalk will feature Maya Glickman-Pariente - CEO, SPACECIALIST, Head of Space Operations, SAS Founder of “My space academy” - in conversation with Torsten Kriening, publisher of SpaceWatch.Global. "The next generation of space operation - do we really need humans in the loop?" As we dive deeper (or fly higher) into the era of satellite constellations, with dozens, and sometimes thousands of satellites operated simultaneously by privately owned companies, we see a wind of change in the SatOps business. This change is inevitable.

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ESO and Astronomy Groups Petition the UN COPUOS

Space debris around the Earth. Image: ESA

An international collaboration involving ESO has submitted a paper to the United Nations Committee on Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) proposing a new Expert Group to protect dark and quiet skies. The paper underwent discussion at the Scientific and Technical Subcommittee (STSC) of COPUOS under a special agenda item on Dark and Quiet skies.

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UNIO appoints Telecom executive as new CEO

UNIO LEO satellite

UNIO, a European LEO satellite operator space start-up, has appointed Katrin Bacic as their new CEO. Previously Bacic was Managing Director and Chief Strategy Officer at Wayra Germany, the innovation and investment unit of telecommunications group Telefónica from 2018 to 2023. Christian Lindener had led UNIO as interim CEO since its founding who will now focus on developing the European business of US venture builder Mach49 as its partner. 

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