Space

Space4Impact, EPFL’s Space Center eSpace, E2MC Ventures, and Space Innovation joined forces to launch an online course on the New Space Economy. The program is available on edX as a free EPFLx course. Learners can watch more than 30 video lectures by space experts from various domains within startups, academia, the private sector, and public institutions in Switzerland.

The United States’ National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) is partnering with the United Kingdom’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) on the historic first commercial rocket to be launched from the UK, the MOD announced. The launch will be carried out by Virgin Orbit, sending 9 multinational rideshares to orbit aboard its LauncherOne and a modified Boeing 747 aircraft.

Small satellite manufacturer Terran Orbital, primarily serving the United States aerospace and defense industry, announced it has shipped its CAPSTONE satellite to a launch site in New Zealand. The satellite will launch on Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket using a Lunar Photon satellite upper stage to deploy the spacecraft on a lunar transfer trajectory. 

The second Edition of Space Café Austria by Judith Delany took a closer look at the trends and recent developments in European Space Policy. Host Judith Delany spoke with Tomas Hrozensky of the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI), an expert in the field. Tomas has been a Researcher at ESPI since July 2018. He holds an MA and PhD

Startup AST SpaceMobile, announced it has received an experimental license from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) supporting its US-based testing of the BlueWalker 3 satellite. The company is building the first space-based cellular broadband network designed to be accessible directly by standard mobile phones, SpaceMobile said.

The Near Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec), a key instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope (Webb) has successfully passed all its functional tests including subsystems and mechanisms, Airbus said. The NIRSpec commissioning team, including experts from Airbus, performed the required tests as Webb continues cooling down to cryogenic temperatures.

UK-based space situational awareness specialists Northern Space and Security Limited (NORSS), and Australian Nominal Systems, have been awarded a contract to develop ARTSIM a spacecraft and missions simulator solution to support the UK Ministry of Defence’s (MoD) future satellite operational plans, NORSS said. to provide a modular, data representative satellite simulation architecture.

Australian space company, Gilmour Space Technologies, announced that is has been selected to develop and launch a new sovereign surveillance satellite for the Department of Defence, as part of the government’s AU $7 billion investment in new space capabilities. The AU $15 million partnership is in line with Australia’s recently released Defence Space Strategy.

The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), the U.S. Air Force Research Lab and Aerojet Rocketdyne completed a free flight test of Lockheed Martin’s Hypersonic Air-breathing Weapon Concept (HAWC).  The vehicle accelerated to and maintained a speed faster than five times the speed of sound after release from the carrier aircraft.

Chinese space startup LinkSpace, carried out a static fire test of its Reusable Launch Vehicle T6 (RLV-T6) equipped with new Fengbao-1 methane-fueled engines, the company said. The 14.5-meter tall rocket will be launched to the Kármán line (100 km) and then landed with the help of landing legs and grid fins.