Space

Our new episode of Space Café "Black Ops by Dr. Emma Gatti" inaugurates in a time of conflict on Earth. A conflict that, inevitably, has already had an impact on the Space sector, like on so many other sectors. Many space related civil operations have been disrupted, Roscosmos suspended all the EU launches, Soyuz spacecraft is under sanctions

NASA announced that it will support the development of a second lunar lander to transport astronauts to and from the Moon’s surface to provide competition with SpaceX during the sustainable phase of the Artemis program. The agency will soon kick off the Sustaining Lunar Development award for a second lander separate from the existing Human Landing System (HLS).

Danish ESA astronaut Andreas Mogensen has been assigned a long-duration mission to the ISS and is scheduled to fly as the pilot of a Crew Dragon spacecraft in mid 2023 or early 2024, ESA announced. Mogensen’s first trip to the Station was a 10-day mission named Iriss in 2015.

Washington-based mobile connectivity company Kymeta, has signed a distribution partner agreement with OneWeb to offer satellite broadband services around the globe, Kymeta said. The agreement enables Kymeta to resell OneWeb services to government and commercial customers globally.

Euroconsult has released the 6th edition of its High Throughput Satellites (HTS) report, an in-depth analysis of geostationary (GEO) and non-geostationary (NGSO) HTS markets. The report is extended to major drivers, strategic issues, competitive landscape and detailed forecasts of capacity supply and demand

Australia announced the establishment of the Defence Space Command, a space defence agency to secure the country's place in the cosmos. The Space Command is designed to counter the US, Russia and China’s ability to destroy a satellite in space. The agency will also aim to increase the national understanding of space threats.

Expedition 66 Flight Engineers Raja Chari of NASA and Matthias Maurer of ESA spent 6 hours and 54 minutes outside the ISS during the 248th spacewalk to carry out preparations for an upcoming solar array installation. Maurer and Chari installed hoses on one of the six radiators that keep systems at the proper temperature.

PSN Group (Pasifik Satelit Nusantara) has entered into contracts to build the Nusantara Lima Satellite with a planned launch in 2023 to augment the capacity of SATRIA-1, the company said. These two very high throughput satellites will make PSN one of the biggest satellite capacity providers in Asia, according to the firm. Its 330 Gbps service will cover Indonesia and its surrounding areas.

Blue Origin announced that the sixth crew member to join New Shepard’s 20th mission will be New Shepard Senior Director and Chief Architect, Gary Lai. He joins Marty Allen, husband and wife duo Sharon and Marc Hagle, Jim Kitchen, and Dr. George Nield. Lai will be replacing Pete Davidson, who is no longer able to fly to the edge of space this time.

Defense products and technologies provider Leonardo DRS, announced it has signed a definitive agreement to sell its Global Enterprise Solutions (GES) business to connectivity provider SES, for US $450 million. The transaction has already been approved by the board of directors of both companies.