Space

SpaceWatch.Global has been granted permission to publish selected articles and texts. This is “Space Travel Reality Show Partnered With NASA, Featured On Colbert”, originally published 13 April 2021 at Forbes by Laurel Donnellan. Space Hero will be the world's first global competition to send a civilian into space on a $55M, 10-day trip to the International Space Station.

Paris, 23 April 2021. – The German Aerospace Center (DLR) wants to land a radiation detector on the Moon onboard Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander in 2021, Astrobotic said. DLR will send the detector to measure key radiation data on the flight to the Moon and on the lunar surface.

Paris, 23 April 2021. – Airbus Defence and Space will launch a small Earth observation satellite with Isar Aerospace’s Spectrum launch vehicle, the company said. “This constitutes the first major launch contract between an established space company and a privately financed European launcher company,” the startup said.

Paris, 23 April 2021. – Fresh wind in GEO: The European Space Agency (ESA) and Airbus completed the design of OneSat, a new standard of a software defined and fully reprogrammable satellite platform, Airbus and ESA said. The fully reconfigurable OneSat product line features major innovations and disruptive technologies, ESA and Airbus said.

Paris, 23 April 2021. – The UK startup Satellite Vu raised €4.16 million to launch “the world’s first satellite constellation capable of imaging the thermal footprint of any building on the planet every 1-2 hours”, the company said. The seed round was led by Seraphim Capital.

During this week’s Space Café episode, SpaceWatch.Global publisher Torsten Kriening had the chance to speak with space reporter, Theresa Hitchens. Theresa is a space and air force reporter at Breaking Defense, a digital magazine that reports on the strategy, politics and technology of the international defence sector.

Paris, 22 April 2021. – Another breakthrough: NASA’s Mars rover Perseverance was able to extract oxygen from the Red Planet’s thin, carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere, the U.S. space agency said. “While the technology demonstration is just getting started, it could pave the way for science fiction to become science fact – isolating and storing oxygen on Mars”, NASA said.

Paris, 22 April 2021. – SpaceX and NASA are targeting tomorrow, Friday, 23 April, for the Crew-2 launch to the International Space Station (ISS), SpaceX said. Falcon 9’s launch of Dragon’s second six-month operational crew mission to the ISS is scheduled for Friday, with a back-up opportunity on Monday, SpaceX said.

Paris, 22 April 2021. – Virgin Orbit will launch a series of six hyperspectral LEO satellites for the defense and security company QinetiQ and the geospatial analytics company HyperSat, Virgin Orbit said. Virgin Orbit will provide launch services for each satellite via its LauncherOne system. The first satellite will launch no earlier than 2023.

Paris, 22 April 2021. – Moon missions will generate more than $42 billion of revenue for the international space sector, NSR newest Moon Markets Analysis report found. The report forecasts 140 Moon Missions launching over the next decade to generate $42.3 billion, NSR said. Major growth areas include orbital and surface infrastructure building.