Satellite

Germany based Rivada Space Networks, a new company launching a constellation of 600 Ka-band low Earth orbit communications satellites, will be debuting the company’s system at Satellite 2022 in Washington DC.  Rivada Space was founded by U.S. wireless communications innovator Rivada Networks.

NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS) rocket with the Orion spacecraft atop has rolled out for the first time for a final uncrewed test before the Artemis 1 Moon mission. It took 10 hours and 28 minutes for SLS and Orion to reach the launch pad four miles away from the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB).

Russian cosmonauts Denis Matveyev, Oleg Artemyev and Sergey Korsakov, the first cosmonauts to arrive on the ISS since Russia invaded Ukraine, docked wearing bright yellow suits with blue trimmings. As the standard-issue Russian uniform is blue, speculations started as to why they chose the colours of the Ukrainian flag.

Australian launch service provider Southern Launch, and not-for-profit organisation for the advancement of the engineering field within Australia, Engineers Australia, have signed a service level agreement to boost the careers of the company’s engineering team.

As part of the partnership between SpaceWatch.Global and The Strategist, we have been granted permission to publish selected articles. This is “Australia needs to aim high with space strategic update” by Malcolm Davis, originally published on 11 March 2022. Last week at the 13th Australian Space Forum in Adelaide, the minister for science and technology, Melissa Price, 

Last weekend I received a link to the presentation that Steve Collar (CEO of SES) gave during GovSatCom22 in Luxemburg late last month. Steve is someone I genuinely respect, and we go back a long time. I fondly remember working with him on a DVB-RCS project back in 2003 that we thought was going to be critically important for the future of our industry,

The German Bundeswehr (Federal Defense) has awarded Polaris a contract to build and flight-test a scaled demonstrator of its Aurora space launch and hypersonic system, Polaris reported. The vehicle is a downscaled version of the future spaceplane powered by a reusable liquid-fuel rocket engine.

ESA announced the suspension of the ExoMars programme in alignment with the sanctions imposed on Russia by its Member States. ESA’s ruling Council assessed the situation that the war in Ukraine caused with regards to ExoMars, and came to a unanimous decision. The Council came to the conclusion that it was impossible to keep cooperating with Roscosmos on the ExoMars rover mission.

SpaceWatch.Global is pleased to present the 50th episode in our podcast series The Space Cafe Podcast #050: Hansjörg Dittus, about Europe's Role in Space (an honest discussion). Hansjörg Dittus served for many years on the board of the German Aerospace Center. Against the backdrop of dramatic developments in the crisis with Russia,

A new €1 billion fund called “Cassini” was announced at the last European Space Conference, this fund will help to boost start-ups and space innovation, including supporting the plans for a more comprehensive strategy on developing European space launch vehicles.