Satellites: October 2007 Archives

Chinese state media is reporting all is go for its Chang’e 1 probe, while Japan’s Kaguya/Selene spacecraft is also readying itself for lunar probing

China’s state media is also reporting that seven Chinese citizens have booked flights with Virgin Galactic

Meanwhile astronauts entered the newly attached International Space Station's Italian built Node 2 module over the weekend and discovered mystery metal shavings while moving other bits of the ISS around

In Russia they are more concerned with planetary defence

And finally Space.com is reporting about the US defense department's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's solar thermal propulsion work and NASAWatch.com has video of VAriable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR) engine testing

More stuff as always from hobbyspace.com

The head of India's space agency worries about the fact that Google Earth has the capability to get images that show things governments would rather people could not see. Well personally I would be very happy to have an independent civilian organisation monitor what is going on, who trusts governments, elected or otherwise, anyway?

Hobbyspace in this blog entry links to this article about how three years after SpaceShipOne there is no obvous sign of major progress. And we can expect more articles like this, not just because the wider media's journalists know nothing about aerospace development but also because the personal spaceflight industry itself has got to do better or investment interest will evaporate.

Space Politics has more on NASA's budget woes

NASASpaceflight.com apparently has some detail about NASA's Lunar Lander progress. Flight reported on the Lander's project office's plans back in July with an expected first design analysis cycle to be completed by August.

Russia is to provide instruments for Moon and Mars missions according to this report

The US Senate has passed an amendment to the appropriations bill that includes NASA's budget to give the US space agency an extra $1 billion. But its not obviously good news, the US House of Representatives has passed its version of the relevant appropriations bill but I am not aware of any extra billion from them. And under US law the Senate and House have to come together to agree a final appropriations bill, and so this amendment could be a very temporary. At the moment NASA is being funded for its 2008 fiscal year that started on 1 October under what is called a continuing resolution, which is what NASA was funded by for its last fiscal year. That resolution is essentially the appropriated 2006 budget.

Cosmiclog podners the next 50 years of spaceflight

Leonard David has a look at what people can expect to see at the forthcoming X Prize Cup

Hobbyspace.com's spacetransportnews.com has plenty of links for everything from the LA Times debate about space with transterrestrial musing's Rand Simberg to the North Dakota student rocket initiative.

Aviation Week and Space Technology has reported that the US Senate has killed plans from the Missle Defense Agency to develop a space based test bed, which means anti-ICBM missiles in space, I think.

MSNBC reports on Russian celebrations of Sputnik. And if you're still hungry for Sputnik stuff then there is this clutch of links from spacetransportnewws.com or you can see ex-NASA engineer and author Jim Oberg's writings on the subject here and here or you could even checkout Flight's Sputnik stuff here.

So 50 years after Sputnik the British seem to be finally joining the rest of the developed world and funding its own astronaut programme.

It wasn't the lead story I was expecting for this anniversary but after five decades of speak no astronaut, hear no astronaut and see no astronaut, this is quite a seismic shift for the UK even if other natoins are wondering, "what took you so long?"

It reminds me of a story one of my German university friends told me about the German philosopher who was asked by his students, if it was the end of the world what would you do? The philospher said, "Go to England." Bewildered his students asked, "why?" The philospher answered, "because everything there happens 100 years later."

Well its fifty years in this case but you get the idea. You can find my own theories about why there has been this sudden change here.

Anyway, on to more important things, what is out there in the blogosphere on this auspicious day?

The European Space Agency has its own take on Sputnik's birthday

NASA took has its own Sputnik special

Sadly the English language section of the Russian Federal Space Agency's website has nothing on Sputnik and neither does the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's English web pages.

In a bizarre twist China has apparently announced that for 800 Yuan tourists can go and watch satellite launches

Hobbyspace.com's spacetransportnews.com has more excellent links as always

MSNBC reports NASA administrator Michael Griffin's comments that China will likely beat the US back to the Moon with a manned mission. Such comments don't instill a huge amount of confidence in NASA's current efforts or maybe it is a scare tactic to get Congress to give them some more money as the agency's budget is now stuck back in a continuing resolution with only 2006 funding levels.

And just to make us feel as though we're back in the good old bad old years of the Cold War MSNBC has another report about some belligerant commenst by a Russian general about orbital weapons.

But then again you could always place your trust in the Force and help this team out with their 6.4m (21ft) long rocket powered model of the X-wing fighter from the Star wars movies.