All Space articles – Page 184
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Eurockot plans Iridium launch on converted SS-19 ballistic missiles
The Russian-German Eurockot company has won a contract from Motorola for the December launch of two Iridium mobile communications satellites. This will be the first launch by the commercial organisation, which uses Rockot-converted Russian SS-19 intercontinental ballistic missiles as launch vehicles. Eurockot, a joint venture of DaimlerChrysler Aerospace and ...
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NASA gives Hamilton $115 million Space Station contract
Hamilton Sundstrand has won a $115 million contract from NASA to design, develop and qualify water and oxygen generation assemblies for the International Space Station (ISS). This is one of the largest development programmes undertaken by the company, which will be renamed Hamilton Sundstrand Space Systems International, following United ...
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Former astronaut questions Shuttle flight rate
Tim Furniss Former Shuttle astronaut Brewster Shaw, now heading the Boeing space station programme, has questioned the optimistic flight rate of 10 to 12 missions per year which NASA is suggesting may be required to keep the International Space Station (ISS) on target for completion in 2004. Shaw, ...
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Shuttle could fly until 2020
NASA's Space Shuttle could still be flying in the year 2020 or even 2030, a Boeing executive said yesterday. Richard Stephens, vice-president and general manager of the company's reusable space systems division, says the Shuttle's four-orbiter fleet, which is approaching its 100th flight, is only 25% through its lifetime. ...
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Plate supplier
A new century has arrived at Hall 4/F11, where a leading name in the aluminium industry is making its first appearance at the Paris air show. Major commercial and military aircraft manufacturers have made Century Aluminium a preferred supplier of heat-treated plate. Aerospace plate is Century's premier product, ...
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Fear of failure makes launch industry nervous
Tim Furniss Satellites failing in space. Spacecraft problems delaying launches. Launch failures. This has been the story of the past year - and the nightmare may not be over. What has gone wrong? Today, we depend on satellites to such an extent that it can directly affect us. ...
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First European experiments for ISS ready to fly
Two European Space Agency (ESA) experiments will be flying on the International Space Station (ISS) later this year. Flying on Russia's Zvezda service module in November will be a global transmission services (GTS) service and the Matroshka radiation monitor, ESA announced at the show. The GTS uses ...
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ESA plans mission to retrieve Mars sample
Tim Furniss The European Space Agency (ESA) and the French space agency (CNES) are part of an international effort to return samples of the Martian surface to Earth in 2008. The Mars bid will begin in 2003 with the launch of a Delta III booster which will despatch ...
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Phantom Works tackles advanced commercial design
Boeing's Phantom Works, which started life in secrecy as part of fighter builder McDonnell Douglas, has begun to get involved in advanced development work for Boeing's commercial airliner group. The Phantom Works is now a "virtual" operation, headquartered in St Louis, but with outposts at all of Boeing's major ...
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Female team shows who's boss
The success of Thermal Electronics is testament to the business acumen of the fairer sex. The female-owned company specialises in the production of custom cable and wire harness assemblies, printed circuit board assemblies and electronic assemblies. It now manufactures to NASA specifications through its participation in the International Space Station ...
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New steps to orbit
With a sixth commercial launch planned by year-end, the Euro-Russian Starsem has hit the market with a bang Tim Furniss/LONDON The Euro-Russian Starsem commercial satellite launcher consortium is an international success story. Starsem plans three more commercial Soyuz launches of 12,450kg (27,400lb) Globalstar low earth orbit (LEO) mobile ...
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Expendable evolution
Expendable launcher makers are trying to keep their concept alive Andrzej Jeziorski/PARIS Amid predictions of a satellite launch boom in the coming decade, space industry executives, financiers and insurers from around the world gathered in Paris in May for the first world summit on the space transportation business. ...
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Science still the 'pillar' of ESA: Rodota
Tim Furniss Science is still "the pillar" of the European Space Agency (ESA), director general Antonio Rodota said at a press breakfast yesterday. In the "shaping and sharing of the future of European space," science hasn't always received such bullish support but Rodota emphasised its importance when he ...
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NASA orders hybrid Delta for SIRTF launch
NASA has contracted Boeing to supply a hybrid Delta booster to launch its Space Infrared Telescope Facility (SIRTF). The booster is a Delta II with the nine large strap-on boosters from the Delta III. This booster is also available to commercial customers for launches of 2,030kg (4,400lb) payloads ...
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Discovery paves way for first crew to join the Space Station
Tim Furniss/LONDON The Space Shuttle Discovery landed at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) on 6 June after the nine-day, 19h mission STS96 to prepare the International Space Station (ISS) for the first resident crew next March. This date depends on the successful launch in November of Russia's Zvezda ...
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Starsem wins Mars Express launch contract
Tim Furniss The European Space Agency (ESA) has formally contracted Starsem to launch the Mars Express spacecraft in June 2003 aboard a Soyuz booster from Baikonur. Starsem is a consortium operated by Russian company, Samara, which manufactures the Soyuz, the Russian Space Agency and Europe's Arianespace and Aerospatiale. ...
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High concepts, low risk
Private enterprise is driving the future of space transport with a wealth of reusable launch vehicle concepts Andrzej Jeziorski/PARIS From man's earliest forays into space up to the arrival of NASA's Space Shuttle, every launch, manned or unmanned, necessarily destroyed the launch vehicle. Even today, the Shuttle is the only ...
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Shuttle changes
New cockpits will bring the Shuttle into the space age Tim Furniss/LONDON Milliseconds can make a big difference during a Space Shuttle launch. The faster the crew can react to a problem, the greater possibility of avoiding disaster. That is where "glass cockpits" - cockpits with digital displays - come ...
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Launch failures prompt Boeing to form review team
Boeing has formed a mission assurance review team to examine the company's Delta, Sea Launch and Inertial Upper Stage (IUS) programmes following recent launch vehicle failures. A Delta III failed this May as did an IUS, aboard a Titan IVB, in April. The team will examine organisational roles ...
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Indian ambition
India's determination to become a commercial space power is beginning to pay dividendsTim Furniss/LONDON India has underscored its determination to become "a space power in the next century" by developing a geostationary satellite launch vehicle (GSLV) with which to enter the international commercial launch market. Not only is ...