NASA confirms Dragonfly mission despite doubled costs

NASA has approved for development a mission to Saturn’s moon Titan despite a cost that has doubled since the agency selected the mission nearly five years ago. NASA announced April 16 that the Dragonfly mission had passed its confirmation review. Passing the review allows Dragonfly, a nuclear-powered rotorcraft that will travel to various locations on Titan to study the moon’s habitability, to move into full-scale development. The mission went through part of its confirmation review last fall, but the agency said in November that it would defer a final decision on the mission until the spring, after the release of the fiscal year 2025 budget proposal. NASA also announced then that the launch of the mission, previously scheduled for July 2027, had slipped a year to July 2028. The confirmation review sets a formal commitment by NASA to the cost and schedule for a mission. NASA said that it confirmed a July 2028 launch for Dragonfly and a total mission cost of $3.35 billion. That cost is far higher than what NASA approved when it selected Dragonfly in June 2019 as its latest New Frontiers mission. At that time, the mission had a cost cap of $850 million for what NASA designates as Phases A through D, which excludes launch and operations after launch. NASA, in its announcement about the confirmation, acknowledged the total lifecycle cost, which does include launch and operations, was double from what that earlier estimate. The agency blamed several factors, including replanning due to budget constraints, impacts of the pandemic and supply chain challenges, and an “in-depth design iteration.”

NASA's Dragonfly mission is now scheduled to launch in 2028 and arrive on Saturn's moon Titan in 2034. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Steve Gribben

In a statement to SpaceNews April 19, NASA said the costs included in that original cap increased from $1 billion in “real year” dollars, adjusted for inflation, to $2.1 billion, hence the statement that costs had doubled.

“In each of the three fiscal years following Dragonfly’s selection, NASA imposed a cost cap in the current year due to budget constraints. The cumulative impact of these early NASA-directed replans, and another after the Preliminary Design Review (PDR), are responsible for nearly two thirds of the increase in Phase A-D costs,” NASA stated.

“The Dragonfly project also conducted an in-depth design iteration prior to PDR,” NASA added. “The increased costs of that, combined with COVID-driven increases in labor rates and the costs of parts and materials, are responsible for the balance of the increase in Phase A-D costs.”

Those increases are apparent in NASA’s fiscal year 2025 budget proposal. NASA is requesting $434.6 million for Dragonfly in 2025, compared to a projection of $355.5 million for the mission in the agency’s 2024 budget request. For fiscal years 2025 through 2028, NASA is now projecting spending $1.68 billion on Dragonfly, double the projection for the same period in its 2024 proposal.

NASA also anticipates spending more on Dragonfly’s launch. NASA said it will procure a heavy-lift launch vehicle for the mission later this year that will allow Dragonfly to arrive at Titan in 2034. That is the date planned when NASA selected the mission in 2019, despite a two-year delay in its launch since then.

They agency remains supportive about the mission despite the cost challenges. “Dragonfly is a spectacular science mission with broad community interest, and we are excited to take the next steps on this mission,” Nicola Fox, NASA associate administrator for science, said in the statement about Dragonfly’s confirmation. “Exploring Titan will push the boundaries of what we can do with rotorcraft outside of Earth.”

Those cost increases, along with broader budget pressures on NASA in general and its planetary science programs in particular, have implications for future programs. Dragonfly is the fourth mission in the New Frontiers line, after New Horizons, Juno and OSIRIS-REx. NASA had planned to release a call for proposals for the fifth New Frontiers mission in 2023, but has delayed that to no earlier than 2026.

The agency has also warned of likely delays in calls for future missions in the Discovery line of planetary science missions, with lower cost caps than New Frontiers, as well as a line of planetary smallsat missions called SIMPLEx. “We have very few knobs that we can turn in order to respond to these short-term challenges in the budget,” said Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s planetary science division, on delays in future calls for mission proposals during an April 15 town hall.

The budget constraints have also affected NASA’s ability to start work on a future flagship planetary science mission, a Uranus orbiter and atmospheric probe that was recommended by the most recent planetary science decadal survey.

“In the current budget environment, we’re unable to begin the studies and activities we think would be required” to start work on the mission, Glaze said at the town hall. NASA had hoped to start work on that this year or next year. “Right now, the current funding situation does not seem to support that.”

Artemis 2 Orion spacecraft starts testing ahead of moon mission with astronauts in 2025

NASA's next moon spacecraft for humans made one small leap into an altitude chamber for vital testing before it brings astronauts on board. The Orion spacecraft for Artemis 2 is slated to fly around the moon with four astronauts no earlier than September 2025 — but first, engineers with NASA want to make sure it is ready for the job. Testing in a vacuum chamber at NASA's Kennedy Space Center began Wednesday (April 10) to assess Orion for "electromagnetic interference and electromagnetic compatibility," NASA officials wrote in a statement. The aim is to make sure the spacecraft can continue working well amid these fields, both spacecraft-generated and space-generated, ahead of the big launch day. The four Artemis 2 astronauts who will fly around the moon aboard Orion are NASA commander Reid Wiseman, NASA pilot Victor Glover (who will become the first Black person to leave low Earth orbit, or LEO), NASA mission specialist Christina Koch (the first woman to go beyond LEO) and Canadian Space Agency mission specialist Jeremy Hansen (the first non-American to achieve the feat). Their spacecraft, now at KSC's Neil A. Armstrong Operations and Checkout Building, is inside a chamber with a lot of moon heritage. It was used to "test environmental and life support systems on the lunar and command modules during the Apollo program" that brought nine astronaut crews to the moon between 1968 and 1972, NASA officials wrote.

The Artemis 2 moon spacecraft lifts into an altitude chamber at NASA's Kennedy Space Center on April 4, 2024. The Orion spacecraft will undergo electromagnetic compatibility and interference testing inside the chamber at the Operations and Checkout Building. (Image credit: NASA/Amanda Stevenson)

The Artemis 2 moon astronauts pose in the well deck of the USS San Diego during recovery exercises on Feb. 25, 2024. From left: Canadian Space Agency mission specialist Jeremy Hansen, NASA mission specialist Christina Koch, NASA pilot Victor Glover and NASA commander Reid Wiseman. (Image credit: NASA/Isaac Watson)

There are multiple altitude chambers available at KSC; Orion is in the west chamber, which was upgraded to "test the spacecraft in a vacuum environment that simulates an altitude of up to 250,000 feet (76.2 km)," NASA wrote.

Technicians hoisted Orion into that chamber on April 4 using a newly installed 30-ton crane in the building, which can move the stacked Orion crew and service modules into the chamber, manipulate the lid of the chamber and carefully transfer the spacecraft in the building's high bay.

While Orion spacecraft have flown to space twice before, this mission will be the first with astronauts on board. It will also test new systems, such as life support. (The spacecraft model's previous journeys were the Artemis 1 uncrewed mission to lunar orbit in late 2022 and a brief trip to Earth orbit in 2014.)

Artemis 2's Orion has more work in store after the altitude chamber. It will next be sent to another zone, called Final Assembly and Systems Testing, in the same KSC building. Then, more altitude testing will happen "to conduct a test that simulates as close as possible the conditions in the vacuum of deep space," NASA wrote. Those altitude tests could begin as soon as this summer.

Artemis 2 will kick off the larger crewed Artemis program, which plans to put boots on the moon again with Artemis 3 as soon as 2026. Both missions were delayed in January 2024 due to technical issues; Artemis 2 was pushed back about nine months while Artemis 3 is forecast to wait an extra year.

The NASA-led Artemis program is eventually slated to put a settlement at the moon's south pole, near water resources that exist there.

The Artemis Accords include 35 countries committing to peaceful space exploration norms led by NASA; a subset of those countries, including Canada, are providing hardware for moon missions. Japan, another signatory to Artemis, committed to a pressurized lunar rover for astronauts and will be the first country other than the United States to land an astronaut on the moon, NASA and Japan announced on Wednesday (April 10).

Scout Space eyes military customers for space domain awareness sensor

Scout Space, a startup based in Reston, Virginia, is developing a space domain awareness sensor aimed at the military market as the U.S. seeks new ways to monitor and protect its assets in orbit. The company on April 4 announced it won a $1.8 million Small Business Innovation Research contract under the SpaceWERX Tactically Responsive Space challenge, in partnership with the Space Systems Command’s Space Safari program office. Scout’s chief executive Philip Hover-Smoot said the company is using a portion of the funding to accelerate the development of Owl, an optical telescope designed to track objects in space with great detail. This can be valuable for the military in situations where they need to identify a specific type of satellite or even its functionality. “The space domain awareness capabilities of the Owl sensor enable flexibility and our ability to quickly respond to meet the mission need,” said Capt. George Eberwine, program manager at Space Safari. “This partnership with Scout is an example of Space Safari’s efforts to accelerate innovation to support future TacRS operations.” Since it was founded in 2019, the company has developed smaller sensors for space traffic management and other applications in low Earth orbit. The Owl sensor is designed for “more exotic deployment opportunities,” said Hover-Smoot, including geostationary satellites and lunar missions. “It is a large sensor and it has substantial power requirements.”

Illustration of Scout Space Owl on an orbital transfer vehicle spacecraft. Credit: Scout Space

The Space Force is going to seek new types of space domain awareness technologies, he added, as the U.S. military is prioritizing space surveillance to defend its assets against potential threats from rivals like China and Russia.

“There is a lot of competition and there is a lot of need as every platform that goes to space needs sensors — for safety and security applications as space becomes more congested,” said Hover-Smoot.

China launches first of a new series of Yaogan reconnaissance satellites

China launched its first Yaogan-42 satellite late Tuesday, adding to the country’s growing military satellite reconnaissance capabilities. A Long March 2D rocket lifted off from Xichang Satellite Launch Center at 6:56 p.m. Eastern (2256 UTC) April 2. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) announced launch success within the hour. CASC’s statement also revealed the previously unknown payload to be Yaogan-42 (01) (“remote sensing-42 (01)”). The satellite was later tracked by the U.S. Space Force’s 18th Space Defense Squadron (SDS) in a roughly 500-kilometer-altitude orbit inclined by 35 degrees. Both Yaogan-42 (02) and its Long March 2D launcher were developed and provided by CASC’s Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST). Neither CASC nor Chinese state media provided any details regarding the classified satellite. These statements omitted the usual general description of Yaogan satellites. Some Yaogan satellites are described as being for purposes including land survey, crop yield estimation, environmental management, meteorological warning and forecasting, and disaster prevention and reduction. Uses of others include “electromagnetic environment detection and related technical tests.”

A Long March 2D lifts off from Xichang spaceport on April 2 (UTC), 2024, carrying the Yaogan-42 (01) satellite. Credit: Ourspace

Outside observers assess Yaogan series satellites to be designated for military and civilian purposes.

The various series of Yaogan satellites are understood to include optical imaging, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) and electronic intelligence (ELINT) satellites. This combination provides high-resolution imagery and all-weather and all-day and night imagery, along with the collection of electronic signals from radar, communication systems and other electronic devices, with coverage of both land and sea.

The vast majority of Yaogan satellites operate in a series of low Earth and sun-synchronous orbits. Some groups of Yaogan satellites, such as Yaogan-31, could be analogous to U.S. Department of Defense Naval Ocean Surveillance System (NOSS) satellite triplets. Other groups, in orbits with inclinations of 35 degrees, ang spaced 60 or 120 degrees apart, provide near constant surveillance over areas of security concern close to China.

Additionally China launched the Yaogan-41 satellite towards geosynchronous orbit in late 2023. That satellite launched on a Long March 5, China’s largest operational rocket. The mission A used a new, elongated 18.5-meter-long, 5.2-meter-diameter payload fairing.

Tuesday’s launch was China’s 15th orbital mission of 2024. The country is aiming to launch around 100 times across 2024. Around 70 will be conducted by CASC, with China’s commercial launch service providers planning around 30 launches.

Commercial activity will include the new Tianlong-3 from Space Pioneer. The 71-meter-long rocket will be capable of lifting 17 tons of payload to low Earth orbit, or 14 tons to 500-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit, according to the firm. The rocket would become China’s second most capable rocket, behind the Long March 5. It is intended to have a reusable first stage in the future.

SAST plans to launch its new, 3.8-meter-diameter Long March 12, previously referred to as the “XLV,” during 2024.

SpaceX launches Eutelsat 36D, lands booster on seventh reuse anniversary

SpaceX launched Eutelsat’s latest geostationary satellite March 30 on a trip due to take around half a year to a geostationary orbit slot over Africa and Eurasia. A Falcon 9 rocket carrying the roughly 5,000-kilogram Eutelsat 36D lifted off 5:52 p.m. Eastern from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, and placed the satellite into a geostationary transfer orbit 34 minutes later. Eutelsat 36D is based on the all-electric Airbus Eurostar Neo platform and equipped with 70 physical Ku-band transponders for providing TV and government connectivity services from 36 degrees East. The satellite has a steerable antenna and is set to replace French fleet operator Eutelsat’s aging Eutelsat 36B satellite. Eva Berneke, Eutelsat’s CEO, said Eutelsat 36D is on track to start commercial services in the second half of 2024, after reaching position and completing health checks. The satellite would be co-located with Ekspress-AMU1, also known as Eutelsat 36C, which Russia’s RSCC operates. Ekspress-AMU1 is one of the satellites Eutelsat leases capacity from to have been caught up in sanctions amid Russia’s war in Ukraine.

SpaceX launched a geostationary satellite for Eutelsat in its 30th mission so far this year. Credit: SpaceX

Reuse anniversary

The rocket’s first stage landed as planned on a droneship in the Atlantic Ocean post-launch, marking the 273rd time SpaceX has returned a Falcon 9 booster for reuse.

SpaceX launched its first reused Falcon 9 booster for a customer seven years earlier in a mission for SES of Luxembourg March 30, 2017.

The Eutelsat 36D launch also marked SpaceX’s 30th mission this year.

But less than four hours later, SpaceX launched a batch of satellites for its Starlink low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband constellation from a nearby pad at the Cape.

SpaceX had planned to launch another set of Starlink satellites March 30 from Vandenberg, California, but scrubbed this mission because of poor weather.

Alongside 35 geostationary satellites, Eutelsat operates a network of more than 600 LEO satellites after buying OneWeb last year.

The company expects to have completed 90% of the ground network OneWeb needs for full global services by the end of June.

According to Eutelsat, multi-orbit capabilities will give it an edge over Starlink and other single-orbit constellations by offering enterprise and government customers extra network redundancy and flexibility.

NASA optimistic about resolving Voyager 1 computer problem

A NASA official says he is optimistic that a problem with the Voyager 1 spacecraft that has kept it from transmitting intelligible data for months can be resolved. Speaking at a March 20 meeting of the National Academies’ Committee on Solar and Space Physics, Joseph Westlake, director of NASA’s heliophysics division, said it appeared possible to fix the computer problem on the nearly 50-year-old spacecraft that has disrupted operations since last November. “I feel like we’re on a path now to resolution,” he said. “They’re on the right path and I think we’re going to get to a point where Voyager 1 is going to continue, alive and kicking in space.” Spacecraft controllers first noticed a problem with the spacecraft in November, when the data transmitted by the spacecraft was unusable. Engineers concluded that the problem was with an onboard computer called the flight data system (FDS), which collects data from the spacecraft’s instruments and other spacecraft telemetry. Several factors have hampered efforts to correct the problem. Voyager 1, launched in 1977, is now more than 24 billion kilometers from Earth, which means it takes 22.5 hours for signals to travel between Earth and the spacecraft. None of the people who developed the FDS in the early to mid 1970s are available to assist now, so the project has had to turn to documentation to help identify the problem.

NASA is optimistic engineers can fix the computer problem that has kept Voyager 1 from transmitting usable data for months. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA announced March 13 progress in fixing the FDS when a command called a “poke” was transmitted to Voyager, and the spacecraft responded by sending back a readout of its memory. The agency said at the time it will compare that readout to one transmitted before the problem to help identify the issue.

Westlake said at the committee meeting that the problem appears to be a corrupted memory unit on the spacecraft. “It’s a part failure on one of the memories and they’re looking for a way to move a couple hundred words of software from one region to another in the flight computer,” he said. A word is two bytes.

He did not estimate how long it would take to make those software changes. NASA, in its latest statement about the spacecraft, said that using the FDS memory readout “to devise a potential solution and attempt to put it into action will take time.”

Defense Innovation Unit awards three contracts for space logistics technologies

The Pentagon’s commercial technology arm, the Defense Innovation Unit, announced March 20 it is funding three projects to explore ways to create a more robust space infrastructure that can support military operations beyond low Earth orbit. The projects were awarded to Blue Origin, Northrop Grumman and Spacebilt. “Each of the companies selected for an award showed strong research and development investments into their particular solutions for use in the commercial market,” said DIU. DIU is partnering with Blue Origin on a space mission called Dark-Sky 1 that will send to orbit a heavy multi-orbit space tug based on the company’s Blue Ring platform. The vehicle will be launched as a rideshare payload on a U.S. Space Force national security mission. Dark-Sky 1 is jointly funded by DIU and Blue Origin. “This effort will be ready for launch in July of this year,” a DIU spokesperson told SpaceNews. “Blue Origin is in the final stages of developing the Dark-Sky 1 mission system, which will demonstrate core mission operation and flight system capabilities.” “The lessons learned from this DS-1 mission will provide a leap forward for Blue Ring and its ability to provide greater access to multiple orbits,” said Paul Ebertz, senior vice president of Blue Origin’s In-Space Systems.

Blue Origin says its Blue Ring orbital transfer vehicle will be able to host more than 3,000 kilograms of payload, operating in Earth orbit through cislunar space. Credit: Blue Origin

On-orbit refueling, manufacturing

Another contract jointly funded by DIU and Space Force is for in-space refueling technologies from Space Logistics, Northrop Grumman’s in-space servicing subsidiary. The government is funding integration of the company’s Active Refueling Moule (ARM) and Passive Refueling Module (PRM) in military spacecraft. These are interfaces to enable docking and transferring of fuel. The PRM will fly on a Space Force operational mission and will be integrated on the company’s new servicing vehicle, called Mission Robotics Vehicle.

A third contract was awarded to reusable spacecraft manufacturer Spacebilt, previously known as Skycorp. DIU wants to validate the company’s approach and methods for in-space assembly and manufacturing for DoD use cases.

“Since award, Spacebilt has progressed toward a mass manufacturable product, conducted risk reduction missions to the International Space Station for their flight hardware, and maturity of their commercially available avionics hardware,” DIU said.

Spacebilt is targeting a late 2026 launch of its multi-orbit logistics vehicle that is launched in a protective container and assembled on orbit.

Established in 2015, DIU acts as a bridge between the Department of Defense and the commercial tech sector. It identifies promising technologies with potential military applications and streamlines the often-bureaucratic acquisition process.

Startical orders test satellites for air traffic surveillance and comms constellation

Spanish defense contractor Indra has teamed up with local air navigation services provider Enaire to order two satellites next year to test their proposed air traffic surveillance and communications constellation. Their joint venture, Startical, said March 18 it has ordered a 20-kilogram satellite from GomSpace and a 110-kilogram satellite from Kongsberg NanoAvionics — the first of more than 270 spacecraft planned for low Earth orbit. Startical said the GomSpace satellite would be deployed in early 2025, followed by NanoAvionics around the middle of the year, but did not disclose launch details. The company plans to test the performance of a receiver for tracking Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) signals from aircraft and a very high-frequency (VHF) radio system for improving pilot communications. Financial and technical details were not disclosed. “Our goal is to become the main global provider of air traffic management technology in the space segment and a market leader in satellite surveillance and voice and data communications services,” Startical CEO J. Enrique González Laguna said in a statement. Satellite operator Viasat seeks to improve airspace-tracking capabilities with its L-band satellites to complement currently congested VHF data links, as part of an air traffic modernization program with the European Space Agency.

NanoAvionics will base its satellite on its MP42 microsatellite bus, like the one pictured here. Credit: Konsberg NanoAvionics

According to ESA, fitting aircraft with higher-bandwidth communications would give air traffic controllers more data to schedule landings in advance, minimizing fuel consumption and maximizing airspace and airport capacity.

Viasat says communications between pilots and controllers using the Iris network could also move from voice to text messages for improved operational safety and efficiency.

Europe’s easyJet recently became the airline to use Iris commercially, Viasat announced Jan 29.

“Iris provides everything the industry needs to modernise Air Traffic Management today and is fully operational,” a Viasat spokesperson said via email.

The service is currently deployed in Europe through a group of 19 air navigation service providers, Viasat added, with more expected to join in the coming months.

Startical said its proposed VHF constellation would use the aeronautical radio communications band approved in December by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), part of the United Nations.

U.S.-based Aireon, which currently provides ADS-B surveillance services using hosted payloads on Iridium Communications’ low Earth orbit constellation, also announced plans March 7 to get a license for operating a space-based VHF system in the newly allocated spectrum band.

Space-based VHF holds particular promise for areas with limited connectivity or without ground infrastructure, Aireon said, such as remote regions and oceanic routes.

Like space-based ADS-B, Aireon said space-based VHF could help improve airspace safety, efficiency, and sustainability by reducing the distance between aircraft and more efficient routing.

“Space-based VHF has tremendous potential for the entire aviation industry,” Aireon CEO Don Thoma told SpaceNews via email, “and it will require investment of the entire industry to be successful. We are looking forward to seeing the results of Starticle’s first satellite launches.”

Thoma said Aireon has spent more than 10 years developing, deploying, and operating what is currently the only global space-based ADS-B system.

The company is looking to draw on this experience for its venture into space-based VHF, along with partners that include Iridium and air navigation services providers based in the United Kingdom, Canada, Ireland, Italy, and Denmark.

Mars Sample Return science continues amid budget uncertainty

THE WOODLANDS, Texas — Efforts by scientists to use a Mars rover to collect samples are continuing even as NASA wraps up a new assessment of when and how those samples will be brought back to Earth. The Perseverance rover, which landed on Mars in February 2021, has filled 26 of its 43 sample tubes, scientists involved with the mission said in presentations at the Lunar and Planetary Sciences Conference (LPSC) here March 12. The rover is climbing up the remains of a river delta that once flowed into Jezero Crater. Of those 26 tubes, 20 contain rock cores, said Meenakshi Wadhwa, a planetary scientist at Arizona State University who serves as principal scientist for Mars Sample Return (MSR) at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Two contain regolith and another holds a sample of the atmosphere, while the other three are “witness tubes” that serve as controls to identify any terrestrial contamination in the other tubes. Two of the remaining 17 tubes are also witness tubes, leaving 15 that can be filled with other samples. Scientists are planning next phases of the rover’s traverse, she said, such as to the crater rim, which promises what she called “an incredible diversity” of rocks of different ages and exposed to different processes, “including materials of astrobiological potential.” That work is ongoing as NASA enters the final phases of a review of the overall MSR architecture, including the schedule and design of the mission that will collect those sample tubes and return them to Earth. After an independent review board, or IRB, concluded that the agency’s existing approach could not meet cost and schedule goals, NASA commissioned an MSR IRB Response Team (MIRT) in October to evaluate alternative approaches.

A sample tube on the Martian surface in the shadow of the Perseverance rover. Perseverance is continuing to collect samples as NASA develops a new plan for returning them to Earth. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

“Much of the work is already complete” by the MIRT, Wadhwa said. The MIRT is expected to complete its work by the end of the month, with NASA releasing its revised MSR plans, and proposed budget, as soon as April.

That has put not just MSR but also NASA’s overall planetary science portfolio in limbo. NASA’s fiscal year 2025 budget proposal, released March 11, left MSR funding as TBD, or to be determined. At the same time, the agency must also develop an operating plan for fiscal year 2024 funding provided by an appropriations bill passed March 8 that instructed NASA to spend at least $300 million, and as much as $949.3 million, on MSR in 2024.

The TBD in the fiscal year 2025 budget request for MSR reflects the uncertainty about the plans for carrying out the program, said Lori Glaze, director of NASA’s planetary science division, during a town hall meeting at LPSC March 11. “We’re trying to give the response team the time they need to complete their assessment and provide the recommendation,” she explained.

Once that work is done, NASA will amend its budget request to seek specific funding for MSR in 2025, but at the expense of the allocations requested for other planetary programs in the original proposal. “I do not expect the top level of the planetary budget to go up above the $2.73 billion” in the original request, she said, which is already fully allocated to other programs. “We need to think about how we support Mars Sample Return within a balanced planetary portfolio and within that $2.73 billion top line.”

NASA faces similar challenges for determining MSR funding in 2024 within the limits set by the appropriations bill. “This is going to be the heart of a very difficult process,” she said.

While providing little information about what the new MSR architecture, and its cost and schedule, will be, NASA officials at the conference reemphasized the scientific value of the program.

“Mars Sample Return is one of the highest priorities in the past two decadal surveys. It is an agency priority,” said Lindsay Hays, acting lead scientist for MSR at NASA Headquarters, during a March 12 presentation. The samples, she said, can serve as a “Rosetta Stone” to decode the early history of terrestrial planets.

Those officials acknowledged, though, the uncertainty about MSR was affecting science planning. That includes potential surveys beyond the crater rim by Perseverance to collect samples. “We’re awaiting to see what the MIRT results are,” Hays said. “The MIRT is going to help us understand what is our future architecture and future schedule.”

She added that “maximizing sample number and simple diversity is absolutely key” for the mission, a point Wadhwa also made.

“We are currently awaiting the outcome of the MIRT in terms of what the timeline is going to look like,” Wadhwa said, which will shape what kind of traverse Perseverance will take to collect additional samples at and beyond the crater rim. “We have an amazing set of rocks awaiting us in those regions.”

Crew-7 returns to Earth

A Crew Dragon spacecraft splashed down early March 12, returning a multinational crew after more than six months of the International Space Station. The Crew Dragon spacecraft Endurance splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast from Pensacola, Florida, at 5:47 a.m. Eastern after a normal reentry. The spacecraft had undocked from the station more than 18 hours earlier. Endurance’s return marked then end of the 199-day Crew-7 mission, which launched last August. On board were NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Satoshi Furukawa and Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov. All four were out of the capsule less than an hour after splashdown. That post-splashdown recovery is among the fastest for the 12 Crew Dragon splashdowns to date. “The SpaceX team did a great job of getting the Dragon capsule out of the water and back on to the ship. They continue to get better and better,” said Steve Stich, NASA commercial crew program manager, in a call with reporters. He said favorable weather conditions, with very light winds and calm seas, likely also contributed to the speedy recovery. The splashdown completed the third flight of Endurance, all long-duration ISS missions. Benji Reed, senior director for human spaceflight programs at SpaceX, noted at the briefing that the capsule has spent 534 days in space, more than any crew-rated vehicle in history.

The Crew Dragon capsule after splashdown on the Crew-7 mission. Credit: NASA/Joel Kowsky Credit: (NASA/Joel Kowsky)

Crew-7 departed the ISS nearly a week after the arrival of their replacements, Crew-8, on another Crew Dragon spacecraft named Endeavour. NASA astronauts Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt and Jeanette Epps, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin will stay on the ISS for the next six months.

Endeavour, Reed added in the call, will overtake Endurance’s current record, with 476 days and counting in space. “The Dragons are a workhorse in the industry.”

The return of Crew-7 frees up a docking port on the station for a cargo Dragon mission, CRS-30, scheduled for launch later this month. That vehicle will remain docked to the station for a month before it returns to Earth. It will be followed by the first crewed flight by Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner, now scheduled for early May.

Stratolaunch performs first powered Talon flight

Stratolaunch conducted the first powered flight of its Talon vehicle March 9, reaching “high supersonic” speeds in the uncrewed test. The Talon-A vehicle, designated TA-1, took off attached to the company’s Roc aircraft from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California at 10:17 a.m. Eastern according to flight tracking data. The plane flew west to a location in the Pacific off the central California coast, where it released TA-1 at an unspecified time. Roc returned to Mojave more than four hours after takeoff. Stratolaunch executives said in a call with reporters that they could not disclose the top speed or altitude of the TA-1 on its flight, citing “proprietary agreements” with unspecified customers. They were, though, satisfied with the flight. “As part of our successful achievement of the test objectives, we did reach that high supersonic regime approaching hypersonic flight,” said Zachary Krevor, president and chief executive of Stratolaunch. Hypersonic flight is typically defined as speeds higher than Mach 5. Aaron Cassebeer, senior vice president of engineering and operations, said the TA-1 achieved its major test objectives, including release from Roc and ignition of its engine, sustained acceleration and climb through high supersonic speeds while maintaining control, then decelerating and gliding to an ocean splashdown. TA-1, an expendable vehicle, was not recovered. “Overall, we’re incredibly pleased with how TA-1 performed today,” he said. “As it stands right now, we are well positioned to continue our planned test series.”

Stratolaunch's Roc aircraft, with the Talon TA-1 vehicle attached between its fuselages, takes off March 9 from Mojave Air and Space Port in California. Credit: Stratolaunch/Matt Hartman

The company’s next vehicle, TA-2, is its first reusable hypersonic vehicle. It is scheduled to begin flight tests in the second half of the year, with another reusable vehicle, TA-3, under construction. Stratolaunch is also modifying a Boeing 747 is acquired last year in Virgin Orbit’s bankruptcy auction to serve as a second air-launch platform.

Stratolaunch was founded more than a decade ago by Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen with the initial goal of providing air-launch services using a giant twin-fuselage, six-engine aircraft. The company at various times considered a variant of SpaceX’s Falcon 9, a vehicle concept called Thunderbolt by Orbital ATK (now part of Northrop Grumman) and that company’s existing, but much smaller, Pegasus XL rocket. It then started work on its own launch vehicle and engine.

The company pivoted after the 2018 death of Allen. The company dropped plans for its own launch vehicle and was later sold to a private equity firm, Cerebus. The company announced in 2020 it would focus instead on developing hypersonic vehicles that would be air-launched by Roc.

The TA-1 flight was also a milestone for Ursa Major Technologies, the company that developed the Hadley engine that powers the vehicle. That engine, which uses liquid oxygen and kerosene propellants, is designed to produce 5,000 pounds-force of thrust. Ursa Major had not disclosed any flight tests of that engine before the TA-1 flight.

Cassebeer said the Hadley engine fired for about 200 seconds on the flight. “The Hadley engine performed very well today. It met all of our expectations,” he said.

Italian space startup Kurs Orbital raises $4 million in seed funding

Kurs Orbital, an Italian startup developing technology for in-space satellite servicing, announced March 7 it has secured $4 million in seed funding. Based in Turin, Italy, Kurs was co-founded in 2021 by former director of Ukraine’s space agency Volodymyr Usov. The company relocated to Italy in 2022 after Russia invaded Ukraine and set up operations at the European Space Agency’s Business Incubation Center. The funding round was led by the European firm OTB Ventures. Other participants include Credo Ventures, Galaxia, In-Q-Tel and Inovo. Usov, who is Kurs’ chief executive, said the seed funds will help to accelerate the development and commercialization of an interface module, called ARCap, that Kurs designed to facilitate in-orbit docking and maneuvers known as rendezvous and proximity operations.

 

Illustration of Kurs Orbital’s interface module, called ARCap, designed to facilitate in-orbit docking and maneuvers. Credit: Kurs Orbital

Module offered to satellite manufacturers

The company does not intend to build servicing vehicles and plans to offer the ARCap as a stand-alone product.

“With the help of our investors, we will be able to reach the market sooner, enabling many other startups and companies to start debris removal and satellite servicing operations,” said Usov.

He said Kurs aims to deliver a “flight ready” ARCap module by late 2025.

“The interface is designed with a modular architecture in mind to be scaled up and down based on application and orbit to be utilized at,” said Usov. The first flight ready system will be developed for missions in low Earth orbit.

Usov said Kurs has several agreements with satellite manufacturers and space logistics companies, including Clearspace, Thales Alenia and D-Orbit.

NASA cancels OSAM-1 satellite servicing technology mission

NASA has canceled a multibillion-dollar project to demonstrate satellite servicing technologies that had suffered extensive delays and cost overruns. In a brief statement March 1, NASA announced it was ending the On-Orbit Servicing, Assembly and Manufacturing (OSAM) 1 mission. OSAM-1 was being developed to refuel the Landsat 7 spacecraft and then perform the in-orbit assembly of a Ka-band satellite antenna. NASA said it was canceling OSAM-1 “due to continued technical, cost, and schedule challenges, and a broader community evolution away from refueling unprepared spacecraft, which has led to a lack of a committed partner.” The agency said that, after formal congressional notifications of its decision, it would start the process for an orderly shutdown, which would include transferring hardware and “pursuing potential partnerships or alternative hardware uses.” NASA said it would also review how to mitigate the impact of the cancellation on the workforce at the Goddard Space Flight Center, which was leading OSAM-1. NASA spokesperson Jimi Russell said there are approximately 450 NASA employees and contractors working on OSAM-1, and that NASA “is committed to supporting project workforce per plan through fiscal year 2024.” OSAM-1 started about a decade ago as Restore-L, with the goal of launching as soon as 2020 to refuel Landsat 7. The mission was renamed OSAM-1 in 2020 with the addition of payloads to perform in-space assembly and manufacturing activities.

The OSAM-1 satellite servicing technology demonstration mission suffered significant cost and schedule overruns. Credit: NASA

The mission, though, suffered significant cost overruns and delays. As of April 2022, the mission’s total cost, once projected to be between $626 million and $753 million, had grown to $2.05 billion and its launch delayed to December 2026. NASA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG), in an October 2023 report, concluded the project would likely suffer additional overruns, with an estimated cost at completion as high as $2.17 billion and a launch of between March and June 2027.

A key factor in OSAM-1’s problems, the report concluded, was the performance of Maxar, which is supplying both the spacecraft bus as well as the robotics payload, called Space Infrastructure Dexterous Robot (SPIDER), under contracts with a combined value of nearly $316 million. Maxar delivered the OSAM-1 bus in September 2023, two and a half years behind schedule, and was running more than two years late with the deliveries of SPIDER components, OIG found.

Maxar acknowledged in the report that they had “significantly underestimated the scope and complexity of the work” modifying one of its 1300-series satellite buses, designed for commercial geostationary orbit communications satellites, for use on OSAM-1 in low Earth orbit. The company also had technical problems with SPIDER as well as issues managing subcontractors. NASA said in September 2023 it has removed one element of SPIDER called MakerSat, which would have manufactured a composite beam, to focus on its servicing and assembly technologies.

That report traced the problems with the OSAM-1 bus and SPIDER to the use of fixed firm price contracts that, OIG concluded, gave NASA no means to incentivize the company’s performance. NASA at times stepped in, providing an estimated $2 million in labor to help with the OSAM-1 bus in 2022 and 2023.

“In our discussions with Maxar officials, they acknowledged that they were no longer profiting from their work on OSAM-1,” OIG noted in its report. “Moreover, project officials stated that OSAM-1 does not appear to be a high priority for Maxar in terms of the quality of its staffing.”

Maxar spokesperson Eric Glass said the company had delivered to NASA a pallet for the SPIDER payload, as well as one of its three robotic arms, with the other two robotic arms planned for delivery later this year. “While we are disappointed by the decision to discontinue the program, we are committed to supporting NASA in pursuing potential new partnerships or alternative hardware uses as they complete the shutdown,” he said.

One problem OSAM-1 did not have was funding. Congress regularly exceeded NASA’s requests for funding for the mission. The OIG report noted that NASA requested $808.5 million for OSAM-1 between 2016 and 2023 but Congress appropriated more than $1.48 billion. NASA requested $227 million for OSAM-1 for fiscal year 2024 and both the House and Senate versions of spending bills fully funded the mission.

OSAM-1’s cancelation comes as many companies are commercially pursuing satellite servicing technologies, in many cases using more cooperative approaches such as designing satellites with refueling ports that reduce the complexity of refueling. At the annual meeting of CONFERS, a satellite servicing industry group, in October 2023, an audience member noted there had been little discussion about OSAM-1 in conference presentations.

Bo Naasz, who leads satellite servicing capability development at NASA, acknowledged the difficulty in developing a spacecraft designed to refuel a spacecraft “not prepared” for servicing. “It’s really hard,” he said. He argued the value of OSAM-1 was to demonstrate robotic technologies that could be transferred for other applications while gaining experience in satellite servicing.

“We can help convince the consumer that we know how to do this and that it’s ready,” he concluded. “I think it is, but I also think it’s hard.”

China launches classified military satellite towards geostationary belt

China launched the TJS-11 classified satellite early Friday as the country continues to build its geostationary capabilities. A Long March 5 lifted off from Wenchang Satellite Launch Center on Hainan island at 6:30 a.m. Eastern (1130 UTC), Feb. 23. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp., (CASC), announced launch success just under an hour after launch. The announcement also provided the first official statement on the payload: TJS-11 (Tongxin Jishu Shiyan-11). The satellite is described as being mainly used to carry out multi-band, high-speed satellite communication technology verification. Neither CASC nor Chinese state media provided further details on the satellite which belongs to a series of classified geosynchronous satellites for the Chinese military. TJS satellites are thought by observers to serve a range of purposes including early warning, signals intelligence and more. Buildup to the mission was shrouded in secrecy, despite the open location of the coastal launch. There were no official reports of the rollout of the rocket, in contrast to previous missions. Notably it is the shortest time between launches of the Long March 5, at 70 days since the launch of Yaogan-41. Like the Yaogan-41 launch, the TJS-11 mission used an elongated 18.5-meter-long, 5.2-meter-diameter payload fairing. Standard fairings are 12.3 meters long. This is the first TJS satellite launched on a Long March 5, China’s most powerful launch vehicle. The Long March 5 can loft 14,000 kilograms into geosynchronous transfer orbit. The launcher is required to launch China’s largest satellite bus, the DFH-5.

The satellite series and its activities has caught the attention of observers in recent years. For instance, China’s TJS-3 (Tongxin Jishu Shiyan-3) satellite launched in 2018 and released a payload of unstated purposes.

Assessments of the pair’s maneuvers suggest the spacecraft moved in concert and carried out operations including spoofing. This involves coordinated maneuvers at certain times in an attempt to confuse rivals’ space tracking networks. Orbital data reveals that TJS-3 has been making close approaches to American satellites.

The U.S. Space Force recently stated its growing concern at China’s advancing capabilities in geostationary orbit (GEO). Assets of note include the Ludi Tance-4 (01) L-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite and the Yaogan-41 optical satellite, with an estimated resolution of 2.5 meters. China launched the pair separately in the second half of 2023.

“Paired with data from other Chinese surveillance satellites, Yaogan-41 could provide China an unprecedented ability to identify and track car-sized objects throughout the entire Indo-Pacific region and put at risk numerous U.S. and allied naval and air assets operating in the region,” Clayton Swope, a former U.S. intelligence official and now a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), said Jan. 30.

Furthermore, a Long March 7A rocket launched the mystery TJS-10 satellite towards GEO in November last year.

The launch of TJS-11 was the seventh flight of the Long March 5. It was also China’s ninth orbital mission of 2024. CASC has yet to provide an outline for its overall launch activities for 2024, in contrast to previous years. China launched a national record 67 times last year with one failure.

Known major activities include Shenzhou missions to the Tiangong space station and the pioneering Chang’e-6 lunar far side sample return mission. The latter mission will fly on the next Long March 5. Launch is expected in May, following the launch of the requisite Queqiao-2 relay satellite on a Long March 8 next month.

Chinese commercial launch providers are expected to continue to build on a breakthrough 2023. The debut of new liquid-propellent launch vehicles including the Tianlong-3 (Space Pioneer), Nebula-1 (Deep Blue Aerospace) and Pallas-1 (Galactic Energy) expected in the second half of 2024.

Eutelsat scales back OneWeb Gen 2 upgrade plan

Eutelsat has decided to hold off deploying significantly upgraded OneWeb broadband satellites to instead focus on adding continuity of service capacity for customers with long-term contracts, the French fleet operator said Feb. 16. The shift to a progressive approach for improving low Earth orbit satellite capacity and performance shaves off nearly one third of the company’s previous $4 billion budget for a second-generation constellation, Eutelsat CEO Eva Berneke said during an earnings call. Berneke said the strategy still leaves Eutelsat open to potential public sector funding from programs such as IRIS², Europe’s sovereign broadband project, for financing the development of new technologies that could be added to the constellation. “But it’s also really to make sure that the timeline works,” she continued, “I mean, it’s very important to us that we keep the continuity of service with our customers in these multi-year contracts and set them up over time, and then bring the new functionality when it’s ready.” After testing a OneWeb Gen 2 technology demonstrator last year, Eutelsat has been speaking to manufacturers about a constellation of around 300 satellites that could begin deployments as soon as 2025. Most of the 633 satellites in OneWeb’s current generation were launched between 2020 and 2023, and the constellation has a design life extending to around 2027-2028. The satellites were built by a Florida-based joint venture with Airbus of France, which recently bought Eutelsat out of the group for an undisclosed sum.

Eutelsat says integrating its geostationary broadband network with OneWeb’s low Earth orbit satellites is the best way to meet future global connectivity needs. Credit: OneWeb

Eutelsat did not detail how many satellites are under its revised strategy.

The operator has previously said a Gen 2 constellation could be smaller than Gen 1 partly because newer satellites would leverage Eutelsat’s geostationary satellites over high-demand areas.

During the Feb. 16 earnings call, Eutelsat chief financial officer Christophe Caudrelier said the company is talking to government-backed export credit agencies (ECAs) in India, the United Kingdom, and France to support the majority of Gen 2 costs.

The planned ramp-up of OneWeb’s commercial services worldwide would also support the investment.

Although all the satellites OneWeb needs for worldwide coverage are in position, ground segment delays are currently holding back global services.

Previously slated to begin global low Earth orbit services in early 2024, Eutelsat recently said it expects to have completed only 90% of OneWeb’s ground network by the end of June following a mix of installation and licensing setbacks.

Key enterprise and government customer markets for OneWeb that are waiting for services to come online include India and Saudi Arabia.

Eutelsat reported around 700 million euros ($754 million) in OneWeb customer backlog as of the end of December, up 23% from three months earlier and continuing to grow.

Customers in areas where OneWeb services are available, such as Alaska, are experiencing up to 195 megabits per second download and 32 Mbps upload speeds, according to Eutelsat, with a latency of 70 milliseconds.

GEO wins the day

Services from recently launched geostationary satellites Konnect VHTS and Eutelsat 10B helped put the operator on track for a return to growth following years of annual revenue declines thanks to its waning legacy video business.

Eutelsat recorded 572.6 million euros in revenue for the six months to Dec. 31, up 1% compared with the same period in 2022 when adjusted for currency changes on a like-for-like basis.

Video was the only Eutelsat business unit that did not post revenue growth, falling 8% year-on-year to 331.1 million euros — but still representing the bulk of the company’s total sales. Non-renewed and scaled-down broadcast contracts dragged the division down, along with sanctions against Russian and Iranian channels.

Government services, mobile connectivity, and fixed connectivity were up 10.5%, 35.6%, and 9.2%, respectively.

These three verticals included some contribution from OneWeb, Caudrelier said, underlining Eutelsat’s rationale for acquiring the company last year to boost its pivot to connectivity services.

Adjusted EBITDA, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, stood at 365.6 million euros Dec. 31, down 12.7% compared with 419 million euros a year earlier.

Varda gets reentry license for space manufacturing capsule

After months of effort and one rejected application, Varda Space Industries said Feb. 14 it has received a license from the Federal Aviation Administration to return a capsule from its first mission. The FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation issued a reentry license for Varda’s W-Series 1 spacecraft. The license will allow the company to land a capsule from that spacecraft at the Utah Test and Training Range (UTTR) and neighboring Dugway Proving Ground west of Salt Lake City. Varda said that reentry is scheduled for Feb. 21. “We’ve been working closely with our government partners and our satellite partner, Rocket Lab, to ensure a safe and compliant return from space,” Varda said in a statement. “Today we’re excited to announce the FAA has approved a re-entry attempt for Feb 21st.” Varda launched W-Series 1, its first spacecraft, in June on the SpaceX Transporter-8 rideshare mission. The company performed experiments to test the production of crystals in microgravity, which would be returned to Earth in a capsule developed by Varda attached to the Rocket Lab-produced spacecraft. The company had hoped to return the capsule as early as mid-July, but said then was still working with the FAA to obtain a reentry license, required for any commercial spacecraft returning to Earth. One issue the company said it was facing was that it was the first company seeking a reentry license under new regulations called Part 450 intended to streamline the licensing process, but which some companies reported difficulties adjusting to.

Varda Space Industries' W-Series 1 spacecraft includes a capsule designed to return pharmaceutical experiments. Credit: Varda Space Industries

In October, the company said it had come close in early September to getting an FAA reentry license as well as securing approval from the U.S. Air Force, which operates UTTR. “It was ultimately a coordination problem amongst three different groups that had not worked through this operation before,” Delian Asparouhov, co-founder of Varda, said in an interview at the time.

“This is the first time in our nation’s history that the FAA has granted a Part 450 reentry license, and licensed a commercial entity to land a spacecraft on U.S. soil,” Varda said in its statement about the license. “We are incredibly proud to have this opportunity with our government partners, and appreciate their dedication to safe innovation in the United States.”

The conical capsule, about 90 centimeters across and 74 centimeters high, weighs less than 90 kilograms, as described in a section of an environmental assessment about the reentry. The capsule landing area is an ellipse 45 by 35 kilometers covering parts of UTTR and the neighboring Dugway Proving Ground. The main spacecraft would also reenter and burn up, with only small pieces surviving reentry.

According to the environmental assessment, several ranges run by the Department of Defense in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon and Utah were considered as potential landing sites for the capsule, as they offered controlled access not available elsewhere, such as public lands maintained by the Bureau of Land Management. Only the UTTR/Dugway met all the requirements to safely return the capsule.

The assessment noted that non-U.S. locations were ruled out from consideration for this mission because of the “time, uncertainty, and complexity associated with obtaining the necessary agreements” between the U.S. and the foreign government for the landing, as well as challenging shipping the capsule back to the United States.

However, Varda announced in October an agreement with Southern Launch, a spaceport operator based in Adelaide, Australia, to host capsule returns at the Koonibba Test Range northwest of Adelaide. That range could be used for Varda’s second mission, scheduled for as soon as mid-2024.

Satellite operators join forces to chase direct-to-smartphone opportunity

A group of satellite operators have joined forces to push the fledgling direct-to-smartphone market to adopt services using their radiowaves, rather than spectrum derived from terrestrial mobile network operators. Viasat, Terrestar Solutions, Ligado Networks, Omnispace, and Yahsat announced the creation of the Mobile Satellite Services Association (MSSA) Feb. 9, a non-profit aiming to harmonize Mobile Satellite Services for integrating with standardized devices. Together, they hold more than 100 megahertz of L- and S-band spectrum that they say could help extend terrestrial cellular networks worldwide. San Francisco-based Skylo says it has developed ground infrastructure technology that would enable satellite-based messaging from smartphones slated to roll out by the end of the year, using geostationary satellites operated by Viasat, Ligado, and Terrestar. “We have multiple partners including carriers and [original equipment manufacturers] conducting trials of SMS this quarter,” Skylo cofounder Tarun Gupta told SpaceNews via email. “We anticipate that carriers will integrate and roll out the service to users by the end of this year on new devices coming out.” MSSA wll advocate for policies, laws and regulations that would encourage widespread adoption of the service in alignment with standards widely used by the cellular industry, potentially enabling direct-to-smartphone users to roam across their networks.

An Airbus illustration of an I-6 F1 satellite launched in late 2021 to replenish Inmarsat L-band services now controlled by Viasat. Credit: Airbus

Iridium Communications, a global operator of Mobile Satellite Services that recently decided to move away from proprietary direct-to-direct network for an open network approach, is notably absent from the MSSA partnership.

MSSA is led by Viasat chair and CEO Mark Dankberg.

“Integrating satellite connectivity into consumer mobile devices is a transformative opportunity for the satellite industry,” Dankberg said in a news release.

“As a coalition of leaders with a unified voice, MSSA will be a driving force in making this new marketplace a reality, while respecting the rights of nations to meaningfully engage and retain sovereignty in a rapidly growing space economy.”

On the other side of the direct-to-smartphone market, players such as SpaceX, Lynk Global, and AST SpaceMobile see using cellular spectrum from mobile network operator partnerships as key to building a critical mass of subscribers.

Their services would also reach unmodified smartphones already in consumer pockets.

Lynk Global, which launched commercial services last year, says it is currently serving more than seven countries, including parts of Palau, the Cook Islands, and Solomon Islands.

However, while Mobile Satellite Service operators already have widespread permission to beam their radio frequencies from space to devices, direct-to-smartphone players seeking to use cellular spectrum more broadly must overcome many interference concerns and regulatory hurdles.

First Intuitive Machines lunar lander mission set for Feb. 14 launch

Intuitive Machines and SpaceX have confirmed plans to launch the IM-1 lunar lander mission as soon as Feb. 14, pending a fueling test on the pad later this week. In a Feb. 5 statement, Intuitive Machines announced it was targeting a launch of its lander in a “multi-day window” that opens Feb. 14. Liftoff of the Falcon 9 from Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A is scheduled for 12:57 a.m. Eastern that day. The announcement came hours after a SpaceX official, speaking at a briefing about the upcoming launch of NASA’s PACE Earth science mission on another Falcon 9, confirmed that Feb. 14 date, which had been widely known in the industry but which neither NASA nor Intuitive Machines would disclose at a Jan. 31 briefing about the agency’s payloads on the lander. “Our Intuitive Machines launch is targeting Feb. 14, Valentine’s Day,” said Julianna Scheiman, director of civil satellite missions at SpaceX, at the Feb. 5 briefing. “We’re tracking well to a Feb. 14 launch.” One final milestone before that launch is a fueling test, or wet dress rehearsal, scheduled for Feb. 7. That is important for IM-1 since the lander needs to be loaded with liquid oxygen and methane propellants while on the launch pad shortly before launch, a procedure that required modifications to the infrastructure at LC-39A. “We’ll be performing essentially a tanking test, or wet dress rehearsal, for that spacecraft on Feb. 7,” she said, to confirm that the spacecraft can be fueled on the pad.

Intuitive Machines says its IM-1 lunar lander mission is scheduled for launch as soon as Feb. 14, with a tanking test scheduled for Feb. 7. Credit: SpaceX

While Intuitive Machines said in its statement that it had a multi-day window, Scheiman said the mission had a three-day window, with launch opportunities Feb. 14 through 16. Intuitive Machines previously stated that a launch any day in that window would set up a landing attempt on Feb. 22.

The 675-kilogram lander, called Odysseus by the company, is carrying six payloads for NASA through a Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) award valued at $118 million. It is also carrying six commercial payloads, ranging from sportswear company Columbia to artist Jeff Koons. The commercial payloads also include Eaglecam, a camera developed by students at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University that will eject from the lander during its final descent to the surface to attempt to photograph the landing.

If IM-1 is successful, it will be the first private mission to land softly on the moon after three previous failed attempts. The Beresheet lander by Israel’s SpaceIL crashed during its descent to the lunar surface in 2019, and the HAKUTO-R M1 lander from Japanese company ispace crashed attempting a landing in April 2023. Astrobotic’s Peregrine lunar lander suffered a propellant leak hours after its Jan. 8 launch that prevented the spacecraft from attempting a lunar landing.

NASA Earth science mission once slated for cancellation ready for launch

A nearly billion-dollar mission to study the Earth’s oceans and atmosphere is ready to launch after surviving several cancellation attempts earlier in its development. A Falcon 9 is scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 40 Feb. 6 at 1:33 a.m. Eastern. The vehicle will place into sun-synchronous orbit NASA’s Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem, or PACE, spacecraft. PACE carries three instruments designed to study the ocean as well as clouds and aerosols in the atmosphere. Ocean Color Instrument (OCI), the primary instrument, will provide information on ocean color from ultraviolet to infrared wavelengths. It is accompanied by the Hyper Angular Research Polarimeter (HARP2) and Spectro-polarimeter for Planetary Exploration (SPEXone), which will provide data on atmospheric clouds and aerosols as well as support atmospheric correction of OCI data. “PACE is going to so profoundly advance our understanding about how our oceans work and how they are related to the broader Earth system and the changing climate,” said Karen St. Germain, director of NASA’s Earth science division, at a Feb. 4 briefing about the mission. A key focus of PACE will be studying phytoplankton on the ocean surface. That includes being able to differentiate among phytoplankton species, said Jeremy Werdell, PACE project scientist. “Now we’ll know where the harmful ones are, where the beneficial ones are, where the beneficial ones are moving to.”

NASA’s PACE spacecraft being encapsulated in the payload fairing of its Falcon 9 rocket ahead of a launch scheduled for as soon as Feb. 6. Credit: NASA GSFC/Denny Henry

Scientists will complement PACE data with that from other Earth science missions, such as the Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) spacecraft. “SWOT tells us more about how the ocean moves, including the height of the sea. PACE is going to give us information on what’s living in those surface oceans,” said Kate Calvin, NASA’s chief scientist and senior climate adviser.

Data from PACE will also help track different kinds of aerosols in the atmosphere, such as sea spray, smoke and desert dust. That is useful for monitoring air quality and its impacts on human health, interactions between the atmosphere and the ecosystem, and cloud formation. “It’s so dynamic, space is the only way you can possibly do this,” said Andy Sayer, PACE atmospheric scientist.

PACE has a design life of three years, but St. Germain said NASA expects the mission to last longer, with enough consumables such as propellant on the 1,700-kilogram spacecraft to operate for at least a decade. “We’re hoping for a nice long life for PACE.”

Once launched, PACE will go through a commissioning period expected to last 60 days, Werdell said at an earlier briefing Jan. 17, with “first light” data released after about 40 to 50 days. All the data from PACE will be publicly available with no exclusivity period for the mission’s science team.

PACE, with a total cost including reserves of $964 million, became a target for budget cuts earlier in its development by the Trump administration. All four of its NASA budget proposals, for fiscal years 2018 through 2021, sought to cancel PACE. All four times Congress rejected the cut and restored funding to the mission.

“It has been a long, strange trip,” Werdell said at the Feb. 4 briefing when asked about those proposed cancellations. “We were as confident as one could be that we would find ways to persevere. The community wanted all of this.”

“One of the reasons we’re sitting here today is because there were many in our stakeholder community who understood the potential impact of PACE and supported us moving forward,” said St. Germain.