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Category: satellites

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The US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) officially handed off control of the Space Surveillance Telescope (SST) to the US Air Force Space Command. After five years of successful operation the telescope will now be dismantled and sent overseas.

Australian forces are planned to handle the task of scanning the skies for asteroids that could endanger satellites or potentially strike the Earth. The Air Force will maintain “a broad and full SST partnership” with the Australian military, said 1st Lt. Sarah Burnett, a spokeswoman for Air Force Space Command (AFSPC). After the move, SST will operate as a dedicated sensor in the US Space Surveillance Network, operated by AFSPC.

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Hmmm; there is another use for this type of satellite just can’t openly state.

SHANGHAI—China launched a satellite to monitor its greenhouse gas emissions early on Thursday, the latest step in efforts to cut its carbon footprint, the official Xinhua news agency said.

The launch follows the United States joining China in formally ratifying the Paris agreement to curb climate-warming emissions. It also comes as large sections of northern China have been shrouded in near-record levels of air pollution for most of the past week, disrupting flights, closing factories and schools, and forcing authorities to issue red alerts.

China launched the satellite via a Long March-2D rocket from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the northwestern Gobi Desert, Xinhua said.

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Scientists with the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) claim NASA’s results ‘re-confirm’ what they’d already achieved, and have plans to implement it in satellites ‘as quickly as possible.’ China claims they’ve created a working prototype of the ‘impossible’ reactionless engine – and they say they’re already testing it in orbit aboard the Tiangong-2 space laboratory. The radical, fuel-free EmDrive recently stirred up controversy after a paper published by a team of NASA researchers appeared to show they’d successfully built the technology.

The implications for this could be huge. For instance, current satellites could be half the size they are today without the need to carry fuel.

At a press conference in Beijing, researchers with CAST confirmed the government has been funding research into the technology since 2010, and claimed they’ve developed a device that’s already being tested in low-Earth orbit, IBTimes UK reports. It comes just a month after anonymous sources told IBTimes UK that tests on the EmDrive were underway aboard Tiangong-2 shown below.

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Dr. Chen Yue, Director of Commercial Satellite Technology for the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) announced on December 10, 2016 that not only has China successfully tested EmDrives technology in its laboratories, but that a proof-of-concept is currently undergoing zero-g testing in orbit (according to the International Business Times, this test is taking place on the Tiangong 2 space station).

Scientists with the China Academy of Space Technology claim NASA’s results ‘re-confirm’ what they’d already achieved, and have plans to implement it in satellites ‘as quickly as possible.’

‘The establishment of an experimental verification platform to complete the milli-level micro thrust measurement test, as well as several years of repeated experiments and investigations into corresponding interference factors, confirm that in this type of thruster, thrust exists.’

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Millennium Space Systems have reached a major development milestone for their ALTAIR satellite ahead of a proposed launch in March 2017. They have announced that the first satellite has completed development and been shipped. The satellite was enabled by additive manufacturing and has now gained flight qualification.

Paul Swanson, Millennium Space’s Low Earth Orbit (LEO) constellations program manager, explained the importance of reaching this target,

This flight qualification of our ALTAIR™ spacecraft represents a key milestone in providing low-risk and very high-platform performance coupled with affordability as the company transitions to full-scale manufacturing of our ALTAIR™ product line and anticipated ALTAIR™ constellations.

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The D3 project, funded by the EU, is developing a decommissioning device, to be installed on the satellite prior to launch, that removes old satellites when they reach the end of their missions or their lives or when a major failure occurs.

#investEU #SMEs #SMEinstrument #space

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With the ongoing number of China’s space mission, how important is this missile test that is believed to be capable of destroying enemy communications? If all goes according to plan, what will happen then? Find out what authorities have to say.

( Idf/Getty Images)

China is once again being put to the spotlight after it has revealed that they are preparing to launch their anti-satellite missile that is believed to have the ability of destroying satellites in space. Authorities of the said project says that this is definitely one of Beijing’s most potent asymmetric warfare weapons. one of Beijing’s most potent asymmetric warfare weapons. It was found that the US intelligence officials have already detected preparations for a test launch of the Dong Neng-3 which is due to take place at a military facility in central China. However, despite these information, riva; countries said that little is known about the missile and the satellite.

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In Brief

  • Scientist have developed an ingenious means of converting nuclear power plant waste (76,430 metric tons in the US alone) into sustainable diamond batteries.
  • These long-lasting batteries could be a clean and safe way to power spacecraft, satellites, and even medical devices.

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SpaceX, the aerospace company founded by the Mars-hungry tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, just made a big move to enshroud the planet in high-speed internet coverage.

On November 15, the company filed a lengthy application with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to launch 4,425 satellites. (We first heard about the filing through the r/SpaceX community on Reddit.) That is a hell of a lot of satellites.

According to a database compiled by the Union of Concerned Scientists, there are 1,419 active satellites currently orbiting Earth.

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