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Cheap Space Access

Orbital Sciences Corporation announced today that it has been selected by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) to design, develop and manufacture the next satellite in NASA’s New Millennium Program (NMP) technology demonstration spacecraft.

The satellite, Space Technology 8 (ST8), will be based on Orbital’s Microstar platform, a lightweight, multi-role spacecraft bus of which dozens are already in orbit.

At launch, ST8 will weigh approximately 385 lbs (175 kg). In addition to the satellite contract, Orbital will also provide the mission’s launch vehicle, a Pegasus rocket, “the world’s leading small launcher for dependable transportation to low-Earth orbit”. Together, the total value to Orbital of the ST8 program is expected to exceed $50 million.

The ST8 mission is a technology demonstration, with four payload experiments. They include a large flexible solar array, a 40-meter deployable boom, high radiation environment electronics and a thermal radiator experiment.

Orbital says they have built and launched more small-class satellites than any other company by a wide margin. Over the past two decades, Orbital has delivered nearly 100 small satellites that have performed national security, commercial communications, Earth and space science, remote imaging and technology demonstration missions.

The company’s Pegasus, Taurus and Minotaur rockets combined have carried out a total of 47 space missions, 43 of which have been successful, including the last 22 Pegasus launches dating back to 1996. Together, these launch vehicles have placed 99 satellites and other payloads into orbit.

Orbital is looking over their shoulder at PayPal c o-founder, Elon Musk (below) who’s coming up fast.

His El Segundo-based SpaceX hopes to make its commercial launch service debut next month. The firm has spent about three years developing a family of Falcon boosters to grow from its Falcon 1 design and Merlin rocket engine. It will carry a FalconSat-2 (photo), built by cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy “to measure space plasma”.

If successful, the initial SpaceX launch will be followed in March 2006 with the second Falcon 1 launch carrying the TacSat-1 satellite built by the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory for the Pentagon’s Office of Force Transformation. Leading SpaceX is Elon Musk, a native of South Africa who amassed a fortune as co-founder of PayPal.

Through their Kwajalein launch site on Omelek Island, SpaceX is the only US heavy lift provider with an equatorial launch location.

SpaceX filed a lawsuit against Boeing and Lockheed Martin accusing the aerospace companies of violating antitrust laws for U.S. government launch services.

Amazon.com billionaire Jeff Bezos is building a rocket-ship complex set to open early next year. Founded in 2000, Blue Origin employs about 40 people, and the work force at the Kent Washgton site will grow to 70 to 100 over the next several years, city records say. According to its Web site, the company’s design team includes veterans of several major aerospace programs, including the space shuttle, National Missile Defense and the Sea Launch floating rocket-launch platform.

John Carmack, with a fortune earned from the computer games Doom and Quake, founded an aerospace company and is testing a rocket called the Black Armadillo. Armadillo Aerospace was one of 24 teams currently competing for the X Prize.

Inexpensive space access is here:

The big 6″ defense contractors (Boeing, Lockheed, Northrop, General Dynamics, Raytheon, and Orbital) are slipping (PPT) as new, smaller companies (like SpaceDev, MicroSat Systems, and SpaceX) enter the market.
SpaceShipOne, which used a hybrid propulsion technology to win the $10 Million Ansari X Prize, a contest created to stimulate the development of the private sector human space flight industry.
Surrey Satellite Technology of the UK has enabled seven countries to build their first civil satellite over the last 12 years.
A total of 44 countries have accessed space through an independent launch capability or the launch capabilities of others.

Professor Robert Twiggs (right) of Stanford’s Space Systems Development Laboratory, got there first with his cheapie CubeSat.

SpaceDev’s CHIPSat, was the world’s first orbiting node on the Internet. Their new MMB-100 microsat is a 220 pound microsatellite using standard Ethernet and USB connections. The SpaceDev MMB-100 can be commanded from the ground via the Internet. Cost: $10 million, not including integration and launch.

CLEO (Cisco in Low Earth Orbit) is based on Cisco’s 3251 Mobile Access Router Card, typically used to connect police cars and ambulances on the ground. It’s in orbit, onboard the UK-DMC satellite. And it works.

Search and Rescue transponders, like those deployed 25 years ago, in the space-based COSPAS-SARSAT system, are built outside of Montreal, Canada. EMS is responsible for the design and manufacture of the satellite Search And Rescue Repeaters used on the SARSAT satellite payloads, which are part of the global COSPAS-SARSAT system developed by Canada, the USA, France and Russia.

The Search and Rescue product line is being transferred to COM DEV over the next few months. COM DEV is a global leader in the supply of radio frequency (RF) transponder subsystems in satellites.

COSPAS-SARSAT receives emergency signals from radio beacons, then relays them to search and rescue authorities. Since the system was first deployed it has been credited with saving over 17,000 people.

EMS designed and built the 15 meter radiating panel of Canada’s 5.3 GHz space-based Synthetic Aperture Radar (RadarSat).

The Alasan HAARP phased array, using up to 3.6 MW, can be down-converted in frequency using the ionosphere to create coherent low frequency waves spanning five decades from fractions of a Hz to tens of KHz. It can be up-converted as well, producing emissions in the infrared (IR) and visible spectrums.

[NOTE TO CANADIANS: Could you please move RadarSat off the 5.4 GHz band? The world's people as well as WiMax providers like Redline, Wi-Lan, Rogers and Shaw cable thank you.]

This weekend Chinese leader Hu Jintao outlined some of his country’s ambitions for a space program including going to the moon in 15 years.

Been there, done that.