The Sateliot “GroundBreaker” is the first of a constellation of over 250 spacecraft designed to communicate with terrestrial 5G cell towers worldwide.
Category: satellites – Page 49
SpaceX’s most powerful operational rocket soared to the skies once again for its sixth mission.
SpaceX launched its massive Falcon Heavy rocket for the sixth time ever on Sunday, April 30. Falcon Heavy lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida Sunday at 8:26 p.m. EDT for the ViaSat-3 Americas mission. It lifted three satellites to geostationary orbit.
Though it will eventually be overtaken by SpaceX’s Starship, Falcon Heavy is currently SpaceX’s largest and most powerful operational rocket.
SpaceX
Falcon Heavy lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida Sunday at 8:26 p.m. EDT for the ViaSat-3 Americas mission. It lifted three satellites to geostationary orbit.
According to the South China Morning Post, a Chinese private company is planning to develop a constellation of satellites akin to Starlink for Chinese hypersonic craft.
GalaxySpace.
Called GalaxySpace, according to some space experts, it is “somewhat unusual” for a commercial company to participate in China’s hypersonic program. This is because China’s hypersonic flight program is normally used for military purposes. Others hailed the action as a significant step forward, emphasizing how private sector innovation may enhance the nation’s space capabilities.
Remark: This article is from The Conversation France written by Victor DOS SANTOS PAULINO & Nonthapat PULSIRI (V&N) — Experts from Toulouse Business School and The SIRIUS Chair (France)
Lorsque nous parlons d’espace, nous pensons aux étoiles que nous voyons la nuit ou à de bons films de science-fiction. Or, l’espace comprend également tous les satellites et engins qui sont lancés depuis la Terre. Dans certains engins spatiaux, il y a des astronautes, comme l’Américaine Christina Koch ou le Français Thomas Pesquet, qui voyagent pendant plusieurs jours ou mois pour de nombreuses missions.
Pendant ce temps, plus de 8 000 satellites non habités opèrent sur les orbites terrestres pour améliorer la vie quotidienne. Par exemple, les satellites de communication contribuent à améliorer l’accès à Internet dans les zones blanches, les satellites d’observation sont essentiels pour les prévisions météorologiques et les satellites de navigation (GPS) sont indispensables pour les besoins de transport actuels et futurs tels que les véhicules autonomes.
Les progrès dans le secteur spatial offrent aujourd’hui de nouvelles opportunités dans la mise en orbite de constellations de milliers de satellites (par exemple, la flotte Starlink lancée par SpaceX, la société de l’homme d’affaires américain Elon Musk) ou encore dans l’exploitation minière spatiale et le tourisme spatial. Certains pays (dont la France et les États-Unis) ont par ailleurs annoncé que soutenir leur écosystème spatial constituait une priorité pour dynamiser l’économie.
A team of oceanographers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, working with a colleague from Chungnam National University and another from the University of Hawaii, has mapped 19,000 previously unknown undersea volcanoes in the world’s oceans using radar satellite data. In their paper published in the journal Earth and Space Science, the group describes how they used radar satellite data to measure seawater mounding to find and map undersea volcanoes and explains why it is important that it be done.
The ocean floor, like dry land masses, features a wide variety of terrain. And as with dry land, features that truly stand out are mountains—in the ocean they are called seamounts. And as on land, they can be created by tectonic plates pushing against one another, or by volcanos erupting. Currently, just one-fourth of the sea floor has been mapped, which means that no one knows how many seamounts exist, or where they might be. This can be a problem for submarines—twice U.S. submarines have collided with seamounts, putting such vehicles and their crew at risk. But not knowing where the seamounts are located presents another problem. It prevents oceanographers from creating models depicting the flow of oceanwater around the world.
In this new effort, the research team set themselves the task of discovering and mapping as many seamounts as possible, and to do it, they used data from radar satellites. Such satellites cannot actually see the seamounts, of course, instead they measure the altitude of the sea surface, which changes due to changes in gravitational pull related to seafloor topography; an effect known as sea mounding. In so doing, they found 19,000 previously unknown seamounts.
One of the most difficult issues in space exploration is extending the lifespan of satellites. Even if the satellite’s system is operational, it can run out of fuel and become defunct.
Enter Orbit Fab. This startup is working on an innovative solution to make satellites reusable by developing gas stations in space to refuel them. We had written about them in 2021.
SpaceX just did their second launch of V2 Mini satellites. Their first launch was two months ago and some satellites were lost as their new tech didn’t work on all satellites. Well, SpaceX has solved the bugs, and launched a second batch. Once the bugs are 100% solved, all future Starlink launches will only contain these new satellites.
These higher capacity satellites service about 33% more customers per pound of satellite than the V1.5 Starlink satellites.
SpaceX launched its second batch of upgraded Starlink satellites after some of the first version 2 (v2) buses deorbited earlier than planned. Liftoff aboard a Falcon 9 rocket occurred April 19 at 10:31 AM EDT (14:31 UTC) from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
This mission launched 21 of the Starlink v2 satellites into low Earth orbit. In December 2022, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) gave SpaceX approval to launch up to 7,500 next-generation Starlink satellites, known as Gen 2. That’s still a much smaller number than the original 29,988 the company originally requested.
These upgraded satellites will eventually be operating in circular orbits with altitudes of 525,530, and 535 km and inclinations of 53, 43, and 33 degrees, respectively, using frequencies in the Ku-and Ka-band.
Researchers use a reaction wheel actuator system to make a quadruped robot walk on a narrow balance beam.
A team of researchers at Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute (RI) has created a method that enables a quadruped robot to walk on a narrow balance beam.
Their solution involves implementing a Reaction Wheel Actuator (RWA) system, which is mounted on the back of the quadruped robot. Through a novel control technique, the RWA system enables the robot to balance independently, irrespective of the position of its feet. To enhance the robot’s balancing capabilities, the team leveraged hardware that is commonly used to control satellites in space.
No people or satellites were aboard. There won’t be another try until at least Wednesday.
“Learned a lot today,” Musk tweeted after the flight was postponed.
The company plans to use Starship to send people and cargo to the moon and, ultimately, Mars.
NAIROBI, April 14 (Reuters) — Kenya launched its first operational earth observation satellite on Saturday onboard a SpaceX rocket from the United States, a live feed from Elon Musk’s rocket company showed.
The satellite, developed by nine Kenyan engineers, will collect agricultural and environmental data, including on floods, drought and wildfires, that authorities plan to use for disaster management and to combat food insecurity.
The Falcon 9 rocket carrying the Taifa-1 satellite, took off at about 648 GMT without incident from Vandenberg Base in California, after three postponements due to bad weather.