World Space Week: Inspiring Discovery

Growing into the largest public space event on Earth, World Space Week is a global celebration of the many contributions that science, technology and education add toward the betterment of humanity. The project is coordinated by the United Nations, based on a UN General Assembly declaration, with support from World Space Week Association (WSWA) and a hardworking team of National Coordinators. Some of the goals are to provide unique leverage in space outreach and education, educate people around the world about the benefits that they receive from space, encourage greater use of space for sustainable economic development and foster international cooperation. In 2015 organizers are hoping to top the 1,400 events in 80 countries logged last year. There are events set this year on every major continent, with the highest concentration being in Europe. The Board of Directors of WSWA is chaired by Max Grimard of Airbus Defence and Space and includes Buzz Aldrin, Anousheh Ansari, Art Dula, Tom Hanks, Elon Musk, Bill Nye, Misuzu Onuki, Seiichi Sakamoto, Chris Welch, Yang Junhua, George Abbey and Adigun Ade Abiodun. (Image Credit: NASA, WSWA, UNOOSA, Solar Fuels Institute, NewSpace2014)

MONDAY

Oct 5 — ISS, LEO: Expedition 45 transferring ~3,000 kg of cargo from Progress 61P, continuing to work with SPHERES experiment & ocular ultrasound study, routing cables in Destiny laboratory to support Cygnus cargo mission planned for early Dec, Kelly and Lindgren reviewing procedures for 2 U.S. EVAs in late Oct / early Nov.

Oct 5 — Chandra X-ray Observatory, HEO: In highly elliptical 65-hour orbit, studying Sagittarius A*, data indicates the supermassive 4-Million solar mass black hole is producing 10 times the normal amount of X-ray flares; normal rate is 1 bright X-ray flare about every 10 days.

Oct 5 — Juno, Jupiter Trajectory: Scheduled to arrive at Jupiter July 4, 2016, will be 2nd craft to have orbited Jupiter; planning to orbit gas giant 33 times, 5,000 km above clouds; ESA is working to launch JUICE in 2022, NASA selecting science instruments for Europa Clipper mission to launch ~2025.

Oct 5 — Cassini OTM-423, Saturn Orbit: Spacecraft conducts Orbital Trim Maneuver #423 today.

Oct 5 — Astrobotic Technology Inc., Pittsburgh PA: NewSpace company signs agreement to send Lunar Mission One’s ‘Footsteps on the Moon’ digital storage payload to Moon; now has 8 payloads to piggyback on Griffin lander (including Team Hakuto rover).

Oct 5 — Spaceflight Industries, Tukwila WA: Purchasing & manifesting a SpaceX rocket for its first rideshare mission “2017 Sun Synch Express” in Q2 2017, twenty satellites already manifested; planning yearly dedicated rideshare missions, has 135 satellites to deploy through 2018.

Oct 5 — Virgin Galactic, Las Cruces NM: Developing & testing 324-newton (73,500-lbf) LOX/RP-1 engine to power LauncherOne small payload launch vehicle capable of lofting 200 kg to Sun Synchronous Orbit.

5th LunarCubes Workshop Focuses on Moon Missions Potential, Funding and Infrastructure

The 5th International Workshop on LunarCubes is being held in Silicon Valley, California October 6-9 at the Doubletree Hilton San Jose. NewSpace company Flexure Engineering, with Russell Cox (pictured L-R) as CEO, hosts Lunar Initiatives including Lunar Surface Applications Workshops, The Lunar Conference (Italy 2016, South Korea 2018, Czech Republic 2020), Lunar Artwork Challenges and Lunar Geophysical Year 2017-2018. This year’s speakers include Dan Faber of Deep Space Industries, Jim Cockrell from NASA / Cube Quest Challenge, John Powell from JP Aerospace, Friedemann Freund from SETI, Yang Liu of SwRI and Steve Durst of ILOA. LunarCube technologies are being developed for Lunar IceCube to search for ice, liquid, and vapor water on the Moon surface from a highly inclined elliptical orbit (Morehead State University), Lunar Polar Hydrogen Mapper (LunaH-Map) to map hydrogen distribution at Moon South Pole up to a meter beneath the surface (Arizona State University), Lunar Flashlight to map Moon South Pole for water-ice deposits on surface and demonstrate 80 square meter solar sail (JPL, UCLA, MSFC), and Hydrogen Albedo Lunar Orbiter (HALO) to investigate the lunar hydrogen cycle and origin of water by examining reflected hydrogen in the Moon’s solar wind (GSFC). The first privately-funded Moon mission, 14-kg OHB 4M spacecraft developed by LuxSpace, traveled to the Moon October 2014 via China Long March 3C, performed a lunar flyby and transmitted signals for 438 hours. (Image Credit: Flexure Engineering, JP Aerospace, SETI, NASA, SwRI, Morehead State University, LuxSpace, OHB, Sean Amidan, ASU, SpaceTREx, JPL)

Oct 5 — European Astrobiology Network Association, ESA-ESTEC, Noordwijk, The Netherlands: Astrobiology Graduates in Europe (AbGradE) Mission Design Workshop.

Oct 5 — Bradford Astronomical Society, Bradford, United Kingdom: Presentation: Neptune – A Calculated Guess.

Oct 5 — Cornell University, Ithaca NY: Lecture: Topographic Evidence of True Polar Wander on Enceladus; presented by Radwan Tajedine.

Oct 5-7 — Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore MD: Workshop: Feedback in the Magellanic Clouds.

Oct 5-9 — Haute-Provence Observatory, Mont Saint-Michel, France: OHP 2015 Colloquium: Twenty Years of Giant Exoplanets.

Oct 5 — Moon: 11.6° S of Pollux, 11:00.

Oct 5 — Amor Asteroid 2009 TK: Near-Earth flyby (0.045 AU).

Continued from…

Aug 28 – Aug 28, 2016 — NASA, University of Hawai`i at Mānoa, Mauna Loa HI: Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation (HI-SEAS) Mission 4; at 2,440-meter altitude.

Sep 14 – Dec 7 — SSERVI, NASA, Online: SSERVI teams at University of Central FL (CLASS) and Brown University/MIT (SEEED) give 13 lectures on Planetary Evolution: Phobos and Deimos, every Monday; live coverage available.

Sep 28 – Nov 27 — Charles Miller, SpaceNews, Online / Alexandria VA: Commercial Space Executive Training course.

NET Oct — ISRO, Launch of Reusable Launch Vehicle-Technology Demonstrator (RLV-TD), Satish Dhawan Space Center, Sriharikota, India: India RLV-TD mission planned to occur late this month.

NET Oct — Taiwan National Space Organization, Advanced Rocket Research Center, Jiupeng Base, Pingtung, Taiwan: First crowd-funded rocket of Taiwan to be launched to 100-km altitude this month.

Oct 4-10 — World Space Week Association, Global: World Space Week 2015: Discovery; annual celebration of international contributions of space science and technology to the betterment of the human condition; Oct 4 is 58th observation of 1st Space mission Sputnik One launched by Soviet Union 1957; Oct 10 is 48th observation of Outer Space Treaty going into effect 1967.