All Space news – Page 210
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Speaking frankly
Seven years ago, British Aerospace Space Systems, GEC's Marconi Space Systems (MSS) and France's Matra Defense & Espace were competing against each other on some projects, but working together on others. It therefore came as no surprise when, in 1990, MSS and Matra Espace merged as Matra Marconi Space (MMS). ...
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Leading in space
France became the third nation in space to launch a national satellite on an indigenously developed booster - after the Soviet Union and the USA - on 26 November, 1995, and it has never looked back. The nation now employs over 13,000 people directly in space activities, 8,000 in industry, ...
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Simulator rivalry
When Thomson-CSF acquired the Rediffusion simulation business from Hughes Aircraft in 1993, the company became, at a stroke, the largest simulator manufacturer in Europe, and the world leader outside North America. Today, Thomson Training and Simulation (TTS) is competing fiercely in every market for simulators, and in 1996 ...
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Europe's X-Ray telescope is on schedule
The X-Ray Multi-Mirror space telescope, Europe's largest science satellite, is on budget and on schedule for a launch aboard the Ariane 5 on 2 August, 1999, mission managers and scientists reported at a quarterly project review at the Matra Marconi Space (MMS) factory at Filton in Bristol, in the UK. ...
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NASA decides on Mars aero-braking
NASA engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory have agreed a strategy for placing the Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) into its operational orbit, using an aerobraking technique which it is hoped will not further damage one of the craft's solar panels, which did not fully extend after launch in November 1996. ...
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NASA has five options for next Discovery mission
NASA has selected five proposals for detailed study as candidates for the next mission in the low-cost Discovery series of interplanetary spaceflights, to be launched in 2002. One or two of the five proposed spacecraft will be selected next October for full development. The five new ...
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First US-Russian spacewalk is completed in ISS rehearsal
Cosmonaut Vasily Tsiblyev and astronaut Jerry Linenger conducted the first Russian/US spacewalk on 29 April, working outside the Mir 1 space station for 4h 57min in a rehearsal for the joint walks required during the assembly and operation of the International Space Station (ISS). The spacewalkers deployed two ...
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Polyot commercial flight fails by red tape
A Russian Cosmos 3M booster carried a military navigation satellite into orbit from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome on 17 April without its commercial payload, the US-built Faisat 2V. Polyot, of Omsk, Siberia which markets the Cosmos for commercial launches, had failed to produce the necessary documentation to the Russian ...
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Joint boost
A new joint venture has been set up to manufacture and market Russia's RD-180 and RD-120 rocket engines. The partners in the new company, known as RD AMROSS, are Pratt & Whitney (P&W) Space Propulsion of West Palm Beach, Florida, and Russia's NPO Energomash (NPO-EM), of Khimky, outside Moscow. ...
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A bullish business
Claims by some market analysts that Arianespace is losing its lead in the international commercial-launcher market have been belied by the company's latest successes. Orders to launch the Intelsat K-TV and Eutelsat W3 satellites have swelled its orderbook to 39 spacecraft, worth $3 billion in launch revenue. The contract to ...
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The big one
Mid-September is the deadline for what may be regarded as the most important launch in the history of the European space programme - the Ariane 502. If the second European Space Agency (ESA) development flight of the Ariane 5 satellite launcher is successful, the $366 million loss of the 501 ...
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Russian cash fails to halt space-station delay
Russian president Boris Yeltsin has pledged to transfer funding of $139 million for Russia's participation in the NASA-led International Space Station (ISS) later this month and to allocate a further $121 million in May. This Russian financial commitment will do nothing to avoid the probable 11-month delay in ...
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NASA may re-fly Columbia in July
The Space Shuttle mission, the STS 83/Columbia, which had to be aborted because of a problem with a fuel cell, could be re-launched as early as July using the same seven crew, says NASA. The $500 million, 16-day mission ended when the Shuttle touched down at the Kennedy ...
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NASA names its Hyper-X team
NASA has awarded a $33.4 million contract to a team led by MicroCraft to build four experimental aircraft which will be used to demonstrate hypersonic propulsion technologies as part of the Hyper-X project. The other team members joining Tullahoma, Tennessee-based MicroCraft are Boeing North American, GASL and Accurate ...
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International Space Base
The name Kourou has become synonymous with that of Arianespace, but the European launcher organisation is only a user of the launch site. The CSG is operated by the French space agency CNES but was developed with funds from the member states of the European Space Agency (ESA). ...
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Lunar prospector construction complete...
Construction and assembly of the NASA Lunar Prospector spacecraft has been completed by Lockheed Martin in preparation for its launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 24 September, on a mission to obtain the first complete compositional and gravity maps of the moon. The $63 million, low-cost, Discovery mission will carry ...
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NASAselects two satellites to study...
NASA has selected two small, low-cost, satellites to study the distribution of the Earth's forests and the variability of its gravity field under a new Office of Mission to Planet Earth, Earth System Science Pathfinders, programme. The vegetation-canopy lidar (VCL) mission will use a multibeam laser-ranging device to ...
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Seasons on Mars...
The latest images from the Wide Field Planetary Camera on the Hubble Space Telescope, since its servicing in orbit by the crew of the STS82 mission, show changes between Mars' northern-hemisphere spring and summer. The annual north-polar, carbon dioxide frost cap is vanishing, revealing the smaller, permanent, water-ice cap. Also ...
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ESA swaps Space Station nodes for free launch
The European Space Agency (ESA) will provide Nodes 2 and 3 for the International Space Station, along with advanced-technology laboratory equipment, to NASA in exchange for a free launch of its Columbus Orbital Facility (COF) aboard the Space Shuttle. The COF is due to be joined to the ...
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M5 aimed at Moon
Japan's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science plans to launch its second M5 solid-propellant booster towards the Moon in August. The 30m-high, three-stage rocket, which had its maiden flight from Kagoshima (left) on 12 February, carrying the Muses B radio telescope into orbit, will next be used to launch the ...