All Space news – Page 227
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Ukraine wins first launch contract
Tim Furniss/LONDON NPO YUZHNOYE OF Ukraine has been awarded a contract from Space Systems/ Loral to launch 36 Globalstar telecommunications satellites into low-Earth orbit aboard three Zenit 2 boosters. The launches will be from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, in 1998. The contract is the first dedicated commercial-launch deal ...
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GOES in orbit
An Atlas 1 model was used to launch a $220 million, Space Systems/Loral-built Geostationary Environmental Operational satellite, the GOES 9, from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on 23 May. For the first time since 1989, the USA has a full complement of GOES spacecraft in space. There are still three more launches ...
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Ready for business
Lockheed Martin is replacing its controversial Series 7000 bus with the new A2100. Tim Furniss/LONDON Most of the proposals for new satellite contracts being made by the Astro Space division of Lockheed Martin in New Windsor, New Jersey, feature the new A2100 spacecraft bus (Flight ...
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New engine to be tested on UK satellite
A NEW ROCKET engine developed and tested by UK companies will be fired in orbit for the first time aboard a satellite in 1997. The 0.4kN (88lb)-thrust engine is the brainchild of Surrey Satellite Technology (SSTL), at the University of Surrey, in Guildford - the UK's only satellite ...
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Space platform
The Ofeq 3 satellite is the first in a series of Israeli space platforms being offered to customers worldwide Tim Furniss/London Israel's Ofeq 3 satellite, which was launched into orbit by the country's Shavit booster on 5 April, is the first demonstration of a new, ...
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The X-Files
The programmes may be complementary, but the X-33 and X-34 launchers meet different needs. Graham Warwick/ATLANTA When NASA awarded contracts for the X-33 and X-34 re-usable launch vehicles (RLVs) on the same day in March, it inadvertently created confusion which Rockwell International and Orbital Sciences, ...
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Arianespace reveals details of launch guarantees
ARIANESPACE HAS provided full details, of its guaranteed Ariane 5 launch service (Flight International, 16-22 November, 1994). "If a satellite is lost during the launch phase - whether the failure is caused by the launcher or the satellite itself - the customer will be granted a free launch ...
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McDonnell Douglas to develop Delta 3 satellite launcher
Guy Norris/LOS ANGELES McDONNELL Douglas (MDC) is to develop the Delta 3 launcher in a bid to break into the market to launch large communications satellites. The decision comes on the back of a Hughes Space and Communications launch contract, potentially worth $1.5 billion. The contract ...
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X-33: teams define the 'ultimate' launcher
NASA has selected three teams to define concepts for a re-usable launch vehicle to replace the Space Shuttle and to design an X-33 technology-demonstrator for the ultimate RLV, which would be an unmanned, fully re-usable, single-stage-to-orbit launcher capable of carrying a 18,000kg payload. The RLV, is expected to be flown, ...
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X-34 partners
Orbital and Rockwell are developing the X-34 small re-usable launcher in an industry-led/government-assisted partnership with NASA. The companies have formed joint-venture American Space Lines - "an American Arianespace" - to develop, operate and market the air-launched X-34 and will together invest $100 million in the enterprise, with NASA contributing $70 ...
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Boeing reaches Space Station milestone
IN A MAJOR PROGRAMME milestone, Boeing Defense and Space Group has completed fabrication of the exterior structure of the first of two US pressurised connecting-node modules for the proposed Alpha international space station. The 2,267kg aluminium nodes are the 4.8m-long, 4.4m-diameter sections to which the Space Shuttle, space-station ...
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Step up
The US Air Force has exercised its third option under its small-launch-vehicle contract with Orbital Sciences, for a Pegasus launch of the STEP 4, space test programme satellite, in 1997. Other options exercised, were for the STEP 3 and fast on-orbit recording of transient events satellites, in 1995 and 1996. ...
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Liquid launch
The Space Shuttle STS 70 mission in June will be a routine Tracking and Data Relay Satellite deployment and experiments flight, with a five-person crew under the command of US Air Force Col. Terrence Henricks. Its first eight minutes of flight, however, will make history. One of the ...
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Boeing expects flat year despite victories
A DROP IN deliveries, added to high levels of research-and-development (R&D) funding, hit Boeing's first-quarter net earnings, which fell by 38%, compared with 1994, to $181 million. A total of 59 aircraft were delivered, compared to 82 a year earlier, when deliveries," ...substantially exceeded the nominal production rate ...
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ERS 2 in orbit after Ariane success
The European Space Agency's (ESA) ERS 2 remote-sensing satellite was safely placed into a 770 x 797km, Sun-synchronous polar orbit on 21 April, after launch by an Ariane 40 from Kourou. Following a three-month commissioning phase, the ERS 2 - which has a predicted operational lifetime of 30 ...
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India accelerates GSLV development
Following its re-negotiated deal with Russia for the purchase of seven cryogenic-rocket engines, India is accelerating the development of the national Geostationary Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV) and its own cryogenic rocket engine and third stage, the C-12 (Flight International, 19-25 April). Almost half of India's $330 million, 1995/6 space budget ...
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Magellan's global views of Venus
NASA HAS RELEASED A COMPOSITE of the complete radar imaging of Venus made using the Magellan mapping orbiter between September 1990 and October 1994, when the spacecraft entered the deeper portions of the Venusian atmosphere and was destroyed. Image A features the North Pole, including, the mountain Maxwell Montes, while ...
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More US astronauts head for Mir date the Mir space station
FOUR US ASTRONAUTS have been selected by NASA, for further missions aboard Russia's Mir 1 space station, as the agency builds up towards long duration operations, on board the planned international Alpha space station. Shannon Lucid, Jerry Linenger, John Blaha and Scott Parazynski are the astronauts named for ...
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Komplex presses on with Start
RUSSIAN LAUNCHER Company STC Komplex will press ahead with plans to offer international commercial launches, despite the failure of its Start satellite launcher on March 28, claims director Yuri Solomonov. Solomonov claims that the booster is still operational despite the failure of the inaugural launch, which resulted in ...
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Florida Authority
The US Air Force has formally handed over its launch pad 46 at Cape Canaveral to Spaceport Florida Authority (SFA) for use by commercial-launcher companies, including Orbital Sciences and Lockheed. The USAF awarded SFA a payment of $2.74 million, while additional funding will come from the space industry and the ...