Gizmodo reports that Rolls-Royce Holdings “is getting into the nuclear reactor business.” The British aerospace engineering company “says it’s developing a micro-nuclear reactor that the company hopes could be a source of fuel for long trips to the Moon and Mars.” As humanity begins “to venture back into space, with crewed missions scheduled to visit the Moon and Mars within the next two decades, the technology that moves us throughout the solar system will be a pivotal part of that journey.” Rolls-Royce teased “the design of its Rolls-Royce micro-reactor for spaceflight with a digital mockup posted to Twitter last week:” As the company “explained in a tweet, the reactor will rely on uranium, a common fuel used in nuclear fission.” Nuclear fission “involves bombarding an atom with a neutron.” The splitting atom releases energy, “and that energy could be used to propel a rocket.” Nuclear reactors “have been used to power things like submarines, but its use in spaceflight has often been overlooked in favor of chemical-based propulsion.”
Full Story (Gizmodo)
Tag: Astronautical
NASA Declares SLS Ready for Crewed Missions
SPACE reports that NASA’s Space Launch System rocket “appears ready to take the next big step – launching astronauts. The debut SLS flight, on Nov. 16, kicked off NASA’s 25-day-long Artemis 1 mission, which sent an uncrewed Orion capsule to lunar orbit and back. … An initial assessment of SLS’ Artemis 1 performance, which NASA released on Nov. 30, gave the rocket high marks, finding that it performed as expected in all areas. Mission team members have now had more time to crunch the numbers, and the reviews continue to be rave, suggesting that no big changes will be required ahead of the first crewed SLS launch.” In a January 27 update, NASA officials wrote, “Building off the assessment conducted shortly after launch, the preliminary post-flight data indicates that all SLS systems performed exceptionally and that the designs are ready to support a crewed flight on Artemis 2.”
Full Story (SPACE)
China Prepares for Over 70 Launches This Year
Space News reports that China’s state-owned and commercial space sector actors “are planning a total of more than 70 launches across 2023 as the country’s space activities continue to expand.” The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) “will again aim for more than 50 launches this year, according to an announcement from an early January meeting.” China launched 64 times in 2022. Combined launch plans “of CASC and commercial actors could see the country top 70 launches this year from three inland spaceports, the coastal Wenchang spaceport and the Haiyang spaceport facilitating sea launches.” Among CASC’s major launches “will be two Shenzhou crewed missions to the Tiangong space station and a supporting pair of Tianzhou cargo spacecraft.”
Full Story (Space News)
What to Expect in the Space Industry in 2023
The New York Times reports that in 2022, NASA “wowed us with cosmic scenes captured by the James Webb Space Telescope.” The DART mission “slammed an asteroid into a new orbit. Artemis I set humanity on a course back to the moon.” China finished “building a new space station in orbit, SpaceX launched 61 rockets in 12 months, and the invasion of Ukraine imperiled Russia’s status as a space power.” It’s a lot “to measure up to, but 2023 is bound to have some excitement on the launchpad, the lunar surface and in the sky.” SpaceX is building Starship for Artemis III and “numerous other rockets may take flight for the first time in 2023.” The most important, Vulcan Centaur by United Launch Alliance, “will eventually replace that company’s Atlas V, a vehicle that has been central to American spaceflight for two decades.” A number of “American private companies are expected to test new rockets in 2023, including Relativity and ABL.” They could “be joined by foreign rocket makers, including Mitsubishi Heavy Industries which could test Japan’s H3 rocket in February, and Arianespace, which is working toward a test flight of Europe’s Ariane 6 rocket.” We’re guaranteed “at least one lunar landing attempt in 2023.” A Japanese company, ispace, “launched its M1 mission on a SpaceX rocket in December.” It’s taking a “slow, fuel-efficient route to the moon and is set to arrive in April, when it will try to deploy a rover built by the United Arab Emirates, a robot built by Japan’s space agency, JAXA, as well as other payloads.”
Full Story (New York Times)
Lunar Gateway to Serve as Model for Future Mars Missions
CNET News reports on the successful Artemis 1 mission and adds that, “assuming everything goes to plan with all stages of Artemis, here are some things to look forward to in the coming decade or so,” including the lunar gateway, “a planned small space station that’ll sit in lunar orbit and serve as a solar-powered communication hub, science laboratory, habitation module for astronauts, holding center for rovers or robots and other such things.” The lunar gateway also “will serve as a model for future missions to Mars,” according to NASA.
Full Story (CNET News)
Artemis I Orion to Depart Lunar Orbit
Aviation Week reports that well beyond “the halfway point of the 25-1/2 day Artemis I test flight, NASA’s Orion crew capsule is prepared to depart its Distant Retrograde Orbit (DRO) around the Moon to return home for a Dec. 11 splashdown off the coast of San Diego, California.”
Full Story (Aviation Week)
NASA’s Orion to Set Distance Record
Gizmodo reports that NASA’s Artemis 1 mission “continues to go well, with Orion entering into its target orbit around the Moon on Friday.” At 4:48 p.m. ET Monday, on what is flight day 13 of the mission, “Orion will reach its maximum distance from Earth, at which point it will be approximately 268,554 miles (432,194 kilometers) from home.” When Orion reaches “this maximum distance point later today, it’ll set a new standard for the farthest that any crew-rated vehicle has traveled from Earth – a standard that likely won’t be bested for years to come.” The spacecraft “had already broken the previous record, set during the Apollo missions, over the weekend, but its journey wasn’t over yet.”
Full Story (Gizmodo)
Learn More (@NASA_Orion video clip)
NASA, SpaceX Successfully Launch Crew-5 Mission to the ISS
Space.com reports that NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 mission successfully launched to the International Space Station Wednesday from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Launch Pad 39A. Liftoff occurred at 12:00 p.m. EDT, “kicking off a roughly 29-hour journey to the orbiting lab.” The spacecraft is scheduled to dock at the ISS on Thursday at 4:57 p.m. ET. The mission’s “four spaceflyers are NASA’s Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata and cosmonaut Anna Kikina.” The launch “made Mann the first Native American woman to reach the final frontier and Kikina the first Russian to fly on a private American spacecraft.”
Full Story (Space.com)
Video
NASA’s SpaceX Crew-5 Mission to the International Space Station (Official NASA Broadcast)
(NASA; YouTube)
SpaceX Falcon Heavy Could Launch This Month After Three-Year Wait
Spaceflight Now reports, “More than three years after SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket last blazed a path into orbit, the 28-engine launcher is finally set to fly again as soon as Oct. 28 from Kennedy Space Center in Florida on a long-delayed national security mission for the U.S. Space Force, a military spokesperson said.” The Falcon Heavy mission “is expected to be the next launch from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy following the liftoff Wednesday of a Falcon 9 rocket and a Dragon capsule carrying a crew of four to the International Space Station. SpaceX ground teams at pad 39A will prepare the pad for the Falcon Heavy, which has a different configuration than the Falcon 9 with three Falcon rocket boosters connected together to triple the launcher’s total thrust.” Spaceflight Now adds that the delay between Falcon Heavy launches is due to a lack of payloads for the rocket.
Full Story (Spaceflight Now)
ULA’s Atlas V Launches from Cape Canaveral
Spaceflight Now reports that a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas 5 rocket successfully launched Tuesday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 5:36 p.m. ET, “on a delivery mission for the commercial telecom satellite operator SES.” The mission is noteworthy as it marked “the first commercial Atlas 5 launch into geosynchronous orbit.” More than six hours after liftoff, the rocket’s Centaur upper stage deployed the SES 20 and 21 satellites, which are set “to begin 15-year missions beaming C-band television and raido programming across the United States.”
Full Story (Spaceflight Now)
Video
ULA’s live broadcast of its Atlas V SES-20/21 mission launch.
(ULA; YouTube)