Space News reports that the need to “modernize US spaceports has been discussed for years, but major upgrades have yet to materialize.” With $1.3 billion in projected “funding for spaceport improvements, the Space Force is now trying to move these plans forward, identifying the most critical areas needing attention in the near-term.” Space Systems Command Program Executive Director Brigadier General Kristin Panzenhagen said, “There’s a significant effort to define what we need to be able to support the capacity and the pace of launch that our nation needs.” Based at Patrick Space Force Base, Florida, Panzenhagen in June “assumed command of Space Launch Delta 45, and oversees the nation’s busiest spaceport on the Florida coast.” Speaking last week at the AFCEA Space Industry Days conference in Los Angeles, Panzenhagen “expressed optimism that initiatives to bring East Coast and West Coast spaceports into the future could soon become reality.” The Space Force has “conducted a detailed analysis of spaceport requirements given the increased pace of commercial space launch, she said.”
Full Story (Space News)
Tag: engineering
Airbus Helicopters Opens 3D Printing Center
Aviation International News reports that Airbus Helicopters “has opened a new 3D printing center at its Donauwörth, Germany site, expanding in-house capacity for this technology.” The airframer now “operates three machines for components made of titanium, four for plastic, and one for aluminum.” Airbus is “using the process for serial production parts as well as for components for prototype aircraft such as the CityAirbus NextGen eVTOL and the high-speed Racer experimental compound helicopter.” Airbus Helicopters Managing Director for Germany Stefan Thomé said, “Among other advantages, 3D printing can reduce the weight of aircraft components, which leads to less fuel consumption. Such potential can bring financial benefits and contribute to reducing CO2 emissions during operations.”
Full Story (Aviation International News)
NOAA Says Evidence of Rare Metals in Stratosphere Likely from Rocket Launches
The Washington Post reports NOAA researchers collected and analyzed particles in the stratosphere that indicates the presence of rare elemental metals niobium and hafnium, which “are common in spacecraft manufacturing and can be found in semiconductors, rocket chambers and other applications.” The discovery “sheds light on the environmental aftermath of a growing number of rockets, satellites and other human-made spacecraft that give off metal vapors as they reenter the atmosphere.” The researchers also “identified aluminum, lithium, copper and lead in the stratosphere – all of which are linked to alloys used by the aerospace industry.” It is still unclear “how the existence of these rare metals and other elements in the stratosphere might influence the climate.”
Full Story (Washington Post – Subscription Publication)
Value of Older Commercial Aircraft Increases as New Models Experience Problems
The Wall Street Journal reported the value of 10-year-old planes, particularly the Airbus A320-200, has surged by 10% since August, recovering from the pandemic. This increase is attributed to problems with the newer A320neo model due to engine issues. Pratt & Whitney found contaminants in the engines, affecting around 40% of the A320neo fleet, potentially grounding hundreds of planes until 2026. Older aircraft models like the Airbus A330-300 and Boeing 777-300ER have also seen increased value. This trend suggests that investors are favoring older aircraft, which appear more reliable and insulated from manufacturing problems affecting newer planes.
Full Story (Wall Street Journal – Subscription Publication)
Commercial Space Companies Warn Congress to Improve Regulations or US May Lose Spaceflight Lead
Spaceflight Now reports that the three companies that “have flown people to space and back, Blue Origin, SpaceX and Virgin Galactic, joined two experts at a Congressional hearing to press for regulatory improvements, warning the US risks losing its lead in spaceflight.” The 1.5-hour-long hearing “before the US Senate Subcommittee on Space and Science was mainly focused on a regulatory framework called ‘Part 450,’ which was designed to help streamline the process of issuing launch licenses under the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation, which goes by the acronym AST.” The five witnesses “argued that not only is the current regulatory framework not achieving its ideal goals, but it is stifling growth and innovation in the commercial launch market.”
Full Story (Spaceflight Now)
2023 ASCEND Announces Livestream Sessions Beginning Monday, October 23
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 20, 2023 – Reston, Va. – The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) today announced five sessions during 2023 ASCEND will be shared via livestream on its website, ascend.events, providing complimentary access to stellar content featured during the event, 23–25 October, Caesars Forum, Las Vegas. The livestream recordings will be made available for on-demand viewing at ascend.events/livestream later each day. ASCEND is the world’s premier outcomes-focused, interdisciplinary space event designed to accelerate building our off-world future.
The sessions to be shared via livestream during 2023 ASCEND include:
Monday, 23 October, 0800–0930 hrs PT
MACRO-01: From Dreaming to Doing: Utilizing Creativity and Imagination to Accelerate our Off-World Future
Speakers:
- Lieutenant General Nina Armagno, U.S. Space Force (Ret.)
- Kara Cunzeman, Director of Strategic Foresight, Center for Space Policy and Strategy, The Aerospace Corporation
- Debra Facktor, Head of U.S. Space Systems, Airbus U.S. Space & Defense
- Dan Hawk, Principal Scientist, United First Nations Planetary Defense
- Jay Kim, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Boryung
- Afua Richardson, Artist
- Daniel Suarez, New York Times Bestselling Science Fiction Author
- Julie Van Kleeck, ASCEND Executive Producer, AIAA Space Domain Lead
The opening program will explore what it means to create and inspire, and why systematic thinking about the future is essential for building humanity’s sustainable off-world futures. We will hear voices from the future and learn from established leaders about how to mobilize organizations and empower individual agency to get there.
Monday, 23 October, 1245–1345 hrs PT
SPEC-14: 2023 AIAA David W. Thompson Lecture in Space Commerce: “Connecting Space to Earth”
Speaker: George Whitesides, Partner, Convective Capital
The 2023 AIAA David W. Thompson Lecture in Space Commerce has been awarded to George T. Whitesides, Partner, Convective Capital. Previously, Whitesides served as Chief of Staff for NASA in the Obama Administration, and later as CEO of Virgin Galactic, which over 10 years he led to space operations and a public company listing. He co-founded Megafire Action, an advocacy organization that supports solutions to the wildfire crisis, and is a partner at Convective Capital, a firm that invests in firetech companies. He is the cofounder of AstroAccess, a non-profit organization dedicated to encouraging universal design and accessibility principles in spaceflight.
Whitesides’ lecture, “Connecting Space to Earth,” will address this moment in time when aerospace lessons and solutions can help solve the world’s greatest challenges.
Tuesday, 24 October, 0800–0930 hrs PT
MACRO-02 Session
Award Presentation: 2023 AIAA von Braun Award for Excellence in Space Program Management to John M. Grunsfeld, Endless Frontier Associates LLC
Keynote: NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy, “Exploration Enabled: Creating a Framework to Ensure Responsible Access for All”
Panel: Accelerating Sustainable Space Exploration Through Global Cooperation, including panelists:
- Peter Gräf, Director for Applications and Science, German Space Agency (DLR)
- Lt. Gen. Larry James, U.S. Air Force (Ret.), Deputy Director, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
- Daniel Neuenschwander, Director for Human and Robotic Exploration, European Space Agency (ESA)
- Shri M. Sankaran, Distinguished Scientist and Director, U R Rao Satellite Center (URSC), Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)
- Hiroshi Sasaki, Vice President and Director General for Human Spaceflight Technology Directorate, JAXA
Tuesday morning will open with an award presentation recognizing aerospace excellence. The presentations will include a keynote address from NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy, followed by a panel discussion featuring space agency leaders from around the world. They will address how their capabilities and technical advancements are being applied to solve the societal problems across the globe; how they are partnering across the spectrum with other national agencies, commercial entities, and private companies; and what they are investing in for the future.
Tuesday, 24 October, 1830–1930 hrs PT
SPEC-32: 2023 William H. Pickering Lecture: “Observing Earth’s Precious Water from Space”
Speakers:
- Parag Vaze, Project Manager, Surface Water Ocean Topography (SWOT) Mission, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
- Nadya Vinogradova Shiffer, Program Scientist and Manager, Physical Oceanography Program, Earth Science Division, Science Mission Directorate, NASA
The 2023 William H. Pickering Lecture will explore a space mission that will address some of Earth’s most pressing climate change questions of our time by informing decisions about our daily lives and livelihoods. The SWOT Mission was developed jointly by NASA and the French space agency, CNES, with contributions from the UK and Canadian space agencies. Using state-of-the-art “radar interferometry” technology, SWOT is measuring the elevation of water to observe millions of lakes and wetlands with surface areas 250 m2 and thousands of rivers whose width exceeds 100 m, while detecting ocean features with unprecedented resolution, accuracy, and spatial coverage. The primary science payload, a novel Ka-band Radar Interferometer (KaRIn), is the first in-flight demonstration of wide-swath (2, 50Km swaths) SAR interferometry for more accurate and comprehensive mapping of Earth’s ocean and surface water from space.
Wednesday, 25 October, 0800–0930 hrs PT
MACRO-03: What Has Space Done for Me Lately?
Panelists:
- Bryan Bender, Vice President, Communications Strategy, Strategic Marketing Innovations, Inc. (former Senior National Correspondent and Defense Editor, POLITICO)
- Dan Dumbacher, AIAA Executive Director
- Emma Louden, Astrophysics Ph.D. Candidate, Yale University
- Shawna Pandya, Director, International Institute for Astronautical Sciences Space Medicine Group
“Why explore space when we have so many challenges on Earth?” This is an all-too-common refrain when it comes to justifying space exploration, with many answers. On the one hand, humanity has benefited tremendously from space-based technologies, satellites, and exploration; on the other hand, what if we took a more directed approach toward solving humanity’s greatest challenges? Or perhaps we aren’t investing in space enough? Watch as our panel of experts discuss the various contributions space-based technologies have made toward improving day-to-day life on Earth and address some of the common arguments against continued investment in space development and exploration.
In addition, the following session will be recorded and will be available on demand at ascend.events/livestream:
Monday, 23 October, 1130–1230 hrs PT
(not available via livestream, only on-demand viewing at ascend.events/livestream)
SPEC-13: 2023 AIAA von Kármán Lecture in Astronautics: “Celebrating a Century of Kármán’s Momentum-Integral and Space-Reductive Approaches: Applications in Rocketry and Beyond”
Speaker: Joseph Majdalani, Francis Chair of Excellence and Professor of Aerospace Engineering, Auburn University
The 2023 AIAA von Kármán Lectureship in Astronautics has been awarded to Joseph Majdalani, Francis Chair of Excellence and Professor of Aerospace Engineering, Auburn University. Named in honor of Theodore von Kármán, a world-famous authority on aerospace sciences, the lectureship honors an individual who has performed notably and distinguished themselves technically in the field of astronautics.
Majdalani’s lecture celebrates the centennial of the momentum-integral approach, one of the most significant theoretical contributions of Theodore von Kármán, taught widely in the fields of
aerodynamics. He will discuss the broad impact of this approach, which was introduced in 1921, and often used in conjunction with Pohlhausen’s polynomial approximations. As a well-recognized authority in the field, Majdalani has recently coauthored a textbook on the subject of viscous boundary layers. He also has developed several new formulations based on Kármán’s approach: these lead to an essentially exact solution to the celebrated Blasius equation, whose analytical treatment has remained intractable for over 100 years.
Registration to attend 2023 ASCEND in Las Vegas is still open. Journalists from around the world are invited to cover 2023 ASCEND in person; press passes are available for credentialed media by request.
Media Contact: Rebecca Gray, [email protected], 804-397-5270 cell
About ASCEND
Powered by AIAA, ASCEND, which stands for Accelerating Space Commerce, Exploration, and New Discovery, is the world’s premier collaborative, outcomes-driven, interdisciplinary community designed to accelerate the building of our off-world future. For more information, visit ascend.events, or follow ASCEND on LinkedIn, Twitter, and Instagram.
About AIAA
The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) is the world’s largest aerospace technical society. With nearly 30,000 individual members from 91 countries, and 100 corporate members, AIAA brings together industry, academia, and government to advance engineering and science in aviation, space, and defense. For more information, visit aiaa.org, or follow AIAA on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Instagram.
Rolls-Royce Pearl 10X Engine Passes 2,000 Hour Milestone
Aviation International News reports that Rolls-Royce’s Pearl 10X engine “has now passed the 2,000-hour milestone in ground-testing.” Rated at “more than 18,000 pounds of thrust, the engine met its thrust objectives on its first run and testing has run smoothly to date.” The first flight trials engine “has been delivered from Rolls-Royce’s Dahlewitz factory near Berlin to L3Harris in Waco, Texas, for installation on the company’s Boeing 747 testbed, with a first flight expected before the end of the year.” Flight trials will be “conducted at the Rolls-Royce’s test site in Tucson, Arizona.”
Full Story (Aviation International News)
Video
Rolls-Royce’s Most Powerful Pearl 10X Engine Getting Ready for First Flight
(Global Update; YouTube)
SpaceX Launch Marks a Tie of 2022’s Record Number of Launches
Orlando (FL) Sentinel reports that a SpaceX launch “from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Tuesday night marked the Space Coast’s 57th launch of the year equaling the record total seen in 2022.” A Falcon 9 with 22 SpaceX Starlink internet satellites “lifted off from Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 40 at 8:36 p.m.” This was the first-stage booster’s 16th flight “with a recovery landing downrange on the droneship Just Read the Instructions in the Atlantic.” For SpaceX it “was its 53rd mission from either Canaveral or Kennedy Space Center this year while United Launch Alliance has flown three times and Relativity Space has flown once.” SpaceX is the “lone launch provider this year from KSC having flown 11 times while ULA, SpaceX and Relativity combined for 46 launches from Canaveral.”
Full Story (Orlando Sentinel)
Video
SpaceX launches 22 Starlink satellites atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, 17 October 2023
(Spaceflight Now; YouTube)
HondaJet Echelon Officially Launched at NBAA-BACE
Aviation Week reports that Honda Aircraft formally “launched the HondaJet Echelon Model HA-480 light jet program during NBAA-BACE, announcing it has signed more than 350 letter[s] of intent and providing additional details about its design.” With a transcontinental range “of 2,625 nm with one pilot and four passengers, the aircraft offers midsize performance in a light jet, says Hideto Yamasaki, Honda Aircraft Co. president and CEO.” Honda Aircraft “unveiled the design as a concept aircraft at NBAA-BACE in 2021.” Since June, when the company “announced its decision to commercialize the program, it received additional letters of intent numbering more than 50, officials say.”
Full Story (Aviation Week)
Video
HondaJet Echelon
(HondaJet; YouTube)
Pratt & Whitney-Powered A320neo Groundings Start as FAA-Required Inspections Begin
Aviation Week reports that groundings of Pratt & Whitney-powered Airbus A320neos “are climbing fast as operators remove engines for accelerated inspections recommended by the manufacturer and mandated by regulators.” The percentage of the PW1100G-powered Airbus fleet “on the ground stood at 19% at the end of September, or 267 aircraft out of 1,378 in the global fleet, an Aviation Week analysis shows.” The figure “is a 6% jump compared to August 31’s figure of 175 aircraft out of 1,358, the data show.” Mandates issued “by the FAA and European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) gave affected operators until late September to remove the first batch of engines flagged for inspections.” The initial batch “consisted of about 140 engines, Pratt said when it unveiled its fleet management plan to address potential cracks in certain high-pressure turbine disks and high-pressure compressor integrally bladed rotors (IBR).
Full Story (Aviation Week)