Tag: September 2023

Blue Origin’s New Shepard Rocket May Fly Soon Following Closing of FAA Investigation

The Orlando (FL) Sentinel reports that on Wednesday, the FAA “said it had closed its investigation into the flight of an uncrewed Blue Origin New Shepard rocket that ended with its booster destroyed and a capsule that had to use its emergency escape system.” The September 12, 2022, “mishap” was due to a “structural failure of an engine nozzle caused by higher than expected engine operating temperatures,” according to a release from the FAA. With the nozzle too hot, it “caused a trajectory change about one minute after liftoff from Blue Origin’s West Texas launch site.” The capsule on the NS-23 mission “that was carrying science payloads performed as designed, though, blasting away from the booster after which it performed a parachute-assisted landing near the launch site.” The FAA’s investigation “resulted in 21 corrective actions Blue Origin had to undertake, including a redesign of the engine and nozzle components so the rocket boosters won’t suffer the same fate on future missions.” While the rocket “remains grounded for now, Blue Origin on its social media posted that flights would resume shortly.”
Full Story (Orlando Sentinel)

Overair Working to Complete First Air Taxi Prototype

An article in Aerospace America describes Overair’s facility and examines the eVTOL aircraft the company is producing and the differences from its competitors. Company Co-Founder and CEO Ben Tigner believes the company’s rotor design and proprietary technology will be what drives Overair’s success in a competitive market. Overair’s aircraft will use large rotors, and therefore require less than competitors like Joby, Archer, and Volocopter – using only four rotors while others use as many as 18. The rotors are large, but lightweight due to their utilization of carbon fiber composite.
Full Story (Aerospace America)

Three Astronauts Return to Earth, One After Setting US Space Record

The AP reports that a NASA astronaut and “two Russian cosmonauts returned to Earth on Wednesday after being stuck in space for just over a year. American Frank Rubio set a record for the longest U.S. spaceflight – a result of the extended stay.” The trio landed in “a remote area of Kazakhstan, descending in a Soyuz capsule that was rushed up as a replacement after their original ride was hit by space junk and lost all its coolant while docked to the International Space Station.” What should have been “a 180-day mission turned into a 371-day stay. Rubio spent more than two weeks longer in space than Mark Vande Hei, who held NASA’s previous endurance record for a single spaceflight.”
Full Story (Associated Press)

Artemis II Launch Coming Together

The Orlando (FL) Sentinel reports that the reigning title holder “for world’s most powerful rocket saw action on both its center core and its two solid rocket boosters this month, with pieces for the Artemis II launch coming together as NASA aims to send humans on a trip around the moon next year.” Arriving by train to Florida on Monday “were all 10 segments for the two side boosters of the Space Launch System rocket that will launch the Orion spacecraft with four humans on board from Kennedy Space Center as early as November 2024.” The booster’s core stage “remains in New Orleans, but teams last week installed the last of four converted space shuttle engines to the base of the stage.” The Boeing Company is the core stage’s primary contractor, and still “has more work to do before it can be shipped by barge from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility to KSC, currently on track for a November arrival, but the tail end finally got the last of its four R2-25 engines stuck in place.” Aerojet Rocketdyne, which “was recently acquired by Melbourne-based L3Harris, manufactured all four engines that were originally designed for the Space Shuttle Program, but have since been converted for use on the SLS.”
Full Story (Orlando Sentinel)

USAF Begins Testing of Joby Electric Air Taxi

Aerospace America reports that on Monday, the US Air Force (USAF) held a ceremony to formally introduce personnel “to the first electric air taxi to be stationed at an American military base: a Joby Aviation S4 tiltrotor.” The S4 will be operated at Edwards Air Force Base by the USAF, Joby, and NASA in order to test its ability to carry personnel and supplies. Edwards Air Force Base 412th Test Wing Commander Col. Douglas Wickert said, “We’re literally standing on the threshold here of a new era in aviation. There’s no doubt that the electrification of aviation is going to be a critical piece in the broader energy transition toward a sustainable future for humanity, and I’m proud that we get to the opportunity to contribute to that. There’s a transformative vertical lift industry that’s emerging, and we need to be partners in it.” The S4 at the ceremony is the first one delivered to the USAF under a $131 million contract between Joby and the Air Force Research Laboratory’s innovation arm AFWERX. The USAF will not officially own the aircraft, but the contract allows the USAF and partners to fly it.
Full Story (Aerospace America)

USAF Receives First Electric Passenger Aircraft Capable of Taking Off, Landing Vertically

The New York Times reports the US Air Force announced Monday that it had “received its first electric passenger aircraft capable of taking off and landing vertically, a milestone for the companies that hope to one day sell thousands of such vehicles to serve as air taxis. Joby Aviation, an air taxi start-up, delivered the aircraft to Edwards Air Force Base in Southern California … , Air taxis are typically powered by batteries and designed to lift off and land like helicopters, but include wings to fly like airplanes.” Joby “said that its electric aircraft is substantially quieter than helicopters or planes. Each can carry one pilot and four passengers and travel as fast as 200 miles per hour and as far as 100 miles, according to the company.”
Full Story (New York Times)

NASA Releases Industry Solicitation for ISS Deorbit Vehicle

FlightGlobal reports that on September 20, NASA “released an industry solicitation for a platform the agency is calling the US Deorbit Vehicle (USDV) – which will be used to safely return the aging ISS to Earth.” NASA said that the “primary objective of this contract is to procure a safe, reliable and cost-effective de-orbit vehicle to meet NASA’s ISS end-of-life de-orbit mission requirements.” According to FlightGlobal, the “USDV solicitation gives the US aerospace industry two months to submit proposed designs for such a platform. Prospective contractors will be required to design, develop, manufacture, test, integrate, deliver and sustain the new orbital vehicle.” NASA said, “The USDV is focused on the final de-orbit activity. … It will be a new spacecraft design or modification to an existing spacecraft that must function on its first flight and have sufficient redundancy and anomaly recovery capability to continue the critical de-orbit burn.”
Full Story (FlightGlobal)

Only 55% of US F-35s Ready to Fly

FlightGlobal reports that an analysis from auditors at the GAO found only 55% of the US military’s fleet of F-35 fighter jets were able to carry out assigned missions during the period in which the auditors conducted their examination. The report was released by the GAO on Thursday and examined the approximately 450 F-35s operated by the military in March 2023. Auditors “said the 55% readiness rate from that the time is ‘far below programme goals,’ citing an array of maintenance issues with the type.” These maintenance issues “include a lack of spare parts, inadequate maintenance training for military personnel and a heavy reliance on contractors for depot-level maintenance – where the most involved or complex repairs take place.” The report states, “The Department of Defense (DOD) relies heavily on its contractors to lead and manage F-35 sustainment. However, as DOD seeks expanded government control, it has neither determined the desired mix of government and contractor roles, nor identified and obtained the technical data needed to support its desired mix.”
Full Story (FlightGlobal)

FAA Proposes New Rule to Reduce Space Debris

UPI reports that SpaceX “launched 22 satellites for its Starlink ‘constellation’ into low-Earth orbit late Saturday night as the Federal Aviation Administration proposed a new rule to reduce space debris from commercial flights.” The FAA said in a statement that limiting debris will “reduce the potential for collisions with spacecraft and satellites to promote a sustainable space environment,” and added, “If left unchecked, the accumulation of orbital debris will increase the risk of collisions and clutter orbits used for human spaceflight and for satellites providing communications, weather and global positioning system services.” The proposed rule “would require companies like SpaceX to dispose of the upper stages of their rockets in one of five ways.” Companies would be “required to either conduct a controlled entry, move the upper stage to a less congested storage or graveyard orbit, send the upper stage on an Earth-escape orbit, remove the upper stage debris within five years in a process called active debris removal, or perform and uncontrolled atmospheric disposal.”
Full Story (UPI)