December is off to a high-flying start, with a flurry of space launches around the world in the past few days. Many of the payloads include interesting science experiments, new satellites and new satellite technologies. Also, the new launches and the previous launches this year demonstrate that space launches, even though hazardous, have achieved a very high success rate.
Let’s take a look at a few of these missions.
1. SpaceX Cargo Resupply Mission to the ISS
First up, the SpaceX launched its Dragon spacecraft on Thursday carrying supplies and science equipment to the ISS. Turn up the volume in the video below to experience the bone-rattling roar of the rocket engines.
Science cargo in the Dragon spacecraft includes —
- The Hyperspectral Imager Suite (HISUI), a next-generation, hyperspectral Earth imaging system.
- Mighty Mice in Space — 40 mice are traveling to the ISS for an experiment to help gauge the effectiveness of an experimental drug to combat muscle and bone atrophy; the therapy blocks signaling by myostatin (MSTN) and activin, which are molecular signaling pathways that influence muscle degradation. A subset of the mice, dubbed the Might Mice, have been genetically engineered and lack the gene for producing myostatin, and will develop additional muscle mass compared to normal mice.
- A combustion experiment to guide research into the behavior of flames in confined spaces in microgravity.
- An experiment (courtesy Anheuser-Busch) to study the malting of barley in microgravity. Understanding how barley responds to microgravity could identify ways to adapt it for nutritional use on long-duration spaceflights. Gotta have beer on that trip to Mars 😄
- Plus a few holiday treats for the ISS crew.
The first stage successfully landed on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You.
2. Rocket Lab’s Electron Rocket Launch
Early Friday morning, Rocket Lab’s Electron small satellite launcher took off from the picturesque Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand. Rocket Lab’s 10th mission was named ‘Running Out of Fingers’; the launch included technology designed to help it eventually recover and reuse elements of its launch vehicle.
Payload included —
- A microsatellite designed by Tokyo-based Astro Live Experiences, which will release hundreds of colorful sky pellets to fall into the atmosphere next year, creating an artificial meteor shower that could be visible to millions, probably during a rock concert show in Japan.
- 6 pocketQube satellites. A PocketQube is a type of miniaturized satellite for space research that usually has a size of 5 cm cubed (one eighth the volume of a CubeSat), has a mass of no more than 250 grams, and typically uses commercial off-the-shelf components for its electronics.
I hope we do not waste precious space resources on silly missions like this but there are no laws to stop such things.
PocketQubs (aka PocketQubes), on the other hand, have the potential to open up new areas of exploration and create headaches for those worried about crowded low orbit space and space debris.
Here is some info on the PocketQub sats from astronomer Jonathan McDowell’s twitter site at twitter.com/...
- NOOR 1A and NOOR 1B are 3P PocketQub sats for Stara Space of Los Angeles built by Alba Orbital of Glasgow. The sats are 15cm x 5cm in size with a mass of 0.75 kg and carry an experimental comms payload.
- FossaSat is a 1P PocketQub for Fossa Systems of Madrid with test systems; it is 0.25 kg, 5cm.
- SMOG-P is a 1P from Budapest U. of Technology and Economics to map terrestrial radio emissions.
- ATL1 is a 2P from ATL Ltd of Csapas, Hungary; it also has a spectrum monitoring payload as well as component tests.
- TRSI_Sat is a 1P technology sat from TRSI Club.
This is how Rocket Lab plans to recover first stage boosters for reuse in future — using a helicopter to snag the rocket in a controlled descent.
It is not as crazy as it looks — we used to catch spacecraft falling to Earth carrying secret Earth imagery on Kodak film in the ‘60s and ‘70s using C-130 Hercules and C-119 aircraft. See the Corona program for details.
3. Soyuz Cargo Resupply Mission to the ISS
A few hours later on Friday morning, a Russian Soyuz Progress spacecraft launched from Kazakhstan carrying more needed supplies and goodies to the ISS.
Payload includes —
- 650 kg of propellant
- 50 kg of oxygen
- 420 kg of water
- 1,367 kg of dry cargo/crew supplies/experiments, etc.
This is a video from a camera attached to the rocket, facing down, giving you a vicarious look at what Major T. J. "King" Kong must have experienced. Enjoy the ride 😄
4. China Kuaizhou-1A rockets
Two Kuaizhou-1A rockets were launched within 6 hours from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center late Friday evening. KZ-1A is a low-cost solid-fueled launch vehicle designed to launch low-orbit satellites weighing under 300 kg each.
The first rocket carried - a Kuaizhou-1A (KZ-1A) launch vehicle launched the Jilin-1 Gaofen 02B satellite, a new optical remote sensing satellite, that will form a network with the 14 previously launched Jilin-1 satellites, providing remote sensing data and services for agriculture, forestry, resources and environment. Jilin, one of the country’s oldest industrial bases, is developing its satellite industry in a new economic drive. The province plans to launch 60 satellites by 2020 and 137 by 2030.
The second rocket carried 6 small satellites into low orbit -
- HEAD-2A and HEAD-2B are the first batch of satellites for the 48-satellite Skywalker Constellation for environmental monitoring and information collection on global ships and aircraft.
- The Spacety-16 and Spacety-17 satellites are medium-resolution micro-nano remote sensing satellites that are mainly used for disaster prevention, maritime applications, agricultural remote sensing and polar environment monitoring.
- Tianqi-4A and Tianqi-4B satellites will provide services such as global Internet of Things data transmission, emergency communications and material tracking.
China has made a high number of successful launches this year and deployed a relatively large number of space assets.
5. De-orbiting of Cygnus NG-11 spacecraft
We have one “arrival” this week — the de-orbiting of the Cygnus NG-11 which carried supplies to the ISS in April and performed some additional experiments in space in the past few months.
Next Up
The two big space events coming up in the next few weeks is the Boeing Starliner spacecraft test launch (no humans on this flight) and the SpaceX In-Flight Abort test of the Crew Dragon spacecraft. We should see crewed launches using American spacecraft next year.
Also, the European exoplanet space telescope CHEOPS is scheduled for launch on Dec 17.
SpaceX also has plans to launch another batch of 60 satellites for its Starlink constellation in December. The Starlink 42,000-satellite constellation program is raising a lot of concern in the astronomy community (for light pollution) and in the rest of the space industry (for space debris).
Epilogue
These recent launches demonstrate that earth orbit missions have become quite reliable, many different private companies are entering the space business with launch vehicles and small satellites, and the cost of sending small satellites into low earth orbit has reduced to a point where many small commercial and education organizations can afford to create and deploy innovative technologies in space.
Further Reading
- SpaceX Dragon Heads to Space Station with NASA Science, Cargo — www.nasa.gov/...
- China conducts double Kuaizhou-1A launch from Taiyuan — www.nasaspaceflight.com/…
- The First Spy Satellites Had to Drop Gigantic Buckets of Film Back to Earth — www.vice.com/…
- www.rocketlabusa.com