In Today’s Deep Space Extra… Wednesday’s National Space Council session at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center seeks to carefully reform regulation of the U.S. commercial space industry, while addressing the threat posed by potential U.S. adversaries. If a space renaissance is indeed underway, will the government’s role be funded sufficiently. Space Launch System’s (SLS) first stage engine shows its muscle in Wednesday test firing.
Human Space Exploration
Pence: To lead in space, U.S. needs less red tape for commercial space companies
Coalition President and CEO in the News – Dr. Mary Lynne Dittmar
Space.com (2/21): Vice President Mike Pence, chair of the National Space Council, lauded U.S. leadership in space, but emphasized the nation can do more to achieve ambitions of sending human explorers to deep space and opening low Earth orbit to new commercial sector activities by streamlining the government’s regulatory environment. Pence led the council’s second meeting Wednesday at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The cabinet level council is to meet again in the Fall.
Second National Space Council meeting focused on regulatory reform, China
Coalition Member in the News – NanoRacks
Spacepolicyonline.com (2/21): After its focus on streamlining the Department of Transportation and Department of Commerce regulatory environments for U.S. commercial space, participants in Wednesday’s meeting of the National Space Council turned to China and its emerging status as a space power. Vice President Mike Pence, the council’s chair, and the others heard opposing views regarding the Beijing government and its industry. Dean Cheng, of the Heritage Foundation, cautioned that China’s motives revolve around military advantage. Jeff Manber, who leads commercially successful NanoRacks, called for greater opportunity to compete in the Chinese market place but in “lockstep” with NASA and the DOD to prevent unwanted technology transfers.
RS-25 hot fire pushes SLS engine to record 113 percent thrust level
Coalition Member in the News – Aerojet Rocketdyne
NASAspaceflight.com (2/21): An upgraded RS-25 Aerojet Rocketdyne rocket engine achieved 113 percent of its rated power over a four minute test firing at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi on Wednesday. Four of the rocket engines are to power the core stage of NASA’s Space Launch System (SLS), the launch vehicle that is to start human explorers on future missions of deep space exploration. The test also featured an assessment of the 3-D manufactured “pogo accumulator assembly,” a stabilizing device. The additive manufacturing process promises to help lower production costs of the powerful rocket engine with a space shuttle heritage.
National Review (2/21): Plans to transition the U.S. led International Space Station to private sector control by 2025 is welcome and could become a model for other government agencies, according to the op-ed. The move could open the Space Station to new forms of research and free NASA to embrace new science and technology pursuits.
Op-ed | On the verge of a space renaissance
Space News (2/21): “A space renaissance of sorts is happening right now, especially in human space endeavors, and it appears to have many nations and many sectors, both governmental and private, eager to participate in projects,” writes Madhu Thangavelu, University of Southern California researcher and aerospace instructor. The commercial sector is eager to inject the latest technology breakthroughs to the pursuits. Thangavelu explains. “This policy is not founded on exploration, science and technology prowess alone,” he adds. “It is the culmination of thought leaders that the free world must lead such an effort.”
Commentary: NASA’s bold plans need bold lawmakers to step up with funding
Orlando Sentinel (2/20): NASA’s $19.9 billion, 2019 budget request is too little to meet the human deep space exploration ambitions laid out in the spending plan presented by the White House to Congress early last week, according to Frank Slazer, vice president for space systems at the Aerospace Industries Association. Even a larger role for the U.S. private sector will not be enough to finance a human return to deep space, Slazer adds. “… our government consistently fails to provide the budgets required to realize these bold visions,” writes the space industry veteran.
Humans can reach Mars but unknown radiation may turn out lethal, Russian scientist warns
TASS of Russia (2/22): A prominent space plasma physicist warms that overcoming radiation could be a significant challenge to the human exploration of Mars. The challenge requires an international response, according to Anatoly Petrukovich, of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Space Research Institute.
How a new ‘happy suit’ would protect astronauts from the stresses of space
Space.com (2/21): Engineers at Florida Polytechnic University have developed a concept that would equip a future space suit with internal sensors able to adjust the garment’s environment — temperature, oxygen and light levels — in response to the astronaut’s changing physical status. The sensors would also provide physicians on Earth with data on the astronauts heart rate, blood pressure and other conditions.
Space Science
European space probe prepares to sniff Martian atmosphere
Association Press via New York Times (2/21): The European and Russian Trace Gas Orbiter has completed a series of aerobraking maneuvers at Mars and in April will begin studying whether traces of methane in the red planet’s atmosphere might come from biological activity or geophysical processes . The spacecraft, launched in March 2016, maneuvered into an elliptical orbit about Mars in October.
The first burst of an exploding supernova has finally been captured
USA Today (2/21): An amateur astronomer observing from Argentina has captured an image of the first moments of a supernova, or stellar explosion. The blast occurred in the spiral galaxy NGC 613, about 40 million light years from Earth in the constellation Sculptor. Another study documents the oldest supernova, a star explosion that occurred an estimated 10 1/2 billion years ago. Details were reported in the journal Nature and the Astrophysical Journal.
Other News
White House emphasizes industry over science in Space Council appointments
Coalition Member in the News – United Launch Alliance
Spaceflightnow.com (2/21): A 29 member advisory panel to the National Space Council named earlier this week gives voice to the commercial space industry, previous astronauts and elected officials. However, some see an absence of representation from those with science and commercial telecommunications backgrounds.
National Space Council backs incremental space regulatory reform
Coalition Members in the News (National Space Council Users’ Advisory Group) – Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, Orbital ATK, United Launch Alliance, Coalition President and CEO Dr. Mary Lynne Dittmar
Space News (2/21): The council, who met at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center on Wednesday, approved recommendations for four reforms including U.S. commercial space activities, among them streamlining the licensing process for launch vehicles that liftoff from more than one spaceport. Others would transition the Office of Space Commerce and the Commercial Remote Sensing Regulatory Affairs Office from NOAA to the office of the Secretary of Commerce and work on reforms to export controls by year’s end.