Cosmic Log
TUKWILA, Wash. — Today it’s an empty office building in a business park south of Seattle, not far from a Mexican restaurant and an organic nursery. But within just a few months, the place will be turning out two to three satellites per month for a U.S.-European joint venture called LeoStella.
LOGAN, Utah — Seattle-based Spaceflight is confirming that it has more than 70 satellites from 18 countries signed up for launch on a first-of-its-kind dedicated rideshare mission, due to fly on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket by the end of the year.
The dozens of spacecraft include two SkySat high-resolution Earth-imaging satellites from Planet, which are designated as the lead payloads. But there’ll also be more exotic payloads on board — including an art project that’s designed to shine in the night sky, and a satellite built by middle-schoolers to test the viability of bacteria in the vacuum of space.
The current tally of 71 satellites on Spaceflight’s SmallSat Express won’t set the record for the most satellites launched at one time. That distinction will still belong to the Indian Space Research Organization, which launched a PSLV rocket with 104 satellites on board last year. But it will represent Spaceflight’s first purchase of the full capacity of a Falcon 9 rocket, and the first use of an innovative set of satellite deployers known as the Upper Free Flyer and the Lower Free Flyer.
When India’s PSLV rocket launched a host of satellites into orbit in January, one big piece was missing: the Federal Communications Commission’s authorization for Swarm Technologies’ super-miniaturized satellites.
The FCC had nixed Swarm’s application on the grounds that the wallet-sized communications satellites, known as SpaceBEEs, were too small to be tracked properly. But Seattle-based Spaceflight, which had arranged for the launch, didn’t know that.
January’s unauthorized launch of the SpaceBEEs resulted in a regulatory slap for Swarm, and no small embarrassment for Spaceflight.
Curt Blake, the launch logistics company’s president, vows it won’t happen again.
Seattle-based Spaceflight has a new product to offer customers who want to get small satellites up and running: Virgin Orbit’s air-launch system.
Virgin Orbit’s system, which involves sending its two-stage LauncherOne rocket into orbit from a converted Boeing 747 jet dubbed Cosmic Girl, isn’t quite ready for prime time yet. But it’s due to become available soon, and when the rockets start flying, they’ll offer Spaceflight’s clients something that’s been hard to get up to now.
Melissa Wuerl, Spaceflight’s director of business development, said her company’s customers have been asking for launch opportunities that can put small satellites into low- to mid-latitude orbital inclinations that stick close to Earth’s equator.
“We started casting about … and there just wasn’t any,” she told GeekWire.
Seattle-based Spaceflight has partnered with Rocket Lab for three launches over the next year, including one of the first launches for BlackSky’s Earth observation constellation.
All three launches will send an assortment of small satellites into low Earth orbit from Rocket Lab’s facility on New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula in New Zealand.
One of BlackSky’s Global satellites and several other rideshare payloads are due to go up on the first flight, set for the end of 2018.
California-based Deep Space Industries says it has signed a contract to provide water-spraying thrusters for the BlackSky Earth observation satellites that are due to be built in Seattle.
The contract covers an initial block of 20 Comet water-based satellite propulsion systems. The systems expel superheated water vapor as propellant to adjust the attitude of small spacecraft in orbit.
Twenty satellites are scheduled to go into orbit by 2020 in the first phase of an Earth observation effort managed by BlackSky, a subsidiary of Seattle-based Spaceflight Industries. The first satellite, dubbed Global-1, is due for launch this year.
It’s official: After receiving all government approvals, a French-Italian joint venture has taken a minority stake in Seattle-based Spaceflight Industries as part of a $150 million funding round.
The French and Italian partners in The Space Alliance, Thales Alenia Space and Telespazio, have also joined in two cooperative arrangements with Spaceflight Industries.
A stealthy California startup called Swarm Technologies is facing the wrath of the Federal Communications Commission after its super-miniaturized satellites were launched without proper authorization.
The flap was first reported March 9 by IEEE Spectrum.
It all started when Swarm Technologies developed a breed of networked communications satellites known as SpaceBEEs (Basic Electronic Elements). The satellites were unusually small: about 4 inches square and 1 inch thick, or roughly the size of a sandwich.
Spaceflight Industries’ BlackSky geospatial intelligence service is taking the wraps off its first operational satellite, Global-1, which will blaze the trail for what’s expected to be a 60-satellite Earth observation constellation.
The Seattle-based venture plans to have four of the Global satellites launched within the next year, as rideshare payloads on rockets that could include SpaceX’s Falcon 9, Rocket Lab’s Electron or India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, or PSLV.
BlackSky has said it aims to offer a service capable of providing on-demand satellite imagery in about 90 minutes for about $90 a picture.
“The Global satellites are an important step forward for the satellite industry,” Nick Merski, vice president of space operations at Spaceflight Industries, said today in a news release. “We are continuing to advance the boundaries of what can be achieved in terms of price point, capability and form factor, and these improvements ultimately help to make space more accessible for a broader set of business applications.”
Redmond, Wash.-based Planetary Resources’ technology demonstrator satellite for asteroid prospecting is due for launch in early January, along with more than two dozen other satellites, aboard India’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle.
The latest word on the schedule for the PSLV-C40 mission came today from Seattle-based Spaceflight, which is providing launch and mission services for Planetary Resources’ Arkyd-6 and 10 other satellites.
Arkyd-6 is only about the size of an inkjet printer, but it’s designed to capture images in midwave infrared wavelengths and send them back to Earth. The imaging technology is destined to be used in future generations of Planetary Resources’ asteroid-surveying spacecraft.