Category Archives: Spacex

SpaceX and Firefly Aerospace are on track to attempt three orbital launches this weekend as the former continues to relentlessly assemble a constellation of Starlink internet satellites and the latter works to secure its first success.

On the heels of 40 successful Falcon 9 launches this year, SpaceX is a few days away from two more Starlink missions that will likely leave the company with more than 3000 working satellites in orbit.

Founded in 2017, 15 years after SpaceX, Firefly Aerospace is almost entirely focused on one near-term goal: the first successful launch of its Alpha rocket.

Fireflys Alpha rocket lifted off for the first time on September 2nd, 2021. Just moments after launch, a faulty cable caused one of the Alpha first stages four Reaver engines to shut down, immediately dooming the attempt. The rocket inexplicably persevered, though, and managed more than two minutes of powered flight before it lost control, became a range safety risk, and was terminated.

More than a year later, Firefly believes it has solved the problems that doomed Alpha Flight 1 and is on the cusp of the rockets second launch attempt, which has been scheduled no earlier than (NET) 3pm PST (22:00 UTC) on Sunday, September 11th.

Recently, the second fully stacked Alpha rocket completed a wet dress rehearsal and static fire while installed on Fireflys Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB) SLC-2W pad, confirming its readiness for flight. Measuring 1.8 meters (6 ft) wide and 29.5 meters (~95 ft) tall, Alpha is about half the width and height of SpaceXs Falcon 9 workhorse, and Firefly estimates that the expendable rocket will be able to launch up to 1.17 tons (~2560 lb) to Low Earth Orbit (LEO).

Thats several times more performance per launch than competitors like Rocket Lab, Astra Space, and Virgin Orbit, but 14 times less than a partially reusable Falcon 9. At $15 million apiece, however, the rockets list price will be 4.5 times less than Falcon 9s, which could be enough to create a niche for customers that want to spend a bit more to send smaller satellites exactly where they want instead of getting dropped off in the general vicinity as a rideshare payload.

Demonstrating an impressive level of transparency, Firefly will offer a public livestream of Alphas second flight in full awareness that it could ultimately broadcast a launch failure for the second time in a row. There are very few instances in the history of spaceflight where a new groups new rocket successfully reached orbit on its first launch, so its a credit to the startup to acknowledge the reality that launch failures are a common extension of the development process, rather than something to hide from the public.

SpaceX knows that reality well. Falcon 1, its first rocket, was about half the size of Fireflys Alpha and suffered three launch failures in two and half years before finally succeeding on its fourth attempt. More than a magnitude larger, Falcon 9 likely benefitted from SpaceXs Falcon 1 experience and had a much smoother start to life, though it did eventually experience its own share of failures years after its 2010 debut.

12 years later, Falcon 9 is one of the most successful launch vehicles of all time, and has simultaneously pioneered the commercially viable reuse of orbital-class rockets. Currently on a historic pace of one launch every ~6.2 days in 2022, Falcon 9 recently completed its 146th successful launch in a row and 173rd successful launch overall.

Hopefully continuing those trends, Next Spaceflight reports that Falcon 9 is scheduled to launch two more batches of Starlink satellites at 9:10 pm EDT on Saturday, September 10th, and 10:53 pm EDT on Sunday, September 11th. In addition to several dozen Starlink satellites, the first mission Starlink 4-2 is expected to carry a relatively large 1.5-ton (~3300 lb) satellite prototype for space-to-phone communications startup AST SpaceMobile. The second mission, known as Starlink 4-34, should be a dedicated launch of another 53 or 54 Starlink satellites.

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SpaceX, Firefly Aerospace targeting three rocket launches in two days - TESLARATI

An exterior of the SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California May 29, 2014. REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni

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WASHINGTON, Sept 9 (Reuters) - SpaceX on Friday challenged the U.S. Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) decision to deny the space company's satellite internet unit $885.5 million in rural broadband subsidies, calling the move "flawed" and "grossly unfair," in a regulatory filing.

The FCC last month turned down applications from billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX and LTD Broadband for funds that had been tentatively awarded in 2020 under the commission's Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, a multibillion dollar program in which SpaceX was poised to receive $885.5 million to beam satellite internet to U.S. regions with little to no internet connections.

"The decision appears to have been rendered in service to a clear bias towards fiber, rather than a merits-based decision to actually connect unserved Americans," SpaceX's senior director of satellite policy, David Goldman, wrote in a scathing appeal filed Friday evening.

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The FCC declined to comment.

SpaceX's Starlink, a fast-growing network of more than 3,000 satellites in low-Earth orbit, has tens of thousands of users in the U.S. so far, with consumers paying at least $599 for a user terminal and $110 a month for service.

Announcing the rejection in August, FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said Starlink's technology "has real promise" but that it could not meet the program's requirements, citing data that showed a steady decline in speeds over the past year and casting the service's price as too steep for consumers.

SpaceX under the program had sought to provide 100/20 Mbps service to 642,925 locations in 35 states. The company in its appeal said the FCC erroneously evaluated Starlink's performance.

FCC commissioner Brendan Carr in a statement last month opposed the FCC's decision and slammed the agency for rejecting the funds without a full commission vote.

"To be clear, this is a decision that tells families in states across the country that they should just keep waiting on the wrong side of the digital divide even though we have the technology to improve their lives now," Carr said.

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Reporting by Joey Roulette; Additional reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Leslie Adler and Aurora Ellis

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

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SpaceX appeals U.S. FCC rejection of rural broadband subsidies - Reuters

US Vice President Kamala Harris announced on Friday the US is creating a coalition of major space firms in order to broaden the country's aerospace sector, according to a White House statement.

Reuters first reported the news.

Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and Northrop Grumman are set to anchor the coalition, the statement said, per Reuters.

Other companies including Elon Musk's SpaceX, Bezos' Amazon, and Richard Branson's Virgin Orbit will partner in the coalition, the White House said in the statement, per Reuters.

The aim of the coalition is to widen the pool of job opportunities in the space industry for people who come from underrepresented backgrounds, per the statement, cited by Reuters. The White House is expected to launch the coalition in October and have three pilot programs, Reuters reported.

The White House and the companies mentioned in this report didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

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SpaceX, Blue Origin part of space firm coalition announced by Harris - Business Insider

Abel Avalon, president and CEO of AST Spacemobile, said in a statement. This revolutionary technology supports our mission to bridge the connectivity gap faced by todays more than 5 billion mobile customers and bring mobile broadband to nearly half of the worlds population that remains unconnected. We want to bridge the gap between rich and poor.

The Bluewalker 3 Falcon 9 payload sits in the canopy. The top of the Falcon 9 will fire two engines before launching the approximately 3,300-pound (1.5 metric-ton) Bluewalker 3 satellite to an altitude of about 318 miles (513 mi). kilometer). Bluewalker 3 is about to disconnect about 50 minutes after takeoff.

Two more engines in the upper tier of the Falcon 9 will launch the rocket into a slightly lower orbit so that the 34 Starlink satellites can be deployed in approximately T+ plus 2 hours and 4 minutes. SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said Saturday nights launch will be one of our most complex missions.

Bluewalker 3 will be the largest commercial communications suite ever built in low-Earth orbit, said Scott Wisniewski, chief strategy officer for AST Spacemobile. It measures 693 square feet and is designed to test live mobile broadband engineering.

We are a company founded on the desire to build mobile broadband straight from space, Wisniewski said. Weve been doing this since 2017. These satellites are designed to communicate directly with mobile phones, regular cell phones and unmodified phones on the ground and well be testing them in the coming months.

In the first few months after launch, assuming Bluewalker 3 is operating well, ground controllers will send commands to the spacecraft to launch its antenna array. According to Wisniewski, the antenna consists of 148 separate sections, each with its own antenna element, connected by mechanical hinges.

The identification process itself is very simple, Wisniewski said in an interview with Spaceflight Now. Essentially, we compress the satellite into a cube and make it appear in two dimensions using the energy stored in the hinges holding it together. Whats exposed is a bunch of antenna elements descending to Earth, And the solar elements ascend to the Sun.

The key to any implementation is to make it as simple and foolproof as possible, Wisniewski says. What the James Webb Telescope has done is truly extraordinary. But that level of complexity, in our opinion, creates the potential for error. And if you can avoid it, you will. Over the years, weve had many There are more complicated designs and there will be many great ways to do it in the future.But in the end, a simple mechanical hinge is the best way to eliminate the risk.

For us, the disclosure will be an important milestone, Wisniewski said. And then well do the calibration, and then well start making phone calls.

AST Spacemobile is backed by venture capital funds and investments from Vodafone, mobile tower operator American Tower and Japanese mobile operator Rakuten. The company has entered into agreements with Samsung, Nokia and mobile operators such as Vodafone, AT&T and Orange to test the compatibility of satellite cellular networks with existing mobile phones.

Bluewalker 3 will showcase SpaceMobiles AST technology with more than 10 mobile network operators on six continents. Our goal is to calibrate their network so that we can communicate with them, Wisniewski said.

If all goes well, the company plans to launch its first five operational satellites by the end of 2023, possibly on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. AST Spacemobile plans to eventually deploy 168 satellites.

This is part of our plan to build 168 satellites globally, Wisniewski said.

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SpaceX Launches One Of Its Most Complex Missions Ever - Spaceflight Now - Nation World News

The concept vehicle provides an answer to the question of what would happen if Elon Musk's idea of rocket boosters were actually implemented, using the knowledge and brand recognition of SpaceX to produce an extravagant rocket-supported electric car with distinctive features and abilities.

The Model R produces 2,600 horsepower in total and reaches a top speed of 290 mph (467 kph) under short burst loads (2,950 horsepower and 326 mph (526 kph) for the more severe racing variant, respectively). It is propelled by ecologically friendly liquid hydrogen propellant.

The automobile has a high degree of changeable downforce due to its unique boosters above each axis that separately press down each wheel, allowing it to turn at up to 4G.

The street and race versions reach 62 mph in 1.9 seconds (100 kph).

Due to the car's extremely advanced packaging, its total weight, when filled with fluids, is approximately 4,784 pounds (2,170 kg). This is due to the interaction between the batteries, thrusters, and rocket propellant. The Model R's projected range is 317 miles with a maximum capacity of 115 kWh (510 kilometers). However, it is just a tenth of that distance in rocket mode.

Schneider, who has worked at Design Studios from Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Volkswagen, Mitsubishi, and Hiphi, answered our questions.

Interesting Engineering: You are a professional car designer. How did you decide to bring Tesla and SpaceX together for a hypercar?

I thought that it was a logical connection. Elon Musk owns both companies, and Im sure there are technological synergies. Also, it is common for many car brands to have performance subbrands, and I thought it would be a lovely metamorphosis to add SpaceX's influence into the mix. It definitely helps that Im a huge space fan and am always watching the live streams of the falcon rockets going up and down again.

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Watch the 'Tesla SpaceX Hypercar' with SpaceX boosters - it will blow your mind - Interesting Engineering

Royal Caribbean Group is adding SpaceXs Starlink Maritime to all of its cruise ships starting next year a major win for the nascent internet service.

The challenge: While most cruise passengers arent likely to be glued to their screens while at sea, having reliable internet access is still important passengers might need to check in with work or be reachable by the babysitter in places without cell service.

While internet access is available on all major cruise ships, its usually delivered via satellites. This service can be slow, and if the cruise ship doesnt have a direct line of sight to a satellite, the internet might not be available at all.

Starlink Maritime: SpaceXs Starlink is a relative newcomer to the satellite internet industry, but its already outperforming competitors, and the addition of more satellites to its mega constellation in 2023 is expected to expand its coverage to the entire globe.

[Starlink Maritime terminals are] ruggedized for relentless salt spray & extreme winds & storms in deep ocean.

In June 2022, the FCC approved SpaceXs request to provide its Starlink internet to moving vehicles, such as trucks, airplanes, and ships. Within days, the company announced Starlink Maritime, a low-latency, high-speed internet service for vessels at sea.

The service costs $5,000 a month, plus a one-time fee of $10,000 for the installation of two high performance Starlink Maritime terminals that CEO Elon Musk tweeted are ruggedized for relentless salt spray & extreme winds & storms in deep ocean.

Currently, the service is only available near coastlines mostly of North American, European, and Australian nations but SpaceX plans to expand its Starlink Maritime coverage into the mid-ocean later in 2022 and in early 2023.

Whats new? Soon after the FCC ruling, Royal Caribbean Group launched a trial of Starlink Maritime on its Freedom of the Seas cruise ship.

Based on the tremendous amount of positive feedback from guests and crew, it is now adding the service to its entire fleet of 64 ships installation of terminals has already begun and is expected to wrap before the second quarter of 2023.

This technology will provide game-changing internet connectivity onboard our ships, enhancing the cruise experience for guests and crew alike, said Jason Liberty, Royal Caribbean Groups president and CEO.

Why it matters: Royal Caribbean Group is one of the biggest cruise line operators in the world in just the second quarter of 2022, its fleet carried 1.3 million passengers, and those numbers are still slightly below pre-pandemic levels.

The availability of Starlink Maritime on its ships is going to change what a lot of cruise passengers expect of satellite internet at sea potentially spurring other major cruise line operators to switch from their current providers to Starlink.

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SpaceX's high-speed internet service is heading to sea - Freethink

They all graduated from Tsinghua and went on to the University of Southern California or similar well-known universities, Li says. Besides that, they all worked at a certain company in Shanghai. Obviously, I suspect these are fake, generated data.

(SpaceX did not reply to a request from MIT Technology Review to confirm the number of Tsinghua graduates working at the company.)

This wasnt the first time Li had noticed what he thought were fake LinkedIn accounts. Starting in late 2021, he says, he started seeing profiles with less than a few dozen connectionsrare for real LinkedIn usersand with profile photos that were always good-looking men and women, likely stolen from other websites. Most appeared to be of Chinese ethnicity and to live in the United States or Canada.

Around the same time, the phenomenon caught the attention of Grace Yuen, the spokesperson for the Global Anti-Scam Org (GASO), a volunteer group that tracks pig-butchering scams. Scammers involved in this practice, which started as early as 2017 in China, create fake profiles on social media sites or dating sites, connect with victims, build virtual and often romantic relationships, and eventually persuade the victims to transfer over their assets. The scammers themselves came up with the name pig butchering, comparing the intensive and long-term process of gaining victims trust to raising a pig for slaughter.

In recent years, as China has cracked down on fraudulent online activities, these operations have pivoted to targeting people outside China who are of Chinese descent or speak Mandarin. GASO was established in July 2021 by one such victim, and the organization now has nearly 70 volunteers on several continents.

While these fake accounts are relatively new to LinkedIn, they have permeated other platforms for a long time. Scammers started moving to LinkedIn maybe after dating sites tried to crack down on them, [like] Coffee Meets Bagel, Tinder, Yuen says.

In certain ways, LinkedIn is a great way for fraudsters to expand their reach. You might be already married and you are not on the dating sites, but you probably have a LinkedIn account that you check occasionally, says Yuen.

A scammer on LinkedIn may try to connect with someone through common work experience, a shared hometown, or the feeling of living in a foreign country. Over 60% of the victims who have reached out to GASO are Chinese immigrants or have Chinese ancestry, which these actors lean on to evoke nostalgia or a desire for companionship. The fake claims to have graduated from Chinas top universities, which are notoriously difficult to get into, also help scammers earn respect.

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The 1,000 Chinese SpaceX engineers who never existed - MIT Technology Review

OK, this is pretty badass. Crushed

For a company whose whole job is badass rocketry, SpaceX sure does flex as new footage of one of its ground-based monstrosities, known as the "Can Crusher," demonstrates yet again.

In a video posted to Twitter, NASASpaceFlight managing editor Chris Bergin showed SpaceX's "Can Crusher" testing apparatus, a brutally colossal gadget designed to test rockets by squeezing them with incredible force.

The Can Crusher in this video was seen rolling down the Boca Chica, TX base as it heads to test components for Starship B7.1, which SpaceX is currently working on assembling.

Bergin's video is the latest glimpse we've gotten of this arachnid-esque Can Crusher, but it's not the first time we've seen it either at SpaceX or elsewhere.

As the name suggests, the spaceflight industry's can crushers are giant compactors that, in essence, do the same thing that aluminum can compactors do to empty soda cans except these operate on a much larger, and much more dangerous, level.

"Place a soda can on the floor in an upright position and then stand on it -- gradually applying weight -- until the can ripples and collapses," a NASA post from 2011, when the agency undertook the world's largest can crusher test at the time, reads. "It's similar to what a team of NASA engineers will do to an immense aluminum-lithium rocket fuel tank in late March; their hope is to use data from the test to generate new 'shell-buckling design factors' that will enable light-weight, safe and sturdy 'skins' for future launch vehicles."

In essence, can crushers like those used by NASA and SpaceX are meant to simulate the force of takeoff and test to make sure rocket components are ready for the stress of the entire ordeal.

While NASA's original can crushers look a lot like their smaller, consumer-grade counterparts, the one employed by SpaceX is as next-generation as the company's rockets. Those "tentacle"-looking things are actually spread out like bungees during testing to secure whichever part is being stress-tested, as previous renders show.

Though can crushers have been a big part of pre-launch rocket testing for more than a decade, we don't often get to see that part of the action which is why this video of the deflated equipment being rolled around on the launchpad looks all the weirder.

More on SpaceX: SpaceX Tested Starship's Engines and Accidentally Caused a Large Fire

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This "Can Crusher" Might Be the Weirdest SpaceX Flex We've Ever Seen - Futurism

SpaceX sent a space tug aloft along with another big batch of its Starlink internet satellites on Sunday night (Sept. 4) and landed a rocket on a ship at sea as well.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifted off Sunday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on the east coast of Florida, carrying 51 Starlink internet satellites to orbit.

Also on board with Starlink Group 4-20 was Sherpa-LTC2, a space tug provided by Seattle-based company Spaceflight. The tug is carrying a payload for Boeing's Varuna Technology Demonstration Mission (Varuna-TDM), which "aims to test V-band communications for a proposed constellation of 147 non-geostationary broadband satellites," according to SpaceNews (opens in new tab).

The first Sherpa-LTC orbital transfer vehicle was removed from a January 2022 SpaceX launch opportunity due to a propellant leak, SpaceNews added.

Related: SpaceX's Starlink megaconstellation launches in photos

Sunday's flight plan called for SpaceX to bring the first stage of its Falcon 9 rocket back to Earth for a soft touchdown on the droneship Just Read the Instructions, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean. The landing the seventh for this particular booster occurred as planned, about 8.5 minutes after launch.

Sherpa-LTC2 deployed from the Falcon 9's upper stage about 49 minutes after liftoff, and the Starlinks followed suit 23 minutes after that, SpaceX confirmed via Twitter (opens in new tab).

SpaceX has already sent more than 3,000 Starlink satellites into orbit, in an effort to create a huge constellation for broadband service targeted for remote areas. SpaceX has launched more than 25 Starlink-centric missions in 2022 already.

Sunday's launch was SpaceX's 40th of the year and continued to add to the Starlink megaconstellation. SpaceX has approval to launch 12,000 Starlink satellites and has asked an international regulator to give the thumbs-up to an additional 30,000.

In late August, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk announced plans to beam connectivity directly to smartphones using Starlink, in conjunction with T-Mobile. Another deal announced Tuesday (Aug. 30) will see Starlink service beamed to Royal Caribbean cruise ships.

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SpaceX launches 51 Starlink satellites and a space tug to orbit - Space.com

MCLENNAN COUNTY Say the name SpaceX in Central Texas and most people think of the giant, rocket engine testing facility in McLennan County.

At any one time, close to 1,000 people or more are employed there. They pump a lot of money into the local economy.

For months last winter and spring, though, the facility also pumped out massive noise and disturbances from the engine testing, frustrating thousands in McLennan County.

Then, a curious thing happened this summer: hardly any noise or vibrations.

Through the summer its dissipated even more to the point now where I hear it rarely, and Ive gotten no calls about it since June, said Mayor Jim Hering of McGregor.

The mayor said the situation last fall, and through the first half of 2022, was reaching a boiling point.

The noise was bad, the shaking was bad," said Hering. "SpaceX knew it. Its not a secret to anybody. Its something we openly talked about."

Two big changes helped quiet things down, starting in June.

For one, Hering said SpaceX changed their actual testing stands. Also, the summer months typically help with noise and vibrations because of the atmosphere, he said.

The company has also improved when it's testing, conducting the vast majority now before 9 p.m. when fines kick in from the city. That was a big source of irritation for locals, as well.

That fine is several thousand dollars. It accumulates over the year, so if they do it again its even more, said Hering.

25 News reached out to SpaceX a few times in the past week for comment, but never got a response.

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SpaceX 'noise' goes largely quiet over the summer - 25 News KXXV and KRHD