OrbitalHub

Orbital ATK dixit:

“The OmegA rocket is one of Orbital ATK’s largest strategic investments. A new, American intermediate-and large-class space launch vehicle, OmegA is capable of launching the full range of national security mission required by the U.S. Air Force, as well as science and commercial payloads for other customers. OmegA’s design leverages commonality and automation to provide speed, reliability, performance and affordability. Already, approximately 500 Orbital ATK employees are working on OmegA, and that number is expected to grow to approximately 1,000 over the next 24 months. Hundreds of other jobs are also being created in our extensive supply chain.

OmegA uses all-American propulsion and other flight-proven technologies, and will be ready to fly in just three years. Like other Evolvable Expendable Launch Vehicles (EELVs), OmegA will operate from both east and west coast launch facilities. OmegA will share common propulsion, structures and avionics systems with current and future programs. In addition, OmegA will leverage current in-production programs that already are staffed with a skilled and highly experienced workforce, and will use existing facilities, supplier relationships and available subsystems for the new launch system’s development and production. Because OmegA shares so many common elements with other programs, the system is affordable for the Air Force while also providing savings of approximately $600 million to other government agencies over 10 years.”

Video Credit: Orbital ATK

Wikipedia dixit:

“The New Glenn is a privately funded orbital launch vehicle in development by Blue Origin. It is expected to make its initial test launch in 2020. Design work on the vehicle began in 2012. The high-level specifications for the vehicle were publicly announced in September 2016. New Glenn is described as a 7-meter-diameter (23 ft), two- or three-stage rocket. Its first stage will be powered by seven BE-4 engines that are also being designed and manufactured by Blue Origin.

Like the New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle that preceded it, the New Glenn’s first stage is designed to be reusable for up to 100 missions, and will land vertically, a technology previously developed by Blue Origin and tested in 2015–2016 on its New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle. The second stage will share the same diameter as the first and use two BE-3U vacuum optimized engines. It will use hydrogen/oxygen as propellant and will be expendable. The optional third stage will use one BE-3U engine. This engine is manufactured by Blue Origin and has already been used on the New Shepard, as the BE-3 sea-level-optimized version. The company has revealed the planned payload capacity of the 2-stage version of New Glenn as 13,000 kg (29,000 lb) to GTO and 45,000 kg (99,000 lb) to LEO.

Launches of the New Glenn are planned to be made from Spaceport Florida Launch Complex 36, which was leased to Blue Origin in 2015. New Glenn will also be available for space tourism flights, with priority given to customers of New Shepard.”

Video Credit: Blue Origin

Blue Origin dixit:

“New Shepard flew again for the eighth time on April 29, 2018, from Blue Origin’s West Texas Launch Site. Known as Mission 8 (M8), the mission featured a reflight of the vehicle flown on Mission 7. The Crew Capsule reached an apogee of 351,000 feet (66 miles, 107 kilometers) – the altitude we’ve been targeting for operations.

For the second time, Blue Origin’s test dummy Mannequin Skywalker flew to space conducting astronaut telemetry and science studies. The flight also carried research payloads for NASA, the German Aerospace Center (DLR), and commercial customers.”

Video Credit: Blue Origin

NASA dixit:

“Psyche is both the name of an asteroid orbiting the Sun between Mars and Jupiter — and the name of a NASA space mission to visit that asteroid, led by Arizona State University. Join the Psyche team to explore why this mission was selected for NASA’s Discovery Program, how we’ll get to the asteroid, what we hope to learn from Psyche, and the importance of scientific discovery.”

Video Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Arizona State Univ./Peter Rubin/SSL

NASA dixit:

“NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite – TESS – will fly in an orbit that completes two circuits around Earth every time the Moon orbits once. This special orbit will allow TESS’s cameras to monitor each patch of sky continuously for nearly a month at a time. To get into this orbit, TESS will make a series of loops culminating in a lunar gravity assist, which will give it the final push it needs. TESS will reach its orbit about 60 days after launch.”

Music Credit: “Drive to Succeed” from Killer Tracks

Video Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

The three main objectives of ESA’s Clean Space initiative. ESA works hard to keep space safe and clean for future generations.

~dj

Video credit: ESA