The New Spaceports Are Here

Just my latest Clearancejobs.com post. This it’s time about the newer spaceports in the US. Will there be enough business for them? With high prices, it’s hard to tell. You can make a better guess after reading: New Spaceports Readying for New Spaceship Business.

From German Tunnels to Space, Part 1

Stay with me here, this will eventually lead to space-related topics. When I was much younger, I was privileged to live overseas twice. Both times my Dad moved us to the Rhineland-Palatinate (Rheinland Pfalz for German speakers)/Eifel region of Germany. It was very pretty—forested and hilly with networks of small, curvy roads. The first time […]

Space Tourism, the Costly Frontier

In previous articles I’ve talked about cheap small satellites for the general public to buy and even use in orbit. But what if you want something more? What if you want to be, if only for a few minutes, an astronaut? “Space tourism is too expensive!” you say? Maybe, if you only follow Virgin Galactic’s sub-orbital efforts […]

Pictures of a Decaying Satellite

The United States Geological Survey (USGS) and National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) -run Landsat 8 Low Earth Orbiting (LEO) imagery satellite’s primary job is to take pictures of the Earth. But occasionally, like teenagers with new camera phones, Landsat 8 feels compelled to take pictures of other satellites. Really—you can see the evidence here […]

Fill it up, RROxITT! And check the solar panels, too.

For a very long time, satellites orbiting the Earth have had a very finite lifetime. Some satellites have lasted over ten years, and aside from anomalies and failing components, a satellite’s fuel tank has been key to how long a satellite can function. But that might change soon for geosynchronous (GEO) satellites, thanks to RROxITT (Remote Robotic […]