First a Chinese moon, now Russian, um, space weapons?

This December 6 article from the website “Russian Beyond the Headlines” is a little confusing. And I’m not sure if it’s confusing because the translators got it wrong or because there’s not much knowledge with how space assets work–or maybe even the Russians aren’t sure what they want. The article finally gets to its point […]

Eighteen years after its start, SBIRS still not quite replaces DSP (or, the Air Force gets less by spending more)

Sad but true. According to this post on Spaceflightnow.com’s site, prime contractor Lockheed Martin and its customer, the United States Air Force (USAF), are slowly and expensively achieving a goal. That is, they are replacing older USAF Defense Support Program (DSP–and more DSP info here) satellites with Space Based Infrared System (SBIRS) GEO satellites. The SBIRS GEO-2 satellite is officially operating as […]

NOAA’s low hanging problem–Part 7

The last post, part 6, went into detail about the problems the Independent Review Team (IRT) brought forward to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) regarding its satellite programs. These were the problems the IRT found and documented in their 2012 assessment report: Oversight and decision process, governance, JPSS Gap, programs, and budget. The […]

NOAA’s low hanging problem–Part 4

Backstory The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) requested an Independent Review Team (IRT) look at NOAA satellite programs for possible problems. The IRT came back with issues and recommendations in two reports: one in 2012 and one in 2013. Within the report, the IRT pushed forward the possibility of no sun-synchronous LEO NOAA satellites […]

Minotaur escapes the maze

Last Tuesday night, Orbital launched a Minotaur rocket with 29 cubesats aboard. It seems everything went well. But perhaps just showing different pictures of the Minotaur’s ascent will be of interest to you–images like the one above? So here you go–the Washington Post has them all nice and posted for you. This launch is also […]