Collaborate Disseminate
A small asteroid came within a cosmic hairbreadth of the ring of communications satellites circling the Earth in geosynchronous orbit this week. Passing by our planet at an altitude of about 35,000 km (22,000 mi), the object measuring four to eight met… Continue reading Asteroid has close encounter with geosynchronous satellite
A new paper has revealed that Greenland and the Antarctic have lost a staggering amount of mass from their ice sheets over the last 16 years thanks to climate change, and that the melting has contributed to sea level rise. The researchers drew on satel… Continue reading Study reveals massive yearly ice loss in the Antarctic and Greenland
SpaceX has announced that it will mount a sun visor on each of its Starlink satellites and have them perform controlled maneuvers, to make them less visible to members of the astronomy community making detailed observations of the night sky. SpaceX has… Continue reading SpaceX will use sun visors to darken future Starlink satellites
The Global Position System (GPS) has turned 25 years old. Operated by the US Space Force, the constellation of navigational satellites went fully operational on April 27, 1995, though US Space Command only made the formal announcement three months late… Continue reading GPS notches up 25 years of telling us where to go
Gosh, what a shame: it turns out that perhaps 2 billion phones won’t be capable of COVID-19 contact-tracing using the API that Google and Apple are jointly developing. The problem is that the scheme the two tech giants have concocted, which Elliot Williams expertly dissected recently, is based on Bluetooth …read more
The Intelsat 901 has returned to service less than two months after its historic docking with Northrop Grumman’s first Mission Extension Vehicle (MEV-1). Intelsat announced today that the 19-year-old communications satellite is now operating in its new… Continue reading Communications satellite returns to service after historic docking
The United States Space Force (USSF) reports that Russia has launched a Direct Ascent Anti-Satellite (ASAT) missile. US Space Command detected and tracked the weapon capable of destroying a satellite in low Earth orbit (LEO) on April 15.Continue Readin… Continue reading US Space Force condemns test launch of Russian anti-satellite weapon
Virgin Orbit continues to edge closer to its objective of firing satellites into space form an airborne 747, this time completing an end-to-end launch rehearsal designed to put all of its systems through their paces. This major test will be the company… Continue reading Virgin Orbit puts its 747 “flying launchpad” through a full rehearsal
Although a hole in the ozone layer might sound like a decidedly retro environmental issue, it’s still a problem today. Most eyes are fixed on the skies over Antarctica, but now scientists have spotted the biggest ozone layer hole in at least 25 years f… Continue reading Satellite spots new ozone layer hole opening up over the Arctic
Regular followers of space news will know that when satellites or space probes reach the end of their life, they either are de-orbited in a fiery re-entry, or they stay lifeless in orbit, often in a safe graveyard orbit where they are unlikely to harm other craft. Sometimes these deactivated …read more
Continue reading Is This The Oldest Still-Working Geostationary Satellite?