Transcript
Maria Varmazas (0:01)
You're listening to the N2K space network.
Gary Gilbert (0:12)
Is your AppSec program actually reducing risk? Developers and AppSec teams drown in critical alerts, yet 95% of fixes don't reduce real risk. Why? Traditional tools use generic prioritization and lack the ability to filter real threats from noise. High impact threats slip through and surface in production, costing 10 times more to fix. Aux Security helps you focus on the 5% of issues that truly matter before they reach the cloud. Find out what risks deserve your attention in 2025. Download the application Security Benchmark from Auxiliary.
Alice Carruth (0:57)
Foreign.
Maria Varmazas (1:03)
Today is April 1, 2025. No foolin'I'm. Maria Varmazas and this is T minus.
Alice Carruth (1:12)
T minus 20 seconds to Los speed reserves.
Maria Varmazas (1:23)
The FAA has closed two mishap investigations into January 16th launches of SpaceX's Star and Blue Origin's new Glenn 4 Sierra. Space has successfully demonstrated resilient GPS technology for the US Space Force. Gitai Japan has been contracted by JAXA to conduct a concept study for a robotic arm system intended for use on a pressurized crewed lunar rover. The European Space Agency has released its annual space environment report. 1 SpaceX successfully launched Fram 2 to polar orbit and our guest today is Gary Gilbert, and Gary authored a book called Space Girl 2. 21 women write about their careers on Earth in the space industry and his book funds scholarships at the International Space University and he'll be telling us more about that later in the show. Happy Tuesday everybody. Let's get into today's intel briefing. Last night the SpaceX Fram 2 mission lifted off from Florida. It was a little touch and go for a while with the weather at the Cape being what it was, but thankfully the Falcon 9 transporting the four person crew in a Dragon capsule took off without a hitch. Fram2 is the first ever crewed mission in polar orbit. It's carrying a cryptocurrency billionaire and three guests on a days long trip that will orbit directly above Earth's north and South Poles. Malta resident Chun Wang, who made his fortune running bitcoin mining operations, paid SpaceX an undisclosed sum of money for this trip. Joining him are a trio of other polar exploration enthusiasts, Norwegian film director Janik Michelson, Germany based robotics researcher Rabea Rogge, who is Germany's first woman in space by the way, and Australian adventure Eric Phillips. It was an unusual launch from Florida, heading southward to reach its orbital path. The mission will last somewhere between three to five days before returning to splashdown off the coast of California. Then it's hoped that the Fremanauts, as they've been nicknamed, will be able to exit the capsule without medical assistance as part of their research into long term human space travel. We're looking forward to seeing the results of this mission as they're shared in the coming days. The European Space agency opened the 9th edition of the ESA Space Debris Conference today. The event coincides with the space agency releasing its annual Space Environment Report. The results don't shed any new light on the subject, but do reinforce the issue that space debris is an increasing problem in low Earth orbit. The report states that within certainly heavily populated altitude bands, the density of active objects is now the same order of magnitude as as space debris. Wow. ESA says the adherence to space debris mitigation standards is not enough to stop the increase of the number and amount of space debris. The report calls for more active debris removal in leo, something we believe we will be seeing more of in the coming years. Did you know that intact satellites or rocket bodies are now reentering the Earth's atmosphere on average more than three times a day? Wow. Yeah, let's hope we don't see more debris raining down on Earth in the years to come. Gitai Japan has been awarded a contract by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or jaxa, to conduct a concept study for a robotic arm system intended for use on a pressurized crude lunar rover. This rover is part of Japan's contribution to the Artemis program and is designed to enable long duration human exploration of the moon's polar regions. The study will aim to define the design and specifications for a robotic arm system capable of supporting lunar science operations primarily during uncrewed periods, while also providing support during crewed missions when needed. The ARM will be tasked with performing a range of mission critical operations including regolith excavation, rock and soil sample collection, unloading, handling and installation of large payloads such as scientific instruments and observation equipment. It will also enable science activities through both remote and autonomous control capabilities. These functions are expected to significantly expand the scope and duration of lunar surface research. Sierra Space has successfully demonstrated resilient GPS technology for the US Space Force. Sierra Space worked in collaboration with General Dynamics Mission Systems to achieve all GPS navigation signals required for the resilient GPS mission. The technology targets the increased need for more resilient GPS systems that protect the United States against adversarial threats like jamming and spoofing of the current GPS infrastructure. This demo is part of the Quick Start RGPS contract awarded in 2024 by the USSF Space Systems Command to develop design concepts for Smaller, more affordable GPS satellites and the Federal Aviation administration has closed two mishap reports. The first one was into the SpaceX Starship Flight 7 mishap on January 16th and states that there were no public injuries and one confirmed report of minor vehicle damage in the Turks and caicos Islands. The FAA oversaw and accepted the findings of the SpaceX led investigation. The final mishap report cites the probable root cause for the loss of the Starship vehicle was stronger than anticipated vibrations during the flight which led to increased stress on and failure of the hardware in the propulsion system. SpaceX identified 11 corrective actions to prevent a reoccurrence of the event. The FAA verified that SpaceX implemented corrective actions prior to Flight 8 and the FAA is overseeing the SpaceX led investigation of the Starship Flight 8 mishap that occurred later on March 6th. That investigation remains open. A return to flight of the Starship vehicle is based on public safety. SpaceX may not launch Starship again until the FAA accepts the final mishap investigation report or makes a return to flight determination and all other licensing requirements are met. The second mishap investigation just closed was into the Blue Origin New Glenn One mishap that also occurred on January 16th. It was a busy day in space. If you remember, the FAA oversaw and accepted the findings of the Blue Origin led investigation. The final mishap report identified the proximate cause of the mishap as an inability of the New Glenn's first stage to restart the engines, preventing a re entry burn from occurring and resulting in the loss of the stage. Blue Origin identified seven corrective actions to prevent recurrence of the event. The FAA will verify that Blue Origin implements corrective actions prior to the launch of the New Glenn 2. Ms. And that wraps up today's top five stories from the space industry. Now we have N2K senior producer Alice Carruth with the stories that we're also keeping an eye on. Alice.