Transcript
Maria Varmazes (0:01)
You're listening to the N2K space network.
Dave (0:10)
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Maria Varmazes (1:05)
I'm Maria Varmazes and this is T minus. T minus 20 seconds to Los speed reservoirs. China says pre launch preparations are progressing smoothly. Ahead of the launch of the asteroid probing miss, the European Space Agency has put out a call to the scientific community to select regions of interest on the moon. Sierra Space has been awarded a NASA contract to study the use of the company's expandable space station technology on the Moon rocket lab to acquire payload development and manufacturing company Geost for $275 million. SpaceX's Starship test flight number nine fails to meet its miss mission objectives happy hump day everybody. If you are anything like the T minus team, then you're slowly coming down from last night's excitement. And if you don't know what I'm referring to, then well, stick with me. SpaceX's Starship launched for its ninth test flight from Starbase in Texas just after 6:30pm local time last night. The launch had many objectives and unfortunately not all were met. But they did demonstrate the first reuse of a super heavy booster. The booster itself performed a full duration ascent burn with all 33 of its raptor engines and and separated from Starship's upper stage in a hot staging maneuver. It looked like all was going to plan. During separation, Super Heavy performed the first deterministic flip followed by its boost back burn. And it also demonstrated its ability to fly at a higher angle of attack during its descent back to Earth. Then when the booster ignited its engines ahead of its designated splashdown area, it experienced what they call a rapid unscheduled disassembly. Yep, yet another explosion in the Gulf. So then the attention went back to Starship. It made it to its suborbital trajectory to cheers from the team at Starbase and Mission Control Hawthorne. Next up was its planned payload deployment. However, things continued to go off nominal. Starship's payload bay door was unable to open, which prevented the deployment of the eight Starlink Simulator satellites. The flight continued, but later an attitude control error resulted in bypassing the Raptor relight and prevented Starship from getting into the intended position for reentry. Starship then went through an automated safing process to vent the remaining pressure to place the vehicle in the safest condition for reentry. Contact with Starship was lost approximately 46 minutes into the flight. All debris was expected to fall within the planned hazard area in the Indian Ocean. So what does this all mean for SpaceX? Well, they say the failed mission objectives are all part of their plan. They collected a ton of data from the flight which will give them the information they need to adjust and go at it again. SpaceX says, and I quote, developmental testing by definition is unpredictable, but every lesson learned marks progress towards Starship's goal of enabling life to become multiplanetary. For sure they will wrap up the mishap report as quickly as they possibly can and we'll see test flight 10, no doubt in the coming weeks Rocket Lab has agreed to acquire the parent holding company of Geost. Geost is an Arizona based electro optical and infrared payload development and manufacturing company and provider to high priority national security satellites. Geost's offerings include electro optical and infrared sensor systems for missile warning and tracking, tactical intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, earth observation and space domain awareness. Rocket Lab has agreed to the acquisition from Lightridge Solutions, a portfolio company of ATL partners, for $270 million in a mix of $125 million of cash and $150 million in privately placed shares of Rocket Lab common stock, plus up to $50 million in potential additional cash earnout payments tied to revenue targets. The acquisition marks Rocket Lab's formal entry into the satellite payload segment and is expected to close in the second half of 2025. Sierra Space has been awarded a NASA contract to study the use of the company's expandable space station technology on the moon. The purpose of this contract will be to ultimately develop innovative solutions for lunar surface logistics and mobility supporting NASA's moon to Mars architecture. The contract, which is under the next Step two, Appendix R for lunar logistics and mobility studies, includes everything from the potential use of Sierra Space's inflatable life habitat technology for tunnels around a moon base to tracking and storage of goods on the moon, as well as integration of the entire framework for habitation on the lunar surface and staying with the moon. The European Space Agency has put out a call to the scientific community to select regions of interest on the lunar surface. ESA is asking the European scientific community to provide evidence regarding the locations which might offer the greatest opportunities for scientific research or that address fundamental questions. ESA is establishing a roadmap for the future of exploration and is looking for projects that are enabled by access to the lunar surface using European lunar surface infrastructure to be established from 2030. More details about the call can be found by following the link in our show notes and heading over to China now. China says pre launch preparations are progressing smoothly ahead of the launch of the asteroid probing mission Tianwen 2. The mission is set to launch on Thursday and will conduct multiple deep space tasks in a single launch, including a flyby and sample return mission to near Earth asteroid 2016 HO3, as well as a flyby investigation of the Main Belt Comet 311 p Tianwen 2's observations are expected to fill critical gaps in current knowledge about the physical structure, composition and evolutionary mechanisms of small solar system bodies. The mission will span an operational period of 9 and a half years and will target asteroid 2016 HO3, referred to as Earth's quasi satellite due to its stable orbit near our planet. Researchers hope to gain new insights into the composition and evolution of early solar system bodies from samples they plan to retrieve from its surface. Following the sample return phase, the spacecraft will continue to study Comet 311P, which resides in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Hey T minus crew, if you find this podcast useful, please do us a favor and share a five star rating and short review in your favorite podcast app. It will help other space professionals like you find the show and join the T minus crew. Thank you, we really appreciate it. Stay with us for the latest update on the NASA Easy Mission. Is it ever going to be easy? We'll be right back.