News Notes - 2015

2015 DEC 23 - AUSTRALIAN LAUNCH VEHICLE
The first test flight of a scale model of an Australian resusable launch vehicle took place in Brisbane. The ALV-0 was used to test the aerodynamics of the flyback booster design. A joint operation between Heliaq Advanced Research, Australian Droid and Robot and the University of Queensland. The ultimate aim is a low cost launch vehicle to deliver 5 to 50 kg to low Earth orbit at a low cost. For more see Heliaq.

2015 DEC 21 - SPACEX FALCON 9 REUSABLE LAUNCH
The maiden flight of the SpaceX Falcon 9 Heavy with full thrust took place, ending with a successful landing of its first stage.

2015 NOV 23 - BLUE ORIGIN REUSABLE SUCCESS
The Blue Origin New Shepard suborbital rocket achieved its first powered soft landing near the launch site, paving the way for full reuse of its propulsion stage.

2015 Sep 30 - AUSTRALIAN BROADBAND SATELLITE LAUNCHED
NBN-Co 1A (Sky Muster) was launched by an Ariane rocket from Kourou. This satellite, built by Space Systems Loral is the first of two satellites that will be used to deliver high-speed broadband service to rural and remote areas of Australia. The satellites, with Ka-band transponders, will be operated by the National Broadband Network Company (NBN Co Ltd), which was established to implement the Australian government policy initiative of providing access to high speed broadband to every household and business in the country via an integrated national network that will utilize fiber, wireless, and satellite technologies.

2015 SEP 19 - LONG MARCH 11
The maiden flight of the Chinese Long March 11 rocket took place fron the Jiuquan launch centre.

2015 SEP 19 - LONG MARCH 6
The maiden flight of the Chinese Long March 6 rocket took place fron the Taiyuan launch centre.

2015 JUL 14 - NEW HORIZONS FLIES BY PLUTO
The NASA New Horizons spacecraft has reached the Pluto-Charon binary planet after a nine year journey. The many images that it has taken will require many months to transmit back to Earth, because of the low data rate that is necessary to give a reasonable signal to noise ratio at the large distance from Earth.

2015 JUN 06 - ASA TO HOST SKYNET NODE
The Australian Space Academy has signed an agreement with the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to host a Skynet robotic telescope node at the ASA Meckering campus.

2015 MAY 20 - FOURTH FLIGHT OF USAF SPACEPLANE
An Atlas V rocket launched the reusable US Air Force Spaceplane on its fourth mission from Cape Canaveral. All missions of this craft are classified, but it is known that one previous mission lasted 675 days in orbit.

2015 MAY 15 - NASA ENGINEER SPEAKS ON SPACE CRAFT ELECTRONICS
Professor John Norgard spoke at the Curtin Institute of Radio Astronomy (CIRA) on the problems of electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) of spacecraft electronics.

2015 MAY - AUSTRALIAN BOOK ON SPACE SECURITY PUBLISHED
Astro Reality War in outer space will affect every nation state that has space assets. Significant reductions to the potential for space warfare might be beyond the political and strategic capacities of major States, and international law is a fragile deterrent.
The book "Astro Reality : Avoiding conflict in outer space" by Roy Sach, and published by Echo Books explores new and different options to this problem.
Dr Sach is a former Director of Defence Space.

2015 APR 30 - MESSENGER CRASHES INTO MERCURY
The NASA Mercury MESSENGER spacecraft ended its life after a four year mission orbiting the planet during which it found evidence of volcanic activity and confirmed the presence of water ice in polar craters permanently shadowed from the Sun.

2015 MAR 13 - MAGNETOSPHERIC CONSTELLATION LAUNCHED
Four identical spacecraft comprising the NASA Magnetospheric Multiscale Mission were launched into highly elliptical orbits to study spatial and temporal changes in the fields and particles of the Earth's magnetosphere.

2015 MAR 06 - DAWN AT CERES
The Dawn spacecraft was inserted into orbit around the asteroid Ceres.

2015 FEB 27 - MAR 4 - SEVERAL SMALLSATS DEPLOYED FROM THE ISS
The International Space Station deployed several satellites including ten Flock remote sensing craft.

2015 FEB 26 - IRANIAN SATELLITE LAUNCHED
The Iranian Defence Ministry launched the indigeneous Farj satellite from Semnan by a Safir rocket. The satellite perigee was below 300 km and probably decayed within a month.

2015 FEB 11 - NEW DEEP SPACE WEATHER SATELLITE
A Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral carried the DSCOVR space weather satellite toward the Lagrange point between the Earth and the Sun. DSCOVR will give NOAA space weather forecasters advance notice of coronal mass ejections before they hit the Earth.

2015 FEB 11 - EUROPEAN SPACEPLANE PROTOTYPE FLIGHT
The European Space Agency's experimental lifting body spacecraft, the Intermediate eXperimental Vehicle (IXV), successfully conducted its first test flight. The IXV is an ESA experimental suborbital re-entry vehicle to validate European reusable launchers. It successfully completed its 100-minute mission, being the first ever lifting body to perform full atmospheric reentry from orbital speed.

2015 FEB 01 - JAPAN LAUNCHES MILITARY RADAR SAT
An HIIA rocket launched a radar surveillance satellite for the Japan Ministry of Defence.

2015 JAN 31 - SMAP SATELLITE TO MEASURE SOIL MOISTURE
A Delta II rocket launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base carried the Soil Moisture Active Passive Satellite (SMAP) into orbit. This will help understanding of the processes that link Earth's water, energy and carbon cycles. The FIREBIRD C and D satellites were also delivered to orbit. These smallsats will undertake Focused Investigations of Relativistic Electron Burst, Intensity, Range and Dynamics. Two other smallsats were also co-launched.

2015 JAN 10 - DRAGON DELIVERS CARGO TO ISS
A Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canavera delivered cargo to the International Space Station aboard a Dragon CRS-5 capsule.