SpaceShipTwo unveil

Monday 7th finally saw the unveiling of Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo at the Mojave Air and Space Port, California. The 60 ft long craft was towed out infront of guests and dignitaries before state governer Scwartznegger broke a champagne bottle over the nose of the vehicle to christen 'VSS Enterprise'.

VSS Enterprise will now begin a gruelling 18 month schedule to certify it for passenger use.

Pictures: Virgin Galactic

Space Elevator Team wins

If you've read Arthur C Clarke's Fountains of Paradise or Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy then you are no doubt familiar with the concept of the Space Elevator. Constructed of super tensile materials and stretching 100,000 km into space - until now the elevator has been a thing of science fiction. However, a Seattle-based team, LaserMotive aims to change all that, and has recently won $900,000 dollars in the Space Elevator Games - a competition set up by NASA to see if machines powered by laser beams could climb cables into the sky.

So what did LaserMotive accomplish to win the prize?

LM's cable climber actually managed to ascend a 3000 ft long cable suspended from a helicopter at a speed of around 8mph. This was accomplished some four times in two days. The best ascent time was 3 minutes 48 seconds.

The next stage of the competition involves the team beaming power up a 1/4 inch steel cable to power their platform. If LaserMotive can accomplish this at around 11mph then they stand to win the second level prize of $2M. NASA's Centenial Challenges director Andy Petro commented: "Power beaming is truly a 21st century technology"

Image: Space.com

Launcher One Satellite System

Several concepts are emerging for Virgin Galactic's Launcher One Satellite System. Currently in consultation with Surrey Satellite Technology Limited (SSTL) - re-known for their micro satellites - Branson's company was initially waiting to see if the UK government would contribute funding for a SSTL led launcher study; the idea being that an SSTL produced rocket could be launched from a Virgin Galactic White Knight. With the funding for the SSTL rocket study still forthcoming from the UK government, Galactic are now moving ahead with their own in-house designed launcher system.

Current satellite launch costs are something in the region of $5-10 million. If Virgin Galactic are going to move into the satellite business then they need to develop a system that can do the job for $1-2 million. SSTL currently rely on converted Soviet missiles like the Dnepr to launch their satellites - so the need for a UK led air-launch effort to ensure lower costs and limit conversion delay is paramount. Check out the images from the 60th International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon, Korea as shown in October

Images: BBC, Flight Global

Selenokhod

The Google Lunar X Prize competition has seen its first entry from Russia in the form of Team Selenokhod. Selenokhod, comprising a group of engineers and aerospace managers from the Federation, plan to land two rovers and a communication package on the lunar surface in order to snag the $30 million prize. The Rovers are solar powered and combine HD cameras, rechargeable batteries and a low gain omni directional antenna to facilitate communication between the robotic elements. Nikolay Dzis-Voynarovskiy, Selenokhod Team Leader commented:

"The contribution progress of private sector in cosmonautics is worldwide trend nowadays. The previous international contest, Ansari X PRIZE, showed that non-government companies have all possibilities to create space technologies needed to achieve ambitious goals. Team Selenokhod wants Russian companies to evaluate the experience of their foreign colleagues, to understand big opportunities of private space exploration and join us in our challenging project"

Selenokhod joins 20 other teams from 44 countries in competing for the prize.

Image: Selenokhod

Team Armadillo qualify for $1M Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge

John Carmack's company Armadillo Aerospace is now well placed to win the $1 million Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge after a successful qualification flight on 13 September. Carmack, the creator of id Software ( developers of the popular Doom and Quake games), turned his attention to aerospace matters in 2000 when he contacted the Dallas Area Rocket Society to see if any of the expert amateurs wanted to join him in working for a new company he had founded - Armadillo Aerospace.

Originally inspired by the CATS (Cheap Access To Space) prize that ran from November of 1997 to November 8, 2000, Carmack decided to dedicate his efforts to try and meet the prize's criteria - $250,000 to the first private team who could launch a 2 kilogram payload to 200 kilometers. With that, Armadillo was born; it's goal - to provide cheap private access to orbit - to accomplish what NASA had accomplished but at a fraction of the cost.

Since its inception in 2000 Armadillo has gone on to develop hydrogen peroxide-powered rockets (Armadillo would later abandon hydrogen peroxide propellant when supply issues became an unsolvable problem), a path that has ultimately led them to their Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge entry - Scorpius.

Scorpius (weight 1900 lbs fully fueled) mades its maiden flight at Caddo Mills Airport in Texas - home of Armadillo's assembly plant. Resembling something like Von Braun's 1952 Moon Ship that appeared in Collier's magazine, Scorpius has already won Armadillo $350,000 for completing the Level 1 challnege in October 2008. The Level 1 challenge involved a flight time of 90 seconds and travel over a simulated lunar surface - point to point. However, the competition heated up with the Level 2 challenge which involved a flight time of 180 seconds - point to point and then all the way back to the start - twice the distance and twice as complex as the first prize winning flight. Incidentally, Armadillo have now qualified for the prize money by default - theirs' being the only craft capable of meeting the necessary criteria of the challenge.

So what does this mean for the future of private human access to space? Carmack has already hinted as to where Armadillo's trajectory now lies: "Since the Lunar Lander Challenge is quite demanding in terms of performance, with a few tweaks our Scorpius vehicle actually has the capability to travel all the way to space". Quite what this means is debatable, but one thing is now certain - amateur rocketeers are catching up with NASA - although on a vastly smaller scale, private rocketry now bears all the hallmarks of being able to deliver the seismic shift that we have all been waiting for. Carmack further added: "We'll be moving quickly to do higher-altitude tests, and we can go up to about 6000 feet here at our home base in Texas before we'll have to head to New Mexico where we can really push the envelope. We already have scientific payloads from universities lined up to fly as well, so this will be an exciting next few months for commercial spaceflight". Indeed, who knows where Armadillo's journey will end?

Image: PopSci

Excalibur Almaz

An Isle of Man company are looking into ways of using secret Soviet era space vehicle technology to send paying passengers on week long orbital trips. Excalibur Almaz has bought 'several' of NPO Mashinostroyenia's Almaz Reusable Re-entry vehicles - spacecraft that were developed to provide the Soviet Union with a manned space station capability.

Originally developed in response to the United States' Manned Orbiting Laboratory programme by Vladimir Chelomei, the Almaz (Diamond) system consists of a RRV (Reusable Re-entry vehicle) and an expendable service module that is capable of offering additional space for the vehicle's 3 crew members; the payload section can also carry up to 500kgs of cargo.

Excalibur Almaz are purportedly working with NPO Mashinostroyenia to reconfigure the company's stock of existing space hardware. EA's officials have told reporters: "A critical feature of the RRVs is their reusability, which will reduce logistical, overhead and program costs for commercial access to space". Changes are also being made to the Almaz vehicles that will bring them up to standard for future customer requirements.

Originally designed to be flown aboard Chelomei's UR-500 rocket, EA intends to adopt the Almaz system to be lofted aboard other launch vehicles. With the history of the NPO Almaz stations (christened Salyut) stretching as far back as the early 1970s, EA will now have to convince potential investors that Soviet era technology can be sucessfully adapted to provide a viable basis for a tourist/commercial vehicle. However,the task may be bolstered due to the fact that EA boasts some impressive names and expertise at its helm including former NASA astronauts Leroy Chiao and Franklin Chang-Diaz. Several veteran space officials and cosmonauts are also steering Excalibur Almaz - in the hope of EA becoming a successful, internationally backed New Space company.

Source: Space.com

Image: Excalibur Almaz/NPO

Bigelow Orion 'lite'

Bigelow Aerospace of Nevada recently pitched a version of their own manned spacecraft to the Augustine Committee; and the vehicle had a somewhat familiar look to it. Based on a stripped down version of Lockheed Martin's Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle, Bigelow's incarnation of the craft promises to be an 'Earth-orbit optimised' people carrier that can be lofted aboard a converted Atlas V by about 2013 - much sooner than NASA hopes to fly its own troubled Orion system.
Atlas V is flown by United Launch Alliance, a joint venture co-owned by Boeing and Lockheed Martin. With Lockheed developing Orion for NASA, ULA's study into man rating the Atlas V at Bigelow's request has obviously spurred Bigelow to adopt the Lockheed capsule design.
Key differences between the Bigelow Orion and the NASA Orion are passenger capacity and the landing system. Whereas the NASA Orion is being designed to take astronauts to the Moon, Bigelow's lite version will carry more crew(7 in total) thanks to the savings made in propellant tanks and hefty heat shields. In addition, rather than a water splashdown, Orion lite will be aircaptured using a similar system to the one used to retrieve sensitive spy capsules and payloads that are vulnerable to contamination.

Credit: Space.com
Images: Bigelow Aerospace.