October 2020

Telesat U.S. Services, LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Telesat, has been awarded a contract by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) for the development and in-orbit demonstration of commercial low-Earth-orbit (LEO) spacecraft buses in a LEO constellation network with robust low-latency communications features as part of DARPA’s Blackjack programme. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101405

Arianespace announced that new shared payload opportunities to low Earth orbit (LEO) have been opened with its Vega launcher’s Small Spacecraft Mission Service (SSMS). For the next launch opportunity – Vega Flight VV18, targeted for the first quarter of 2021 – five companies already have signed contracts for payload slots, thereby fully booking the capacity…

Northrop Grumman Corporation said it will continue supporting NASA’s Artemis missions by providing six additional abort motors and attitude control motors (ACM) for the Orion human spaceflight capsule’s Launch Abort System (LAS), under an agreement with Lockheed Martin, Orion’s prime contractor. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101301

Astroscale raises US$51 million / Dragonfly Aerospace contracted to deliver HR-250 imagers to EOS DA http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101302

In the newest quarterly issue of The Space Report, Space Foundation announced that space investment in Q3 2020 gained strength with more than US$6 billion gained through acquisitions, buyouts, and private equity financing. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101303

NanoAvionics has signed a contract with US-company Accion Systems to host their propulsion system, TILE 3, on-board its new rideshare mission for a demonstration flight in 2021. Accion Systems procured this flight as the culmination of an ongoing U.S. government sponsored propulsion programme. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101200

ENPULSION said it has launched the ENPULSION MICRO to cover the propulsion needs of heavier satellites which want to use the FEEP technology currently used in the company’s NANO product range. First units have already been shipped to customers. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101201

Rocket: Chang Zheng 3B; Payload: Gaofen 13; Date: 11 October 2020, 1657 UTC; Launch site: Xichang Satellite Launch Center, China. The spacecraft entered its predetermined geostationary transfer orbit and deployed its solar arrays. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101100

Russia’s Soyuz-2.1a rocket and Soyuz MS-17 crewed spacecraft have been rolled out to their Baikonur launch pad ahead of a flight to the International Space Station (ISS), Roskosmos said. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101101

Launch of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-1 mission to the International Space Station is now targeted for no sooner than early-to-mid November, providing additional time for SpaceX to complete hardware testing and data reviews as the company evaluates off-nominal behaviour of Falcon 9 first stage engine gas generators observed during a recent non-NASA mission launch attempt. http://www.sat-nd.com/archive/?id=2020101102