Hyperion’s Hydrogen-Powered EV Supercar Has a 1,000-Mile Range—and Can Recharge in 5 Minutes
Hyperion’s first salvo in the battle against combustion is the XP-1 prototype—a futuristic supercar with a claimed 1,016-mile range and the ability to haul to 60 mph in 2.2 seconds. Oh, and the recharge time is less than five minutes.
Flying U.S navy
Can seaweed help solve the world's plastic crisis?
"After you finish your fries, eat the ketchup packet. When you add your pasta to boiling water, toss the bag into the pot, too.
If these instructions sound confusing to you, it's only because you haven't yet heard of Notpla, a London-based startup company that is designing a seaweed-based replacement for single-use plastic packaging."
https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/notpla-seaweed-single-use-plastics/index.html
https://edition.cnn.com/style/article/notpla-seaweed-single-use-plastics/index.html
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope launches in French Guiana
“Look farther, delve deeper and measure more precisely, and you’re bound to detect something new and wondrous,” - Kenneth Sembach, director of the telescope institute.
https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/about/comparisonWebbVsHubble.html
Startup Tests Rocket Launched by Super-Powerful Slingshot
Space startup SpinLaunch has a wild idea: instead of launching rockets vertically from the ground, why don’t we spin them inside a massive centrifuge and use that built up energy to slingshot them to high altitudes, where they can kick on relatively small rocket engines to cover the final distance into orbit?Reusability on the horizon for small satellite launch providersDuring October 2021’s Small Payload Ride Share Association Symposium, a collection of small satellite launch providers gave updates on current and future projects. These providers range from those preparing for first flights, others in the middle of their test flight program, and still others that have already delivered operational payloads. A common theme was having eyes on reusability as future evolutions for small satellite launch systems.
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2021/10/reusability-small-launch-providers/
Air Force's X-37B robotic space plane wings past 500 days in Earth orbit
https://www.jwst.nasa.gov/content/about/comparisonWebbVsHubble.html
https://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2021/10/reusability-small-launch-providers/
That enigmatic U.S. military X-37B robotic space drone has now chalked up more than 500 days circling the Earth.
The Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV-6) is also called USSF-7 for the U.S. Space Force and launched May 17, 2020, on an Atlas V 501 booster.
OTV-6 is the first to use a service module to host experiments. The service module is an attachment to the aft of the vehicle that allows additional experimental payload capability to be carried to orbit.
Reusable spaceplane demonstrator completes 5 test flights in 3 days
Comparing Rocket Sizes
https://www.visualcapitalist.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Comparing-the-Size-of-The-Worlds-Rockets-Full-Size.html
The Porsche dynasty is taking on Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk in space
Bezos and Blue Origin Crew’s Flight to Space
Virgin Galactic Completes First-Ever Spaceflight from New Mexico
Daymak Avvenire
Innovation with "Chinese Characteristics" (a.k.a. I.P theft)
"China’s state rocket company unveils rendering of a Starship look-alike
(...)
The concept is notable not only for its appearance to Starship—the vehicle's exterior is shiny, like the stainless steel structure of Starship, and the first and second stages are similarly seamless—but in its function as well. Although Starship has primarily been promoted as a vehicle to take humans to the Moon and Mars, SpaceX has also developed a point-to-point concept.
(...)
This would not be the first time that the Chinese space program has drawn inspiration from SpaceX. The country tracked SpaceX from the very beginning, particularly with an interest in SpaceX's plans to reuse rocket first stages. During the company's very first launch in 2006, as reported in the book Liftoff, a Chinese spy boat was in the small patch of ocean where the Falcon 1 rocket's first stage was due to reenter.
More recently, in 2019, the Chinese Long March 2C rocket tested "grid fins" like those used by the first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket to steer itself through the atmosphere during the reentry process. China intends to develop the Long March 8 rocket to land on a sea platform like the Falcon 9 booster did, and semi-private Chinese firms such as LinkSpace and Galactic Energy appear to be mimicking SpaceX launch technology."
NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity successfully completed its historic first flight
"The Ingenuity helicopter has successfully completed its historic flight on Mars and safely landed back on the surface, according to NASA.
The first powered, controlled flight on another planet took place at 3:34 a.m. ET."
Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin launches and lands rocket New Shepard, as it prepares to launch people
"The mission on Wednesday reached 348,753 feet altitude, Blue Origin said – or about 106 kilometers, above the internationally recognized boundary of space.
NS-15 is expected to represent the second of two “stable configuration” test flights, CNBC reported in January, after the NS-14 mission featured the debut of a new rocket booster and upgraded capsule. While Blue Origin has only said that the first crewed flights will be “soon,” sources told CNBC in January that the company’s leadership hopes to launch its first crew on the NS-16 mission."
The first helicopter on Mars phones home after Perseverance rover landing
"The first helicopter ever sent to another world is doing just fine on Mars after surviving a "seven minutes of terror" landing aboard NASA's Perseverance.
The Ingenuity helicopter, which landed on Mars with Perseverance on Thursday (Feb. 18), is awake and communicating with controllers on Earth.
Controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) received a downlink on Friday at 6:30 p.m. EST (2330 GMT) through the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, indicating the 4-lb. (2 kilograms) helicopter and its base station are both operating normally."
Maine company successfully launches prototype rocket
"BRUNSWICK, Maine (AP) — A Maine company that’s developing a rocket to propel small satellites into space passed its first major test on Sunday.
Brunswick-based bluShift Aerospace launched a 20-foot (6-meter) prototype rocket, hitting an altitude of a little more than 4,000 feet (1,219 meters) in a first run designed to test the rocket’s propulsion and control systems.
It carried a science project by Falmouth High School students that will measure flight metrics such as barometric pressure, a special alloy that’s being tested by a New Hampshire company — and a Dutch dessert called stroopwafel, in an homage to its Amsterdam-based parent company. Organizers of the launch said the items were included to demonstrate the inclusion of a small payload."
Virgin's Hyperloop
Interview: Horizon presents its long-range Cavorite X5 hybrid eVTOL
(...)
Once in forward flight, the wings close over, restoring the aerodynamically-efficient shape of a standard wing. Horizon claims that with an LS V8 engine on board and a relatively modest battery system, the Cavorite X5 will offer fully-loaded ranges up to 310 miles (500 km) with 215 mph (350 km/h) cruise capability and the ability to fill up and fly home on pump gas. Unladen with cargo or passengers, it'll fly more than 625 miles (1,000 km).
Practically-minded, the company is currently working on a 1:6 scale version to begin testing its systems and software, and plans to have a half-scale machine built in the next 12 months. Low-volume production is slated for 2024, at which point Horizon hopes to sell the X5 first as a kit plane in the amateur-built experimental category. "
Virgin Orbit launches rocket off a 747 aircraft, puts nine satellites in space
"Austin, Texas (CNN Business)A 70-foot rocket, riding beneath the wing of a retrofitted Boeing 747 aircraft, detached from the plane and fired itself into Earth's orbit on Sunday — marking the first successful launch for the California-based rocket startup Virgin Orbit.
Virgin Orbit's 747, nicknamed Cosmic Girl, took off from California around 10:30 am PT with the rocket, called LauncherOne, nestled beneath the plane's left wing. The aircraft flew out over the Pacific Ocean before the rocket was released, freeing LauncherOne and allowing it to power up its rocket motor and propel itself to more than 17,000 miles per hour, fast enough to begin orbiting the Earth.
The rocket flew a group of tiny satellites on behalf of NASA's Educational Launch of Nanosatellites, or ELaNa, program, which allows high school and college students to design and assemble small satellites that NASA then pays to launch into space. The nine small satellites that Virgin Orbit flew on Sunday included temperature-monitoring satellite from the University of Colorado at Boulder, a satellite that will study how tiny particles collide in space from the University of Central Florida, and an experimental radiation-detection satellite from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette."
BLUE ORIGIN MISSION NS-14 SUCCESSFULLY DEMONSTRATES CREW CAPSULE UPGRADES
Key Mission Stats
- 15th consecutive successful crew capsule landing (every flight in program, including pad escape test in 2012).
- The crew capsule reached an apogee of 347,568 ft above ground level (AGL) / 351,215 ft mean sea level (MSL) (105 km AGL/107 km MSL).
- The booster reached an apogee of 347,211 ft AGL / 350,858 ft MSL (105 km AGL/ 106 km MSL).
- The mission elapsed time was 10 min 10 sec and the max ascent velocity was 2,242 mph / 3,609 km/h.
ESA plans demonstration of a reusable rocket stage
"Themis is 30 m high and 3.5 m in diameter. This single-stage vehicle demonstrator holds 130 tonnes of liquid oxygen/methane to fuel three aligned Prometheus engines.
Suborbital flight tests are scheduled as of 2023 at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana."
European Space Agency (ESA) has signed contracts for its first reusable space transportation system
SN8 take-off, belly-flop, then landing flip
Russia planning to go reusable in 2026 with new Amur rocket
"Russia is getting into the reusable rocket game.
The nation's space agency, Roscosmos, announced last week that it aims to develop a two-stage rocket called the Amur, whose first stage will return to Earth for vertical, powered landings like those performed by SpaceX's Falcon 9 boosters.
Indeed, the Amur bears a remarkable resemblance to the Falcon 9, down to the stabilizing grid fins on the rocket's first stage and the desire to launch each booster up to 100 times eventually. "
In 5 years, and a pale copy of SpaceX's design. Copycats contribute very little to the advancement of space exploration innovation...
NASA Looks to Advance 3D Printing Construction Systems for the Moon and Mars
Rocket startup Astra reaches space for the first time with second launch attempt from Alaska
"San Francisco-area startup Astra became the latest U.S. rocket builder to reach space on Tuesday, with the successful launch of its Rocket 3.2 vehicle from Kodiak, Alaska.
The rocket came just shy of reaching orbit, with Astra CEO Chris Kemp telling reporters after the launch that the vehicle reached the target altitude of 390 kilometers but was “just a half a kilometer per second short” of the target orbital velocity."
Blue Origin’s team turns in its moon landing proposal — and provides a sneak peek
Isar Aerospace (Germany) is building a micro-satellite launcher significantly smaller and thus lower in price than bigger launchers on the market today
"The startup is a spinout of TUM — the famous Munich Technical University — where co-founders Daniel Metzler, Josef Fleischmann and Markus Brandl all studied engineering.
Metzler said that typically the price for a satellite launch today can be in the range of between $30,000 and $40,000 per kilogram. “We aim to go more in the direction of $10,000 per kilogram,” he said."
Aptera opens orders on 1,000-mile solar EV that never needs charging
