SpaceX revealed today that almost all of the 49 Starlink satellites it launched last week were affected by a geomagnetic storm and will reenter or have already. Such “space weather” storms are created by the interaction of solar particles with the atmosphere.
Eric Lander, the first presidential science advisor to hold Cabinet rank, resigned tonight after a White House investigation found credible evidence supporting accusations by his staff that he treated them demeaningly. President Biden vowed when he took office that he would fire anyone who treated others disrespectfully. The initial White House response was muted, but the tide turned after Politico reported on the situation today.
Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of February 6-12, 2022 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session for at least part of this week.
A month after formally announcing plans to extend operations of the International Space Station to 2030, NASA is making clear that is the end of the road. A new update to its ISS transition plan spells out how that end will play out, with the orbit gradually lowered until the football-field size facility reenters and any surviving pieces fall into the Pacific Ocean in January 2031. After that, NASA will buy whatever human spaceflight services it needs in low Earth orbit from companies expected to be operating their own space stations by then.
China’s new quinquennial white paper laying out space ambitions for the next five years includes an expanding role in space environment governance such as mitigating space debris. Not mentioned, however, is China’s recent use of one of its spacecraft, Shijian-21, to tow another out of geostationary orbit. That was made public by a U.S. company that tracks objects in space. China’s silence is odd since it aligns so well with its stated objectives and once again underscores the country’s lack of transparency.
NASA and SpaceX officials told reporters today they are not overly concerned about the delayed opening of parachutes during the splashdowns of the two recent flights of the Dragon spacecraft. Each spacecraft has four parachutes and only three are needed for a safe landing, but why the fourth lagged behind is not understood yet. Nonetheless, they are confident enough to proceed with plans to launch the next NASA crew on April 15.
NASA is getting ever closer to the long-delayed and much-anticipated launch of Artemis I, an uncrewed test flight of the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft. SLS and Orion are stacked together at Kennedy Space Center waiting to be rolled out to the launch pad for a dress rehearsal, but the agency said today it will wait another month as it takes preparations step-by-step.
Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of January 30-February 5, 2022 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session this week.
Laurie Leshin, President of Worcester Polytechnic Institute, has been chosen as the new director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, succeeding Michael Watkins. A planetary scientist at Arizona State University who moved to NASA and then returned to academia, she was the first woman President of WPI and will become the first woman JPL Director when she takes office in May.
Today is NASA’s annual Day of Remembrance honoring the nation’s fallen astronauts. This year it is commemorated on the 55th anniversary of the first U.S. human spaceflight tragedy, the fire that killed the Apollo 1 crew during a pre-launch test. As NASA readies its new Artemis system to return astronauts to the Moon while increasing its reliance on commercial partnerships for other human spaceflight missions, the agency’s safety advisors are urging caution.