PROGRESS MS-09 LEAVES INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - Progress MS-09 departed from the International Space Station after spending spending more than six months at the outpost. The cargo freighter autonomously undocked from the Pirs docking compartment at 7:55 a.m. EST (12:55 GMT) Jan. 25, 2019. Following its departure, the vehicle spent several hours moving away from the space station before performing a deorbit burn at about 11:08 a.m. EST (16:08 GMT). Once it entered the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, it burned up with unneeded equipment and trash.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Insider - Jan 27)

SWARM RAISES 25M TO BUILD WORLD'S LOWEST-COST SATELLITE NETWORK - Swarm Technologies, developer of the world's lowest-cost global communications network, reports it has closed its Series A financing round of $25M. The round was led by Craft Ventures and Sky Dayton, founder of EarthLink and Boingo, with participation from Social Capital, 4DX Ventures and NJF Capital. Swarm will use the capital to accelerate software and hardware integrations for customer deployments, to continue hiring world-class talent, and to deploy a constellation of 150 satellites over the next 18 months.   More
(Source: Space Daily - Jan 26)

‘BUSINESSES WILL NOT BE ABLE TO HIDE’: SPY SATELLITES MAY GIVE EDGE FROM ABOVE - In October, the Chinese province of Guangdong — the manufacturing center on the southern coast that drives 12 percent of the country’s economy — stopped publishing a monthly report on the health of its local factories. For five consecutive months, this key economic index had shown a drop in factory production as the United States applied billions of dollars in tariffs on Chinese exports. Then, amid an increasingly bitter trade war between the United States and China, the government authorities in Beijing shut the index down.   More
(Source: New York Times - Jan 26)

INDIA PUTS 'LIGHTEST SATELLITE' KALAMSAT V2 INTO ORBIT - India has launched what it says is the world's lightest satellite ever to be put into orbit. Weighing only 1.26kg (2.6lb), the Kalamsat-V2 was made by students belonging to a space education firm. It will help ham radio operators and "inspire schoolchildren to become the scientists and engineers of the future", India's space agency says. The Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) launched the satellite from its Sriharikota space centre.    More
(Source: BBC News - Jan 25)

COLORADO-BUILT DREAM CHASER, SUCCESSOR TO THE SPACE SHUTTLE, TURNING INTO REALITY - Production of a successor to NASA’s space shuttle will get underway in Colorado and will be overseen by a former U.S. Air Force pilot and astronaut who piloted two shuttle flights and commanded another three. For the past few years, Steve Lindsey has overseen the design, development and testing of the Dream Chaser, a spacecraft that will be built by Sierra Nevada Corp. at its Space Systems operations in Louisville. In December, NASA declared production a “go” after the craft passed a critical review.   More
(Source: The Denver Post - Jan 25)

COUNTDOWN FOR LAUNCH OF DRDO SATELLITE TO START TODAY - The countdown for the flight on Thursday night of an Indian rocket carrying the Microsat R imaging satellite of the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and the Kalamsat student satellite will begin later on Wednesday, an Indian space agency official said. "The countdown for the PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle) rocket launch will start today (Wednesday). "The countdown duration and its starting time, the time of rocket launch would be announced later," an official of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) told IANS.   More
(Source: NDTV - Jan 24)

FIRST UP SATCOM | FIRST ONEWEB SATELLITES SHIPPED FOR LAUNCH - OneWeb and its manufacturing partner Airbus Defence and Space have shipped the first six satellites of OneWeb’s broadband smallsat constellation from Toulouse, France, to French Guiana. Those six satellites are scheduled to launch Feb. 19 on an Arianespace-operated Soyuz rocket. OneWeb originally planned to launch 10 satellites on the first launch, but reduced the number to six in order to keep four as spares. Arianespace is launching the roughly 150-kilogram satellites directly to their 1,200-kilometer operating orbit.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Jan 24)

THIS DARPA SATELLITE WILL BE DESIGNED, BUILT AND LAUNCHED IN 18 MONTHS - New Zealand-based space company Rocket Lab said it plans to launch a satellite for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) next month from the company’s main launch complex at the Mahia peninsula. Rocket Lab operates out of the world’s first privately owned launch facility in New Zealand and has a second launch site at Wallops Island on the eastern shore of Virginia. The launch will mark Rocket Lab’s first mission this year and will use a 56 foot (17 meters) Electron rocket to place DARPA’s Radio Frequency Risk Reduction Deployment Demonstration (R3D2) payload into orbit in late February.    More
(Source: C4ISRNet - Jan 24)

ROCKET LAB TO LAUNCH DARPA SATELLITE - Small launch vehicle developer Rocket Lab will launch an experimental satellite for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency in February, the first of a planned dozen launches in 2019. Rocket Lab announced Jan. 22 that it will launch a small satellite for DARPA on the company’s Electron rocket from its launch site in New Zealand. That launch will take place in February, likely late in the month, Rocket Lab Chief Executive Peter Beck said in an interview.   More
(Source: SpaceNews - Jan 23)

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