HIGH-RES SATELLITES WANT TO TRACK HUMAN ACTIVITY FROM SPACE - Hopkinsville, Kentucky, is normally a mid-size town, home to 32,000 people and a big bowling ball manufacturer. But on August 21, its human density more than tripled, as around 100,000 people swarmed toward the total solar eclipse. Hundreds of miles above the crowd, high-resolution satellites stared down, snapping images of the sprawl. These satellites belong to a company called DigitalGlobe, and their cameras are sharp enough to capture a book on a coffee table. But at that high resolution, they can only image that book (or the Kentucky crowd) at most twice a day.    More
(Source: WIRED - Aug 30)

HURRICANE HARVEY CAUSING HUGE PROBLEMS FOR INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION - Houston, we have a problem 250 miles above Earth. And it’s because the astronauts about the International Space Station can’t send down imagery of Hurricane Harvey, because they’re supposed to send it to NASA’s Johnson Space Center near Houston, where the storm has dumped feet of rain in the last few days. “All right, you guys have got photos of Harvey on SSC-21 if you like,” an astronaut called down, according to CBS News.   More
(Source: BABW News - Aug 30)

SES SWITCHES SPACEX AND ARIANESPACE LAUNCHES TO MITIGATE COST OF SATELLITE FAILURE - Satellite fleet operator SES, which this year has suffered both predictable satellite-launch delays and unpredictable satellite failures, on Aug. 28 said it would move a satellite from launch-service provider SpaceX to Arianespace to minimize revenue losses. As a result, the SES-14 satellite will launch aboard an Ariane 5 ECA rocket early in Q1 of next year rather than a less-clear Q1 launch date offered by SpaceX. SpaceX instead will launch the heavier SES-12 satellite, up to now slated for an Ariane 5, on a Falcon 9 vehicle in Q1 2018.   More
(Source: Space Intel Report - Aug 29)

NASA TRACKS HARVEY'S RAINFALL, SAFEGUARDS JAMES WEBB TELESCOPE - NASA is monitoring Tropical Storm Harvey as it moves back into the Gulf of Mexico this morning (Aug. 28) after causing heavy rains and severe flooding across Texas and Louisiana this past weekend. Harvey initially hit the Texas coast as a Category 4 hurricane on Friday (Aug. 25). NASA's aptly named Aqua satellite — "aqua" is Latin for "water" — has been gathering data that has helped scientists identify the clouds within the tropical storm that are capable of generating heavy rainfall. On Sunday (Aug. 27), NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston was closed to everyone except mission-critical staff due to the flooding.   More
(Source: Space.com - Aug 29)

MINOTAUR 4 LAUNCH TIMELINE WITH THE ORS-5 SATELLITE - Track the major events during the Minotaur 4 rocket’s 28-minute climb into a unique equatorial orbit with the ORS-5 space surveillance satellite for the U.S. military’s Operationally Responsive Space office. Standing around eight stories tall, the five-stage rocket is set for liftoff during a four-hour launch window opening at 11:15 p.m. EDT Friday (0315 GMT) Saturday from Complex 46 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. Here is a diagram of the Minotaur 4’s flight sequence, and a list of major events during the rocket’s ascent into space.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Aug 28)

CONVERTED MISSILE LAUNCHES MILITARY SATELLITE TO TRACK SPACECRAFT AND DEBRIS - A satellite designed to help the U.S. military keep tabs on the ever-growing population of orbiting objects took to the skies atop a converted missile early this morning (Aug. 26). The Air Force's Operationally Responsive Space-5 (ORS-5) satellite lifted off from Florida's Cape Canaveral Air Force Station at 2:04 a.m. EDT today (0604 GMT) atop an Orbital ATK Minotaur IV rocket, which carved a fiery orange arc into the sky as it rose.   More
(Source: Space.com - Aug 27)

NASA SATELLITES WATCH AS HURRICANE HARVEY INTENSIFIES OFF TEXAS COAST - Tropical storm Harvey has been gaining strength and will likely make landfall as a major hurricane, NASA satellite images revealed. What started out as the remnants of a tropical storm could become the worst hurricane to hit Texas in nearly 50 years and the first Category 3 hurricane to hit the United States in almost 12 years, the Weather Channel reports. On Wednesday (Aug. 23), the National Hurricane Center (NHC) upgraded the scattered storm remnants to a tropical depression, and by Thursday (Aug. 24) it started to shape up as a large "tropical cyclone" over the Gulf of Mexico.   More
(Source: Space.com - Aug 26)

TAIWANESE SATELLITE RIDES SPACEX ROCKET INTO ORBIT - Flying with an exceptionally lightweight payload, a Falcon 9 rocket delivered a multipurpose research satellite into a nearly 450-mile-high orbit Thursday for Taiwan following a smooth countdown and liftoff from California’s Central Coast. Weighing in at about a half-ton, or 475 kilograms, the Formosat 5 satellite doubles as an orbiting observatory to look down on Earth and as a pathfinder for Taiwan’s future space ambitions. Formosat 5 climbed into space aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, which lifted off at 11:51 a.m. PDT (2:51 p.m. EDT; 1851 GMT) from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.   More
(Source: SpaceFlight Now - Aug 26)

SPACEX WILL LOSE MILLIONS ON ITS TAIWANESE SATELLITE LAUNCH - SpaceX is poised to fire off a fresh Falcon 9 rocket on Thursday, delivering a comically tiny payload for Taiwan’s National Space Organization. At 1,047 pounds, the Formosat-5 Earth-observing satellite is almost light enough for a human to deadlift—but it’ll launch atop a Falcon 9 rocket with 50 times more capacity. The overkill is thanks to a years-long delay, and SpaceX will take a substantial financial hit to make good on a contract it signed in 2010. Elon Musk’s space flight company will attempt to launch the rocket from Vandenberg Air Force base in California during a 42-minute window opening at 11:51 am PDT on Thursday. https://www.wired.com/story/spacex-will-lose-millions-on-its-taiwanese-satellite-launch/   More
(Source: WIRED - Aug 25)

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