A Tale of Three Launches

Starring Starliner, Star Ship and Rocket Lab

A couple of notable launches in the news this week, and we'll begin with the launch of the long-delayed and over-budget Boeing Starliner to the International Space Station.

Starliner lifted off from Cape Canaveral on Wednesday carrying astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. As the first crewed launch of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, Williams is the first female astronaut to fly on the first flight of a crewed spacecraft. The launch also marks the first crewed launch on the ULA Atlas V rocket and the first crewed launch on an Atlas-family class rocket since Gordon Cooper on the last Mercury program flight aboard “Faith 7” in May 1963.

The launch was delayed several times due to technical issues with the spacecraft and ground support computers. But Starliner first flew in 2019 as an unmanned test flight, which turned up several problems with the system. A second unmanned orbital flight test was conducted in 2022, with the capsule and its cargo reaching the station as planned.

This first manned flight test had been delayed several times due to multiple technical issues. Still, better to be late and get it right than rush things and have the flight end in disaster or tragedy.

Boeing has a contract valued at $4.2 billion under the Commercial Crew program to ferry astronauts back and forth to the ISS. A similar contract … valued at a lower $2.6 billion … went to SpaceX, which has already completed 11 crewed missions to the station for NASA and Axiom Space.

Speaking of SpaceX, the fourth test flight of Starship was conducted on Thursday, with the flight accomplishing all of its mission objectives, according to SpaceX founder Elon Musk.

Those primary objectives were to execute a precise landing burn and achieve a controlled splashdown of the Super Heavy booster in the Gulf of Mexico, and ensure a secure, controlled entry of the Starship.

The Super Heavy booster touched down softly in the Gulf of Mexico, while the Starship, in a calculated test, had one thin heatshield tile strategically placed and two removed to assess thermal impacts and explore thermal protection strategies. Like its predecessors, Flight 4 saw the Starship set its course for a splashdown in the Indian Ocean. This flight path was chosen to eliminate the need for a deorbit burn, thereby prioritizing public safety without compromising the mission's primary objective: a controlled reentry of the Starship.

The the ship survived the heat of reentry, but not without damage to at least one of its upper flaps. Yet despite the damage the unique belly flop maneuver was successfully completed followed by a short landing burn and finally, a gentle settling into the waters of the east Indian Ocean.

A third launch of note this week took place in New Zealand, where Rocket Lab successfully launched the second PREFIRE satellite into a polar orbit for NASA.

The Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-InfraRed Experiment climate change-focused mission successfully launched late Tuesday (US eastern time), completing a turnaround of two launches within eleven days.

With both satellites now in orbit, they will crisscross the Artic and Antarctic to study heat lost to space from the Earth’s polar regions. Heat loss measurements collected by the PREFIRE mission will help to improve climate and ice-loss models to better predict Earth’s ice, sea level, and weather changes. The mission is expected to operate for 10 months.

A Passive Docking System (PDS) will be developed by Japan-based partners and Sierra Space for the company's planned commercial space station. The system is being developed jointly by IHI Aerospace Co., Ltd., a principal contributor to Japan’s space engineering expertise, and Kanematsu Corporation.

The new PDS system – an integral element facilitating secure and efficient spacecraft docking including with Sierra Space’s Dream Chaser spaceplane – will be developed in accordance with the International Docking System Standard (IDSS). IHI Aerospace’s solution is designed to offer simplicity, versatility and utmost reliability in space docking operations.

Having successfully completed the preliminary design review, the companies are poised to progress towards the critical design phase.

ThinkOrbital recently operated an electron-beam welding system in space powered by a 20kV power supply developed by CisLunar Industries.

The company was recently awarded a US patent for its modular configurable electronic power conversion system, which addresses key gaps in the current market for space electronics. With this completed mission, the company enters the ranks of commercial companies with space heritage.

Joe Pawelski, Co-Founder & CTO, Cislunar Industries, will be our guest on an upcoming edition of The Ex Terra Podcast to talke about the achievement and more about the company.

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As we stated last week we have begun our changes. We’ve turned on chat and will begin to prime some threads to hopefully gets some good conversation flowing.

We also started the weekly newsletter, of which this is the second installment.

And we have several in-depth articles in the pipeline as well a couple of project ideas we are just beginning to test internally.

But why…

The Purpose of The Journal of Space Commerce

Credit: NASA

We set out almost 4 years ago to follow something exciting. For the first time in our history, we were leaving the planet regularly and so far, permanently. We just had to join the journey in the best way we could. We decided to:

• Chronicle the commercial conquest of space through multimedia. 

• Cajole the industry by bringing awareness to Companies, Investors, Consumers and People interested in space. 

• Critique the industry with constructive criticism and honest fact checking.

It is our Future. It is our Passion. 

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