Asteroid City…Wes Anderson Film or the Next Hot Housing Market?
Plus Mars megatsunamis, coolant leaks, a nuclear fusion breakthrough, and dearMoon gets a crew
Hello Continuum readers and Celestial Citizens,
And welcome to the last Continuum newsletter of 2022! There were a ton of big headlines over the last two weeks, but perhaps my favorite highlight was a “wildly theoretical” study (because really those are the best kind) to come out of a team of researchers at the University of Rochester that proposed space cities could be built out of asteroids. So as a space urban planner and Wes Anderson super-fan, I find myself delighting in and looking forward to possible future asteroid cities and also the film Asteroid City - which is set to come out next year. What a time to be alive! And while Anderson’s film is expected to remain Earthbound, the University of Rochester study has certainly set its sights on a fantastic vision of living off-Earth someday. There is a lot of nuance and engineering to the plan (which builds upon the O’Neillian cylinder concept), but in a nutshell folks…the research team’s plan boils down to “bagging and spinning” the asteroid. What, like it’s hard?
Alright, this newsletter is jam-packed with all kinds of star stuff so let’s get to it! Here’s the space beat you came for…
Top Headlines
Orion – Splashdown! On Sunday, Orion safely returned back to Earth, landing in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Mexico’s Baja California. Notably, the spacecraft succeeded in performing a “skip entry” maneuver. NASA likens this technique to skipping a rock on water - Orion entered the upper part of Earth’s atmosphere, and then used the atmosphere to lift itself out again, before re-entering for splashdown. The first for a human spacecraft to do this, it not only helps the splashdown location be more precise, but also eases up on the G-Force felt by astronauts as they return home. Although breathable air has yet to be tested on the Orion capsule, we’d be remiss in not saying that it’s been a long road just getting to this point. What a way to cap off this year! Here’s hoping we’re on track to see another (safe and successful) Artemis launch in 2024, and this time, with humans!
dearMoon – Speaking of humans in space, it seems like eight just got selected to go! Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa announced the eight artists selected to come with him on the “dearMoon mission” - a SpaceX mission originally announced in 2018. Among the group are electronic musician Steve Aoki and Tim Dodd the Everyday Astronaut. Currently slated for launch in 2023, it’s likely that it will get pushed back considering Starship has still yet to be tested as it waits for FAA approval regarding its “environmental assessment requirements” that were outlined earlier this year. We’ll see if this mission comes to fruition, but for now, we’re just thankful that Maezawa isn’t still using a trip to space as a way to get a girlfriend, at least publicly. Even still, the mission is not without some controversy.
Going Nuclear – You may have heard something about a little breakthrough in nuclear fusion energy. Last week, the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory announced that it successfully achieved fusion with a net energy gain. This is HUGE news - because per Harvard scientist Adam Cohen, “it shows that, as a community, our understanding of the physics of fusion is sufficiently advanced that we can predict and achieve these reactions under the controlled conditions of the National Ignition Facility,” even if its relevance as a clean energy supply for humans “is still a really long way off.”
Mars – A theory that brings to mind the giant waves that nearly took out Matthew McConaughey and Anne Hathaway in Interstellar, proposes that “Martian megatsunamis” may have raged across the planet after meteor strikes - and we may have just found the site of impact. Read more about the Pohl crater and the evidence surrounding this theory in the full Space.com article by Charles Q Choi. And while you’re there, you can also read about Mars volcanic activity, and why one researcher is declaring “Mars is not dead.”
Space Leak – An upcoming Russian spacewalk has been canceled after a coolant leak from a docked Soyuz spacecraft spewed into space. Russian officials stated that there was “damage to the outer lining of the service module of the [docked] Soyuz.” Although the leak doesn’t pose an immediate risk to the station and the crew, it’s unsure whether or not the spacecraft will be able to bring the cosmonauts home. Russia could launch an uncrewed Soyuz to the ISS if needed. This is a developing story, and we will see how this plays out over the coming weeks.
Space Force – A new Space Force unit has been launched in Seoul following North Korea’s test-firing of a “barrage of nuclear-capable ballistic missile[s]” that have the capacity to hit the US mainland. Per APNews, this is “the first such facility on foreign territory that will likely enable Washington to better monitor its rivals North Korea, China and Russia.”
Connection Issues – It seems like some satellites might be calling for an early holiday! NASA has lost contact recently with two of its spacecrafts. NASA lost contact with the Ionospheric Connection Explorer or ICON satellite last Monday. The atmosphere studying spacecraft has been in orbit since 2019, is currently in an extended mission, having passed its two-year prime mission last December. The following day, NASA was unable to make contact with FM06, one of eight CYGNSS satellites that measure ocean surface winds in and near the eye of tropical storms. Like ICON, CYGNSS is also working on an extended mission. NASA is working to restore communications with both.
The JWST Download
Maybe we can name one of these ”orphan stars” little Annie?
Orion and JWST are competing for Deep Space Network bandwidth.
The red spiral galaxies of the early universe!
Shine bright like a (galactic) diamond.
Will we soon have access to ALL of JWST’s data?
And as usual, the OG space telescope comes through again, with another incredible picture of supernova remnants.
A Global Space
Artemis Accords – A big welcome to Nigeria and Rwanda as the latest signatories to the Artemis Accords! Per NASA, “23 nations have affirmed their commitment to transparent, safe, and sustainable space exploration.”
United Nations – In a “largely symbolic move” the United Nations General Assembly approved “a resolution calling for a halt to one type of anti-satellite (ASAT) testing.” Per SpaceNews, a total of “155 nations voted in favor of the resolution, with 9 voting against it and 9 others abstaining.” Any progress is better than no progress especially when it comes to taking care of our orbital environment.
Japan – JAXA astronaut Satoshi Furukawa will keep his seat on a 2023 mission to the ISS despite being involved in a research scandal. Furukawa’s team were found to have fabricated and altered research study data simulating astronaut work on the International Space Station. JAXA has stated that he and the team will be “appropriately punished.” Per Space.com, Furukawa was said to have had a supervisory role in the research and no direct involvement otherwise in the work.
China – It continues to be a busy time for China’s space program. The three person Shenzhou 15 crew have taken the reins to the Tiangong space station. They are tasked with “conducting more than 100 science experiments” as well as embarking on a handful of planned spacewalks. And with discussions of expansion already in the works - it seems the astronauts will have their hands full for their tenure on the station. China’s eyes are clearly set on the future - having moved up the launch date of their planned planetary defense mission to 2025 as well as announcing their plan to cooperate with the Gulf Nations "in the fields of nuclear energy, nuclear security and space exploration." But it’s not all roses: despite the successful launch of the privately developed Kuaizhou 11 rocket, the world’s first launch attempt at a methane-fueled rocket, developed by Chinese commercial launch firm Landscape, ended in failure, losing 14 satellites.
South Korea – Will everyone soon be wearing KASA merch? KASA, or the Korean Aerospace Administration is the new South Korean NASA counterpart planned by President Yoon Suk-yeol, hoping to get operations going as early as the second quarter of 2023. Existing completely separately from the Korea Aerospace Research Institute, this is just a part of South Korea’s ambitious plans for entering the space race, aiming to land a spacecraft on the Moon and Mars by 2045.
SKA – We’re excited for SKA, and no, not the music! Construction has begun in both South Africa and Australia for the Square Kilometer Array (SKA), which will be the largest radio telescope to date. Broken up into two – the SKA-Mid Array in the Karoo Desert in South Africa, and the SKA-Low Array in Western Australia, researchers will be able to use the combined power of the SKA Observatory to study radio waves into the deepest reaches of space.
MOONSHOT
If we’re going to get to space, we’re going to need a lot of help. In our Moonshot section, we’ll share highlights from some of the commercial companies that are taking us there:
Just announced this morning, space infrastructure and imagery company Maxar agreed to go private through an acquisition led by Advent International. This all-cash deal gives Maxar an enterprise value of about $6.4 billion. And while it’s still not very clear what Maxar will look like under Advent, the markets responded favorably. The offer price is a massive premium over Maxar's Thursday close, and the shares are up 120% on Friday as a result. This also seems to be good news for Planet Labs as investors are bidding up the price of their stock as well, “presumably on the thought that if the market had undervalued Maxar relative to Advent's price there could be other opportunities in the space.”
Collins Aerospace has been selected by NASA to develop new space suits to be used in spacewalks on the ISS. The “task order” has a value of $97.2 million and includes designing, building, and demonstrating the suit in a simulated space environment on Earth by January 2024. With all these new spacesuit designs being announced, do we hear Space Fashion week coming soon?
Will the latest round of HLS bids bring about as much drama as the last? In NASA’s second HLS bidding process, it seems that old collaborators Blue Origin and Northrop Grumman are now competing against each other, leading separate development teams. Blue Origin’s “National Team” includes Lockheed Martin, Draper, Boeing, Astrobotic, and Honeybee Robotics, while Northrop Grumman has partnered with Leidos Dynetics.
Rocket Lab is getting ready for its first launch from US soil this Sunday! If the weather holds, NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility will see Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket bring three HawkEye360 satellites into orbit. And if you’re in the US, you may be able to see the launch in your night sky, anywhere from “Maine down to Georgia, and even as far west as Ohio.” It’s been a two year journey for Rocket Lab to be able to launch stateside – for the full story, check out SpaceNews’ write up on the launch.
The much anticipated launch of Virgin Orbit from Spaceport Cornwall in England has been delayed due to “technical and regulatory issues.” SpaceNews reports that the launch may still occur before the end of the year, but a new date has yet to be set.
Quantum Space, a company with a variety of goals for providing in-space logistics in cislunar space, has received $15 million in funding from Prime Movers Lab. This funding will largely go to development of its QS-1 satellite, the first in its planned QuantumNet constellation. Quantum Space aims to have 40 of these “scout spacecrafts” in service by 2030, and they will “carry a variety of payloads, including communications, navigation and space situational awareness.”
Explosions CAN be a good thing – Sierra Space uploaded a new ultimate pressure burst test video of its inflatable astronaut habitat. This second successful test bodes well for these inflatable modules to be used aboard Blue Origin’s planned space station, Orbital Reef.
And in other SpaceX news, the company successfully launched a Japanese lunar lander and a NASA cubesat on one Falcon 9. The lander, developed by iSpace, is named Hakuto-R M1 and carries onboard the Rashid lunar lander developed by the UAE. As we wrote in the last newsletter, if the Hakuto-R M1 lands, Japan will become the fourth country to make a soft landing on the lunar surface. The Lunar Flashlight cubesat from NASA will travel to the South Pole of the Moon, looking for signs of ice in craters.
Space Reads!
Can’t get enough stellar content? Here are some pieces of space-adjacent news we’ve been reading:
Is the 1995 film Waterworld finally justifying it’s record-setting (at the time) budget of $175 million…? Maybe not, but Hubble did just help us discover a set of twin planets that seem to be largely composed of water. Kevin Costner has not commented on a potential sequel at this time.
Is Elon’s recent Twitter takeover distracting him from his space goals? This SpaceNews op-ed from Jeff Foust and Jason Rainbow attempts to answer just that. Why are we so dependent on Elon in the first place…well that’s another question that is at least partially explored in this Washington Post article on the fallacy of “great man thinking.” Powerful men taking singular credit for massive successes built on the work of others? Women everywhere are shocked.
Feel like you can’t keep up with all the space news coming out of China? Here is a great article and timeline from the New York Times to get you caught up.
How bad will the space debris problem get? MacArthur Fellow (and notable Celestial Citizen podcast guest) Moriba Jah talks with Ars Technica about his prediction that we will “lose the ability to use certain orbits” and “we will see a loss of human life” later this decade.
Someone call George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg…another Perfect Storm is on the horizon, only it’s a space hurricane…
Well space people, this brings to a close our final Continuum newsletter of 2022! We would like to take a moment to thank this incredible community of readers that has grown and evolved with us over the last nine months. We appreciate your readership and support for this independent news publication. Thanks for helping us spread the word that space is for everyone and as Christa McAuliffe once said, “it’s everybody’s business to know about space.”
A massive thank you to Evan Yee for writing alongside me all year and helping guide the direction of this publication. Thank you also, to Jackie Appel for her astronomical coverage this year, Helen Floersh for running social media for the Continuum team, and Risha Leondra (of Sow Good Creative) for designing and continually improving our web design and digital media platform. And of course, thank you to Thomas Romer (of Chop Shop Store) for creating our amazing Continuum logo! There are many, many more writers and creatives that have supported our space news mission this year and we are extremely grateful to everyone that has had a hand in helping us grow.
We hope you enjoyed reading Continuum this week and this year and will share it with your friends. And if you really, really like us, then consider becoming a paid subscriber or gifting a subscription to someone this holiday season. Until next YEAR…
Keep it celestial people,
Britt
CEO of Celestial Citizen & Creator of Continuum
