Government/Military

The U.S. Air Force has issued a July 30 deadline for its final request for proposals for the Transformational Satellite Communications System (TSAT) Military Operations System, a program that will provide the warfighter with a secure, interoperable, high-capacity global communications network. The Military Satellite Communications Systems Wing intends to competitively award a contract for the...

NASA astronomers using the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer (FUSE) satellite and ground-based telescopes, have discovered the properties of a rare, extremely massive, and young binary star system at sizes dwarfing the Sun, NASA announced May 28. Known as LH54-425, the system is located in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way....

NASA needs a $1.4 billion increase in financial support or it will be sorely underfunded in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2008, leading contractors stated. As described by sister publication Defense Daily, nearly two dozen aerospace corporations told Congress that if NASA doesn’t receive that boost to its fiscal 2008 budget, American space leadership...

China launched a remote-sensing satellite named Yaogan-2 on May 25 from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, according to the state-run newspaper Xinhua. The satellite, launched by a Long March 2D booster rocket, was designed by the China Academy of Space Technology to conduct scientific research, land resources surveying, crop-yield estimates and disaster...

French scientists are using images from the European Space Agency‘s (ESA) Envisat satellite to learn lessons about the origin and movement of waves which reached heights of up to 36 feet before devastating France’s Reunion Island in the Indian Ocean May 12. The ESA reported that the waves that slammed across the southern port of...

A pragmatic approach will be needed to make Galileo a success, said Jean-Francois Bou, interim CEO of Euro GNSS — the Galileo operating company). "In a complex project such as this, it is important to look at the long-term perspective and not be discouraged by short-term local or operational issues," Bou said. "Everyone recognizes the...

The Galileo satellite navigation project, which is supposed to be built though a combination of public and private funding, is teetering on the abyss after industry players failed to satisfy political demands that they resolve differences and move the project forward by May 10. "The industries did not meet the deadline the Commission and the...

Assertions made last week by the director of the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) that some censorship of satellite imagery might be necessary for national or military defense stirred questions among experts of whether such restrictions would be either feasible or prudent. "If there was a situation where any imagery products were being used by...

Dozens of new imagery satellites are scheduled to be placed into orbit throughout the next several years. With a wide array of capabilities, resolutions and owners, these spacecraft could spur a major expansion of the imagery market. While U.S. companies continue to hold the edge in operating the highest-resolution satellites, nations throughout the globe are...

Europe’s Galileo satellite navigation project was launched with great fanfare earlier this decade by the European Union (EU) and European Space Agency, and the first testbed satellite began transmitting signals in early 2006. But something has gone wrong with the project. Four groups initially bid for the contract to develop and operate Galileo. The two...