Political Passing, Antarctic Mapping, Grounded Russians, JWST Increases and exactEarth Launches
Yesterday, Canadians were saddened to learn of the death of Federal New Democratic Party (NDP) leader Jack Layton from cancer at the age of 61. His energy, upbeat demeanor, cooperative (and competitive) spirit, plus the all around positive attitude Layton projected helped grow the NDP under his leadership from a burnt out 2004 fringe collaboration of 19 parliamentary seats focused on past glories to 101 seats and official opposition status only eight years later.
Hopefully, his talents will not be lost with his passing. They are useful tools (whatever the political affiliation) able to make a positive contribution to any debate on Canadian domestic, foreign, economic or military concerns.
Participants in the upcoming political debates on arctic sovereignty, Canadian innovation and those who (once again) will shortly seek to define the future role of the space systems industry and/or the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) might want to keep this in mind.
Meanwhile, in other news:
John Gilbert "Jack" Layton. 1950 - 2011. |
Hopefully, his talents will not be lost with his passing. They are useful tools (whatever the political affiliation) able to make a positive contribution to any debate on Canadian domestic, foreign, economic or military concerns.
Participants in the upcoming political debates on arctic sovereignty, Canadian innovation and those who (once again) will shortly seek to define the future role of the space systems industry and/or the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) might want to keep this in mind.
Meanwhile, in other news:
- The August 12th, 2011 New York Times article "Tracking the Movement of Ice Across Antarctica" is reporting that a new map of how ice flows across the Antarctic, may become "a crucial tool in helping researchers understand how a warming climate is changing the continent." The map, created using data collected by Canada's RADARSAT-2 satellite, the European Space Agency (ESA) Environmental Satellite for Earth Observation (Envisat), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) Advanced Land Observing Satellite (DAICHI) and other sources was published last Thursday in the online journal Science Express.
- The Russian Federal Space Agency (Roskosmos) has temporarily grounded its Proton-M rocket launchers after the latest in a string of mishaps which culminating in the August 18th launching of an Express-AM4 telecommunications satellite into the wrong orbit. According to the August 23rd, 2011 AFP International article "Russia grounds rockets after launch failure," the scale of Russia's current space problems "was underscored when the first discovery of the missing craft was reported by observers at NORAD (North American Aerospace Defense Command), the bi-national US and Canadian command that was the Soviets' main rival during the Cold War." Although this is not the first time that Russian rockets have launched satellites into the wrong orbit, Roskosmos officials stressed that the grounding will not affect Friday's planned launch of a Glonass communications satellite from Russia's northern Plesetsk Cosmodrome, aboard a member of the venerable Soyuz rocket family or future launches presently scheduled using other Roskosmos operated launch systems.
James E. Webb. |
- Cost overruns on the troubled James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) just keep rising and rising with no apparent end in site. For example, the August 23rd, 2011 Aviation Week and Space Technology article "NASA Estimates $8.7 Billion To Fly Webb" states that "managers at NASA replanning (?) the troubled James Webb Space Telescope have concluded it will cost $8.7 billion to finish the observatory in time for a launch in 2018 and operate it at the Earth-Sun L2 Lagrange point for five years." As outlined in my July 12th, 2011 post "Tracking Costs for the James Webb Telescope" the last cost estimate for the JWST, considered current as recently as July 2011 was for a total cost of $6.5 billion USD. Canada is only making a small financial contribution (around $148 million over the life of the project) and wants to remain friends with the US prime contractors so is likely hoping to avoid any direct involvement in the debate over the JWST's future.
The AprizeSat-3 Microsat. |
- Comdev International subsidiary exactEarth Ltd. has announced the successful launch of two advanced AIS satellites (AprizeSat 5 and 6) aboard a Roskosmos Dnepr launch vehicle according to this August 17th, 2011 press release posted on the exactEarth website. The satellites, built by US based SpaceQuest Ltd., are part of a planned constellation of 64 microsats, which will be used to create a global communication system of data transmission and fixed and mobile asset tracking and monitoring (GMPCS) facilities to gather automatic identification system (AIS) and positional data from ships at sea. As outlined in my March 26th, 2011 post "ComDev Faces Challenges and Direct Competitors" the Canadian led effort is in direct competition with with New Jersey based Orbcomm to roll out the first worldwide system able to track ships from space.
Love your blog. However, entries show up under Google Reader with "(title unknown)" followed by as much text from the entry as it can fit in the column. Not sure why this happens, but maybe you need to adjust the settings?
ReplyDeleteMichael Turner
Project Persephone
Tokyo
Hi Michael,
ReplyDeleteThe three year old template I'm using never had a specific space for titles, so I never entered them.
At this point, I'd need to reload a new template and manually re-enter the titles in the appropriate field to make everything work properly and I just haven't found the time to do so.
The titles do work correctly in the new Space Conference News sites (http://spaceconferencenews.blogspot.com/).
Thanks for your comments.