Hackers and Junk Increase Cost of Satellites
I have spent a lot of blogs talking about all the exciting projects of governments and private companies in the exploration and exploitation of space.
I have spent a lot of blogs talking about all the exciting projects of governments and private companies in the exploration and exploitation of space.
I started this blog with a series of articles about the Chinese space program.
I have talked about space weapons in general and Chinese militarization of space in particular in past blog posts. A new report expected soon from the congressional U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission will provide details of the Chinese space weapons programs. These weapons are referred to as counterspace arms because they are intended to destroy or jam U.S. satellites and limit American combat operations around the world.
I am a booster of human space exploration. I enjoy writing this blog about it. Up until recently, space exploration was the exclusive province of the national governments. In the U.S. NASA is the primary federal agency responsible for space exploration. However, in the past few years, private entrepreneurs have begun building and launching spacecraft.
I have previously mentioned that Boeing was awarded a contract by NASA for building their CST-100 spacecraft. (see Boeing and SpaceX Awarded NASA Contract for Reusable Manned Spacecraft) Now Boeing has renamed their reusable crewed spacecraft the Starliner. It will be built in a "repurposed" shuttle processing facility at the Kennedy Space Center.
Conventional propulsion systems for satellite and spacecraft maneuvering in space utilize some sort of combustive fuel to direct explosive products out of the rear of the vehicle to move it forward. Because there is no oxygen in space, these systems must combine a flammable substance with an oxidizer.