 Hello citizens of Earth and welcome aboard Station 204 for this week's Tomorrow News. Ryan has got a HopiSpaceX update for us. We have some secret spacecraft we're gonna give you all the details about. A expensive launch vehicle is gonna be getting even more expensive. Space traffic and a bonanza to finish it all off. Now, before we get started just wanna remind you that if you like what we do here tomorrow, don't forget to subscribe to us, like our videos, set up the notifications and share us everywhere that you can. So, let's go ahead and get started with this week's edition of Tomorrow News for the week of September 7th, 2020. Ryan, light it up. A piece of SpaceX hardware has de-orbited in the past week, but it wasn't a Falcon 9 second stage. The Starlink 1040 satirized when out of service in December of last year and it's all bit naturally degraded over time until just a few days ago until it burned up for good. This is pure evidence that SpaceX do not want to clutter Earth's orbits with space junk, which is very good to see. The fairings from the SEACON 1B mission have also been returned to Port Canaveral aboard Miss Chief. Following these fairing catches on the September the 3rd, another Falcon 9 launched its way out of Cape Canaveral, lifting 60 Starlink satellites along with it at 1246 Coordinated Universal Time. Shifting over to Starship now, we have just been blessed with this photo of the sheer scale of the vacuum optimized Raptor engine, which is a larger engine bell to make it more efficient in a vacuum, as the name suggests. The RVAC's atmospheric counterpart was doing a lot more work this week however, as it lifted the second Starship to Hop SN6 up to a height of 150 meters. This is another massive accomplishment for the Starship development timeline as after only a couple of delays, it went off without a hitch. Thanks, Ryan. Now, it wasn't just SpaceX that was doing testing this week, we actually had quite a few companies that were putting their projects through their engineering paces. Five, four, three, two, one, fire. Chief, have five seconds. White Support Booster 1 was fired on September 2nd at 1905 Universal Time in a test by Northrop Grumman and NASA at Northrop Grumman's test facility in promontory Utah. This specific solid rocket motor tested upgrades, improvements, and ideas that may power the two boosters for the Space Launch System after the third Artemis mission, Artemis 3, in 2024. This was a spectacular test that looks to have been successful and that 47 meter long booster is derived from the Space Shuttle's solid rocket boosters that generates about 3.6 million pounds of thrust. Now, unlike the Space Shuttle's solid rocket boosters, these on the Space Launch System are expendable. They're not going to be reused. They're just going to drop into the ocean and then become a fish's house. That's pretty annoying. Another thing that's annoying is that we had some honesty actually come out this week. The Space Launch System is going to be costing more than was stated in 2019 and 2018 and 2017 and 2016 and 2015 2014, 2013 2012 and 2011. Gosh, can we please just leave the cost over runs to the James Webb Space Telescope? Kathy Luthor's NASA's new associate administrator for human exploration and operations put out a blog post discussing the cost increases for SLS in very frank terms. This increase comes from the development of the exploration ground systems, the ground support equipment to operate SLS. Now, you'll remember last week we discussed GSE in regards to NROL-44's hotfire abort. So yes, it's a pretty important piece of the puzzle. You can't just overlook and downplay. SLS is now set at a development baseline cost of $9.1 billion and the exploration ground systems are $2.4 billion. Now in 2014, NASA stated SLS would cost $7 billion and the exploration ground system would be $1.8 billion. Now the new estimate for both SLS and the exploration ground systems cost has exceeded 30% of what it originally was stated as. That means that NASA actually has to formally notify the United States Congress about those cost overruns. And NASA has already said that they have. So what are the chances Congress will do anything to SLS? They are zero. The chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which has jurisdiction over the US government's discretionary spending in the annual budget, is Alabama Senator Richard Shelby, who is a massive advocate for SLS. So as has occurred over the past decade, not much will change. SLS is the exact opposite of what we see the private spaceflight world doing. Re-use your vehicle don't chuck it away at the end of the mission and we've actually seen SpaceX with their Falcon 9 refurbishing Stage 1s and flying them again. In fact it's highly unusual when a Stage 1 for the Falcon 9 gets expended as opposed to landing back at the Cape of Urvandy or somewhere out in the ocean. Now the second stage of a rocket is sort of like that holy grail of reusability. It's really really tough to do that because of the energies involved, especially in re-entry and guidance and other things like that. It's very very complicated. But Rocket Lab has figured out a way to potentially maybe use that upper stage of a rocket for some good. Electron's successful return to flight on August 30th with the Can't Believe It's Not Optical mission was great to see. But there was a little extra something involved that we only found out about a few days ago with a successful payload deployment the optional kick stage that flew on the flight was sent a series of commands that turned it from a simple rocket stage that had been expended into an operational satellite called First Light. It's testing in-house subsystems such as thermal and attitude control power, even data storage and it's got a camera sending back some heckin sweet views of Earth. Now the repurposed kick stage is called Photon and we've known about this since it was announced in April of 2019. So this really isn't news in the sense that, oh Photon is completely coming out of nowhere but it was a surprise that they decided to make a kick stage Photon on this flight. And of course as Peter Beck said in the interview, I love what he said I kind of like to do stuff and make sure it works before announcing it. That's a pretty good rule. So what's so special about this? It's just a kick stage that turns into a satellite and that's precisely what makes it so amazing. It's a stage that turns into a satellite, literally a turn-key aerospace service launch, satellite bus and in addition ground stations as well. This adds a crazy amount of capability to rocket labs already impressive repertoire. There is no need to go to a multitude of teams for your launch services, the build of your payload and the communications with your payload. It's just a single company that will do it now, Rocket Lab. Peter Beck noted that the hardest part of being a startup in spaceflight is actually getting your own satellites built. But now they don't have to do that. All they have to do is bring their instruments to Rocket Lab and it will get integrated into a Photon kick stage. So that means that a whole lot more companies are going to be able to get their foot in the door and that means more are going to be able to send their stuff into space. And that's good for everybody all around. And you know what also is good? Rocket launches. We had a couple this week. So let's go ahead and jump right into space traffic. Lifting off on September 3rd at 0151 Universal Time from the Yanis Space Center was the return to flight for Arian Space's Vega rocket with the SMSS-POC mission. The 30 meter solid fuel rocket leapt off of the pad taking 53 satellites on a massive rideshare mission into a polar orbit. Successful deployment put 21 customers from 13 different countries into space. The last Vega flight in 2019 ended with the destruction of the launch vehicle and payload due to a problem with thermal control of the second stage's solid motor. This delayed the flight with further delays occurring due to a complete shutdown of the Ghana Space Center due to the COVID-19 pandemic and then another delay due to unfavorable weather conditions which caused a battery in the Vega launcher to need replacement which further delayed the mission. But they finally got it up there and it's fantastic to see Vega back in action. This next launch takes us to China which is known for its secrecy in some flights, but this one was nearly total secrecy. A long March 2F rocket lifted off from the Zhiquan Satellite Launch Center on September 4th at 0730 Universal Time. This specific configuration of the Long March 2 rocket has only lifted the crewed Shenzhou Space Craft and the two Tiangang Space Stations. Currently known as the Chinese reusable space vehicle, speculation has it that this payload is a space plane and that it may have a design similar to Boeing's X-37B. All China has said is that they placed a reusable experimental spacecraft into orbit to test and it will return to a landing site in China at the end of its mission. Security was so tight that only a handful of videos from the launch have made it onto the usual Chinese social media websites that we sometimes get footage from. And here are your upcoming launches. Don your space suits and put on your moon boots it's time for Space Flight Bonanza! United Launch Alliance is still looking into the cause of NROL 44's hot fire abort from last week and a statement ULA notes that the initial indications were a ground system issue and that they're working to confirm the exact cause. For ULA launches, pad abort that occur within 5 seconds of liftoff require at minimum a week to fix hardware and check that all systems are working as they should. And considering NROL 44 is a minimum billion dollar payload, take your time ULA, take your time. NASA and the United States Department of Energy are getting ready to issue a request for proposals on developing a compact nuclear power system for crude lunar and martian missions with an output of 10 kilowatts. This is especially important for lunar missions as the moon experiences 14 days worth of daylight, but it also experiences 14 days worth of night. So you can exactly run on solar power for the entire time you're on the moon. Now several contracts will be given out for further study in late 2021 and then a single company will get that golden goose contract in 2022. And you'll need to have your fission power source ready to launch by 2027, so dust off that small reactor you have in your garage and get to work. Two new studies released highlight the long road ahead regarding good stewardship of the low earth orbit environment. The Center for Strategic and International Studies focused on how the growing activity in space has not corresponded with an establishment of rules and regulations. A lack of consensus as to how space traffic and orbital debris should be handled exists. Proximity operations with some active satellites approaching others at very close distances aren't well defined. Also noted as a major problem, levels of liability insurance are mismatched and space insurance companies have an extremely high turnover rate. So not a pretty picture for how well we as a species are maintaining the vacuum right above us. However some good news from that second study, the American Astronomical Society, the National Science Foundation National Optical Infrared Astronomy Research Laboratory, whoops that was a mouthful, and multiple current and future satellite operators came together to discuss strategies to mitigate the impact of mega constellations on ground based astronomy. A set of recommendations was developed. Cape satellites in orbits lower than 600 kilometers have darkened surfaces and control the attitude of a satellite to reduce their reflectivity. The working group called SACCON 1 noted that SpaceX was the only company fully invested in helping mitigate the impacts to ground based astronomy. Good job guys. The first VisorSat in the Starlink constellation was launched in June and it hasn't been observed enough yet due to observatories taking a huge impact slowing down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is where amateur astronomers began to play a role and it was found that VisorSat was reduced to 7th magnitude brightness which is below the threshold for the human eye and the darkest skies on earth in the absolute best conditions. Other companies such as OneWeb and Amazon who are developing Project Kuiper have been in contact with SACCON 1 but they didn't provide much participation. Astronomers also gave themselves recommendations develop software that plans observations to avoid or minimize satellites in the field of view, software to remove trails from imagery and to work with satellite operators to develop a system that allows for more accurate satellite position data. The National Science Foundation has commissioned a study that will be delivered sometime in October but it sounds like SACCON 1 was a success in having not just a necessary discussion but developing necessary solutions that all involved can add to. Well done everybody good job! Just last week the Humans to Mars Summit was held in a virtual setting but that didn't stop them from publishing a report supporting NASA's Artemis program finding 85 activities involved in the Artemis program that will help crewed missions to Mars. It was also noted that the International Space Station has provided significant lessons and will continue to do so until the end of its operations. Suggestions to enhance Artemis payoff towards Mars missions include extended crew stays aboard lunar gateway and the development of in situ resource utilization on the lunar surface. Sustainability in mission architecture was pointed out as being key which is something that presently Artemis sorely lacks. Momentus and Made in Space Europe will jointly develop a mission to fly in 2022. For those who are unaware, Momentus is developing a spacecraft called Vigoride which is considered a transfer vehicle allowing Vigoride to rendezvous, capture and then move a satellite to a new orbit. Made in Space Europe has formally signed on to develop a robotic arm that will be used to grab satellites that purchase the transportation services from Momentus. Vigoride will fly its first test flight as a payload on a SpaceX small sat ride chair mission from Vanden Fog Air Force base as early as December. Momentus also has four other SpaceX small sat ride chair missions in the can so fans of space tugs here's the cusp of them becoming a reality. As we wrap up this week's news I of course want to thank all of you who help contribute to the shows of tomorrow. You guys blow me away at the fact that there are so many of you who participate in helping make tomorrow possible. Everything that we do is thanks to you. All this equipment that we have Big Station 204 that we have right here getting me to 204, Ryan, Dr. Scove and many others who put in the effort to make this channel possible that is all you. It's no exaggeration that you help make this possible. 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