Hello and welcome back to Max Q! There was a batch Starship news this week, thanks in part to an informative Twitter slot with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. Read on for all the juicy details.
In this issue:
- Environmentalists sue over Starship
- Nuview’s plan to make a 3D map of the world
- Maxar news and more
A coalition of advocacy groups has filed a lawsuit against the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) over its handling of the environmental assessment of SpaceX’s southeast Texas launch plans.
The FAA gave the green light to SpaceX’s Starship launch program last summer, on the condition that the company carry out a series of measures to mitigate environmental impacts in the surrounding area. But the lawsuit says that this analysis and the mitigation measures it requires are not enough to offset or even fully understand the full effects of repeated Starship launches.
While the FAA has grounded Starship pending an investigation into the April 20 flight test that ended in a midair explosion, the lawsuit asks the court to rescind SpaceX’s launch license to fly. the rocket completely, until a full environmental assessment is completed.
Image Credits: PATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty Images
Dozens of established players and new entrants compete to bring the most advanced remote sensing data to customers. These companies may use hyperspectral, thermal, radar, or optical instruments, but none, so far, use light detection and ranging (lidar), a technology that is best known for its use in self-driving cars. nuviewa geospatial technology company that rose from the underground, wants to change that.
The company aims to build a constellation of 20 commercial satellites equipped with its proprietary lidar system. The “end game,” as Nuview founder and CEO Clint Graumann put it, is to map the entire land surface of Earth with lidar, annually.
Global satellite communications. Conceptual representation of a global network of communications satellites, such as the Starlink satellites. Image Credits: fake images
More news from TC and beyond
- astrobotic confirmed that its first mission was delayed from May 4 because the launch provider, United Launch Alliance, continues to investigate an anomaly with the Vulcan Centaur rocket. (astrobotic)
- European Space Agency is embarking on a feasibility study to examine what it takes to develop a reusable heavy-lift rocket for Europe. (THAT)
- Evolution Space, a company that develops a very small launch pad, passed the Kármán line for the first time last month. (Evolution)
- Space Generation, the US arm of Seraphim Space, announced the eight startups that will participate in its accelerator. (Ad Preview)
- Lockheed-Martin is reorganizing its space business into three key sectors: commercial civil; National security; and strategic and missile. (SpaceNews)
- maxar completed its $6.4 billion sale to private equity, and the company announced last Wednesday that it was no longer listed on the New York Stock Exchange. (TechCrunch)
- Orbex It said construction has started on Scotland’s Sutherland spaceport, which will be the first vertical launch spaceport on the UK mainland, once it is completed. (Orbex)
- phase four, a developer of plasma-based satellite propulsion systems, has secured an undisclosed amount of funding from Veteran Ventures Capital. (Veteran Businesses)
- rocket laboratory launched two satellites for NASA’s TROPICS mission. Also, CEO Peter Beck has a great new profile in Bloomberg Businessweek. (rocket laboratory/Bloomberg)
- spacex is spending a batch of money in Starship development: about $2 billion this year alone. How long can the company operate before it needs to raise incremental funds? (Quartz)
- Starship The self-destruct command did not work immediately during this most recent launch test, it took 40 seconds before the rocket exploded. (TechCrunch)
- Virgin orbit the bankruptcy sale will proceed, and the final sale of the assets (or the company) will close on June 2, according to documents filed in the Delaware Bankruptcy Court. (parabolic arc)
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