Maverick entrepreneur's space rocket fails at blast off

Yahoo – AFP, June 30, 2018

The launch was supposed to send the rocket carrying observational equipment 

to an altitude of over 100 kilometres (62 miles) (AFP Photo/JIJI PRESS)

Tokyo (AFP) - A rocket developed by a maverick Japanese entrepreneur and convicted fraudster exploded shortly after liftoff Saturday, in a major blow to his bid to send Japan's first privately backed rocket into space.

Interstellar Technologies, founded by popular internet service provider Livedoor's creator Takafumi Horie, launched the unmanned rocket, MOMO-2, at around 5:30 am (2030 GMT Friday) from a test site in Taiki, southern Hokkaido.

But television footage showed the 10-metre (33-foot) rocket crashing back down to the launch pad seconds after liftoff and bursting into flames.

No injuries were reported in the spectacular explosion.

The launch was supposed to send the rocket carrying observational equipment to an altitude of over 100 kilometres (62 miles).

The failure follows a previous setback in July last year, when engineers lost contact with a rocket about a minute after it launched.

Interstellar Technologies said it would continue its rocket development programme after analysing the latest failure.

The outlandish, Ferrari-driving Horie -- who helped drive Japan's shift to an information-based economy in the late 1990s and the early 2000s but later spent nearly two years in jail for accounting fraud -- founded Interstellar in 2013.

However, privately backed efforts to explore space from Japan have so far failed to compete with the government-run Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Elon Musk: tech dreamer reaching for sun, moon and stars

Yahoo – AFP, Glenn Chapman, March 5, 2017

Entrepreneur Elon Musk has an estimated current net worth of $13.4 billion from
interests in transport, payments and space technology (AFP Photo/Karim SAHIB)

San Francisco (AFP) - Sending tourists for a trip around the moon is the latest big idea launched by Elon Musk, a Silicon Valley star known for turning his passions into visionary enterprises.

Musk has become one of the United States' best-known innovators. He was a founder of payments company PayPal, electric carmaker Tesla Motors and SpaceX, maker and launcher of rockets and spacecraft.

SpaceX recently announced that two private citizens have paid money to be sent around the Moon in what would mark the farthest humans have ever traveled to deep space since the 1970s.

In a sector where entrepreneurs often speak of "moonshots," Musk is one of the biggest dreamers.

The 45-year-old South Africa-born entrepreneur has channeled a dot-com fortune into a series of ambitious ventures.

Besides being the head of SpaceX and Tesla, Musk is the chairman of SolarCity, a solar panel installer recently bought by Tesla.

He also operates his own foundation focusing on education, clean energy and child health.

And he drafted a paper detailing the feasibility of an ultra-fast "Hyperloop" rail transport system that would transport people at near supersonic speeds, then made it freely available to enterprises willing to pursue the project.

The SpaceX plan to fly tourists around the Moon in 2018 (AFP Photo/AFP)

'Doesn't sit around'

"He is a visionary who has some key passions which he pursues with vigor," Jackdaw Research chief analyst Jan Dawson said of Musk.

"He doesn't sit around and wait for people to do something about them; he goes out and does it himself."

Musk's penchant for rocketing after his passions may appear to spread him thin, but he has built a record of success.

Musk appears strong on painting big ideas in broad strokes and then enlisting people skilled at tending to the nuts-and-bolts work needed to follow through, say observers.

"He doesn't seem to be able to focus," analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group said.

"He just likes coming up with the ideas and is good at picking other people who can deal with the plumbing -- that is why he is able to do a lot of stuff."

And while some may wonder whether hubris or realism reigns in Musk's moves, his businesses have gained value, with the jury still out on the wisdom of the Tesla acquisition of SolarCity.

"He can certainly sell his ideas," Enderle said.

"The fact his businesses have held together so long indicates he is not a con man."

Visionary or mad scientist? Elon Musk's Tesla aims to conquer the car market
in the oil-rich Middle East with electric vehicles (AFP Photo/Karim SAHIB)

Fighting against evil

Musk more than a year ago took part in creating a nonprofit research company devoted to developing artificial intelligence that will help people and not hurt them.

Musk found himself in the middle of a technology world controversy by holding firm that AI could turn on humanity and be its ruin instead of a salvation.

Technology giants including Google, Apple and Microsoft have been investing in making machines smarter, contending the goal is to improve lives.

"If we create some digital super-intelligence that exceeds us in every way by a lot, it is very important that it be benign," Musk said at a conference in California.

He reasoned that even a benign situation with ultra-intelligent AI would put people so far beneath the machine they would be "like a house cat."

"I don't love the idea of being a house cat," Musk said, envisioning the creation of neural lacing that magnifies people's brain power by linking them directly to computing capabilities.

Elon Musk's SpaceX venture carries cargo to the International Space Station and  has
 plans to send two private passengers on a trip around the Moon (AFP Photo/
BRUCE WEAVER)

Living in a game

Some of his ideas have prompted questions about whether Musk is a visionary or mad scientist. He has raised eyebrows with a theory that the world as it is known may be a computer simulation.

"I've had so many simulation discussions it's crazy," Musk said while fielding a question on the topic at the conference.

He maintained that "the odds that we are in base reality is one in billions."

Musk lives in Los Angeles and holds US, Canadian and South African citizenship.

He moved to Canada in his late teens and then to the United States, earning bachelor's degrees in physics and business from the University of Pennsylvania.

After graduating, Musk abandoned plans to pursue further studies at Stanford University and started Zip2, a company that made online publishing software for the media industry.

He banked his first millions before the age of 30 when he sold Zip2 to US computer maker Compaq for more than $300 million in 1999.

Musk's next company, X.com, eventually merged with PayPal, the online payments firm bought by Internet auction giant eBay for $1.5 billion in 2002.

Forbes estimates Musk's current net worth at $13.4 billion.

Elon Musk has become one of America's best-known innovators - turning his passions into visionary enterprises https://t.co/4gVkOp0sTp pic.twitter.com/WLx2kuE2U0

— AFP news agency (@AFP) March 5, 2017

Related Article:

Musk diving into minds while reaching for Mars

India puts record 104 satellites into orbit

Yahoo – AFP, Arun SANKAR, February 15, 2017

Onlookers watch the launch of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO)
Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C37) at Sriharikota on Febuary 15, 2017
(AFP Photo/ARUN SANKAR)

India successfully put a record 104 satellites from a single rocket into orbit on Wednesday in the latest triumph for its famously frugal space programme.

Celebrations erupted among scientists at the southern spaceport of Sriharikota as the head of India's Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced all the satellites had been ejected as planned.

"My hearty congratulations to the ISRO team for this success," the agency's director Kiran Kumar told those gathered in an observatory to track the progress of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).

Prime Minister Narendra Modi congratulated the scientists for achieving the feat which smashes a record previously held by Russia.

"They have hit a century in space technology," Modi said at an election rally in northern Uttar Pradesh state.

The rocket took off at 9:28am (0358 GMT) and cruised at a speed of 27,000 kilometres (16,777 miles) per hour, ejecting all the 104 satellites into orbit in around 30 minutes, according to ISRO.

The rocket's main cargo was a 714 kilogram (1,574 pounds) satellite for Earth observation but it was also loaded with 103 smaller "nano satellites", weighing a combined 664 kilograms. The smallest weighed only 1.1 kilogram.

Nearly all of the nano satellites are from other countries, including Israel, Kazakhstan, Switzerland and 96 from the United States.

Eighty-eight of them are from Planet Inc - a San Francisco-based Earth imagery company - and weigh 4.5 kilogram each.

Only three satellites belonged to India.

Scientists sat transfixed as they watched the progress of the rocket on monitors until the last payload was ejected, and then began punching the air in triumph and hugging each other.

This was PSLV's 39th successful mission, known as India's space workhorse.

India space mission (AFP Photo/Gal ROMA)

World record

The launch means India now holds the record for launching the most satellites in one go, surpassing Russia which launched 39 satellites in a single mission in June 2014.

And it is another feather in the cap for ISRO which sent an unmanned rocket to orbit Mars in 2013 at a cost of just $73 million, compared with NASA's Maven Mars mission which had a $671 million price tag.

ISRO is also mulling the idea of missions to Jupiter and Venus.

The business of putting commercial satellites into space for a fee is growing as phone, Internet and other companies, as well as countries, seek greater and more high-tech communications.

India has carved out a reputation as a reliable low-cost option, relying in part on its famed skill of "jugaad" -- creating a cheap alternative solution.

Experts say much of its credibility stems from India's successful launch of the Mars orbiter, which gave it an edge over its rivals in the space race.

"India is proving to be a very viable option because of the cost and the reliability factor," said Ajay Lele, a senior fellow at the Delhi-based Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses.

"India has been doing these launches successfully and has established itself as a very reliable player."

Mathieu J Weiss, a liaison officer for France's CNES national space agency who is currently in India, said ISRO had pulled off a major feat.

"It's a great technical challenge to launch so many satellites at once into orbit on the right trajectory so that they don't make contact with each other," he told AFP.

Weiss said India had become a major player in the space race by making itself so competitive with its low costs and by working with private companies which are space specialists.

"India has become a space power in its own right in recent years," he added.

Last June, India set a national record after it successfully launched a rocket carrying 20 satellites, including 13 from the US.

The 50-year-old space agency plans to send four more rockets into space later this year ahead of its second lunar mission Chandrayaan-2 slated for 2018.

Modi has often hailed India's budget space technology, quipping in 2014 that a rocket that launched four foreign satellites into orbit had cost less to make than Hollywood film "Gravity".

India launched 104 satellites into orbit in one go, snatching world record from Russia https://t.co/4gMHBtDZsY pic.twitter.com/yp4HbTV8pr

— AFP news agency (@AFP) February 15, 2017

SpaceX rocket landing opens 'new door' to space travel

Yahoo – AFP, Kerry Sheridan, December 22, 2015

This 9-minute time exposure shows the launch, re-entry, and landing burns
 of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, which successfully landed in an upright position
on December 21, 2015 at Cape Canaveral in Florida (AFP Photo)

Miami (AFP) - SpaceX successfully landed its powerful Falcon 9 rocket for the first time, a major milestone in the drive to cut costs and waste by making rockets as reusable as airplanes.

Its engines burning bright orange against the dark night sky, the Falcon 9 made a graceful arc back to Earth and touched down upright at Cape Canaveral, Florida, minutes after launching a payload of satellites to orbit, video images showed.

"The Falcon has landed," a commentator said above the screams and cheers of people gathered at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California.

SpaceX, headed by Internet tycoon Elon Musk, is striving to revolutionize the rocket industry, which currently loses many millions of dollars in jettisoned machinery and sophisticated rocket components after each launch.

"I still can't quite believe it," Musk said in a teleconference after the landing.

"I think this is a revolutionary moment. No one has ever brought an orbital class booster back intact."

Previous attempts to land the Falcon 9's first stage on a floating ocean platform have failed -- with the rocket either colliding with the autonomous drone ship or tipping over.

But this time, video images on SpaceX's live webcast showed the tall, white portion of the rocket -- known as the first stage -- appearing to settle down firmly and stick the landing.

The rocket reached a height of 125 miles (200 kilometers) before heading back to Earth and touching down at a former US Air Force rocket and missile testing range that was last used in 1978.

Video images were cut off within seconds of the landing, and the SpaceX live webcast returned to its commentators, who described the successful deployment of the rocket's payload of 11 satellites for ORBCOMM, a global communications company.

The US space agency NASA applauded the feat.

"Congratulations @SpaceX on your successful vertical landing of the first stage back on Earth!" NASA said in a tweet.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket pictured on December 16, 2015 (AFP Photo)

High stakes

The stakes were high for SpaceX, which has a $1.6 billion contract with NASA to supply the astronauts living at the International Space Station over numerous back-and-forth trips with its Dragon cargo ship.

Just six months ago, a devastating explosion -- caused by a faulty strut -- destroyed the Falcon 9 about two minutes after launch, along with hundreds of millions of dollars in cargo and equipment bound for the ISS.

The company fixed that problem and also made the newest version of the Falcon 9 about 30 percent more powerful than previous iterations, Musk said.

Adding to the competitive nature of the commercial space industry, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos's rocket company Blue Origin announced last month it had successfully landed its New Shepard rocket after a suborbital flight.

"Congrats @SpaceX on landing Falcon's suborbital booster stage. Welcome to the club," Bezos said on Twitter Monday night.

Analysts have pointed out that although New Shepard was first, that SpaceX's feat would be harder to accomplish because the Falcon 9 flies higher in altitude.

"Because SpaceX's vehicle was designed to place a constellation of satellites in orbit, the Falcon 9's first stage flew at significantly greater speeds and more than double the altitude of what New Shepherd reached last month," the Commercial Spaceflight Federation said in a statement.

It called the landing an "incredible achievement" in an industry that is seeking to drive down costs and make spaceflight cheaper and more accessible to tourists and adventurers.

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield added his congratulations.

"That was a hard landing to stick. Opens a brand new door to space travel. I look forward to the details," he wrote on Twitter.

Russian rocket carrying Mexican satellite crashes in Siberia

A Russian rocket carrier has crashed in Siberia shortly after its launch, the Interfax news agency reported. The recent numbers of accidents has tarnished the reputation of the Russian space industry.

Deutsche Welle, 16 May 2015

The Interfax news agency reported on Saturday that the Russian Rocket, Proton M, carrying a Mexican Satellite crashed in a sparsely populated area of Siberia.

It was not immediately clear if there was any damage caused by the crash in the Chita area of southern Siberia where the rocket came down, the report said.

According to Russian space experts, the rocket may have been carrying up to 10 tons of toxic fuel.

The rocket was lost after taking off ffrom Baikunor for the International Space Station in Baikonur in the central Asian Republic of Kazakhstan.

The satellite on board the rocket carrier was intended to serve Mexico and other parts of South America.

The Russian Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos, reported that in a separate space failure on Saturday, the Russian spacecraft Progress failed to ignite its engine and to adjust the orbit of the International Space Station just a few hours before Proton's crash.

According to Russian media, the lives of the crew are not in danger.

Russia's space program in trouble

The Interfax news agency, however, quoted industry sources saying the crash could result in the suspension of all upcoming Proton-M launches, including the next one in June for a British satellite.

Russia's space program, which pioneered space exploration with the launch of the first satellite and the first man into space, has experienced a troubling number of accidents in recent years. This is the latest breakdown to hit Russia's troubled space industry.

ra/bw (dpa, AP, Intrerfax)

Russia delays return of ISS crew members after supply ship failure

Yahoo – AFP, 12 May 2015

A picture taken on September 17, 2006 shows the International Space

Station over Earth (AFP Photo)

Moscow (AFP) - Russia said Tuesday it would delay the return of three astronauts from the International Space Station after the recent failure of a supply ship.

The journey home of the three crew members, originally scheduled for Thursday, has been postponed until June, senior space official Vladimir Solovyov said.

"We have now proposed for this landing to take place in early June," Solovyov was quoted by the state TASS news agency as saying.

Russia's Progress M-27M cargo ship 

blasts off from the launch pad at the

 Russian-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in

Kazakhstan on April 28, 2015 (AFP Photo)

Meanwhile, the mission to replace the three astronauts -- one from Russia, one from NASA and one from the European Space Agency -- has been set back to late July, Solvyov said.

There are currently six crew members on board the International Space Station (ISS).

The delayed rotation follows the recent failure of an unmanned Russian Progress supply ship to dock with the ISS after suffering a communications breakdown.

The Progress craft eventually burnt up as it plummeted back to Earth last week, in a fiery end to a mission to deliver oxygen, water and supplies.

A commission is currently investigating the cause of the incident.

The exact date for the next launch to the ISS will be announced after it comes out with its finding on May 22.

Russia's space agency said Tuesday a provisional investigation showed a problem with the separation of the Progress spacecraft from the Soyuz rocket taking it into orbit.

The malfunction meant the cargo craft ended up on an orbit that was about 40 kilometres too high, the agency said in a statement.

Since the mothballing of the US Space Shuttle programme, Moscow has had a monopoly on sending astronauts to the ISS from its Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

But Russia has recently suffered a series of problems exposing shortcomings in its own programme.

A Progress supply ship crashed in Siberia shortly after launch in 2011. Moscow has also lost several lucrative commercial satellites.

Russia to build own space station by 2023, says Putin

Yahoo – AFP, 16 April 2015

Russian President Vladimir Putin says the worst is over for Russia's economy

 (AFP Photo/Alexei Druzhinin)

Moscow (AFP) - Russia plans to build its own orbiting space station by 2023, President Vladimir Putin said Thursday during a marathon call-in session with the nation.

"By 2023, we plan to create our own national space station in orbit," Putin said.

"This is something far-off in the future, but also necessary for us from the point of view of our national economy."

Russia and NASA recently agreed to keep operating and financing the International Space Station at least until 2024, but future joint space projects remain in doubt, as relations between Russia and the US have plunged to post-Cold War lows over the Ukraine conflict.

The Kremlin strongman said Russia needs its own space station to be able to view its own territory properly from space.

"We use the ISS actively for science and the economy, but from the ISS only 5 percent of the area of Russia can be seen," Putin said.

"From a national station, we should be able to see the whole of the area of our huge country."

"It goes without saying we will bring this project to fruition, and without any doubt, it will be under our control," Putin said.

Russia said earlier this year that it planned to create its own space station using its modules from the ISS after it is mothballed.

In March, the head of Russia's space agency, Roscosmos, said at Baikonur after meeting his NASA that Russia would work jointly with its US counterpart on a project of a new orbital station.

But NASA did not confirm such a plan, saying only that the heads of NASA and Roscosmos discussed future cooperation.

China has also announced plans to complete a permanent orbiting space station by 2023 as part of ambitious plans to become a superpower in space.

The Russia-Soviet space station Mir was ditched in 2001 after 15 years of service.

Putin was speaking during a national phone-in that included a video link with workers at Russia's new cosmodrome under construction, Vostochny in the country's far east.

The new launch pad is designed to reduce Russia's reliance on its rented Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The delayed Vostochny project is mired in scandal, however, with those in charge of the construction under investigation and suspected of misusing millions of rubles in state funds.

US and Russian astronauts successfully dock at International Space Station

A Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying a US astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts has successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS). The scientists' stay on board the ISS will be the longest ever.

Deutsche Welle, 28 March 2015

According to Russian space agency officials, the trio successfully docked the Soyuz-TMA16M spacecraft at 01:33 a.m. (UTC) on Saturday after setting off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 7:42 p.m. (UTC) on Friday.

US astronaut Scott Kelly, 51, and 54-year-old Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko will spend 342 days on board the 400-kilometer high (250-mile) orbiting outpost.

Longest stay

Kelly and Kornienko, both of whom have flown multiple missions to orbit and have each previously spent about six months on the ISS, will be the first people to spend almost an entire year there.

Second Russian cosmonaut, Gennady Padalka, will return to Earth after six months, however.

The trip will mark the longest amount of time that two people will live continuously on the ISS. During the 1990s, however, four Russian cosmonauts spent between 12 and 14 months aboard the Russian space station Mir.

Mission to Mars

The aim of the time spent onboard the ISS is to enable scientists to gain a wider understanding of the effects on the human body of living in microgravity for longer time periods.

Kelly's twin brother Mark is also taking part in the experiment. The retired US astronaut, who previously flew to the ISS four times, will undergo regular health checks on Earth so doctors can compare the brothers' vital signs.

Space tourism

Speaking ahead of Friday's launch, Kelly said the experiment could prove vital in planning future international missions, including to Mars.

"If we ever go beyond Low Earth orbit again, perhaps to Mars, because of the cost and the complexity it will most likely be an international mission, so I see this as a stepping stone to that."

The US astronaut also said he thought the international partnership was "one of the great success stories of the International Space Station."

In September, the newly-arrived crew will also have a visit from the first space tourist since 2009, British soprano Sarah Brightman. The Phantom of the Opera star who has be training at Star City near Moscow since January is set to sing a new song in space, written by her former husband and composer Andrew Lloyd Webber.

ksb/bk (dpa, AFP)

Russia and Indonesia agree to implement “Air Start” project

16.04.2007, 17.21

BERLIN, April 16 (Itar-Tass) - An agreement to form an international company to implement the “Air Start” project was signed on Monday at the world’s biggest Hanover Industrial Fair. This unique project, implemented jointly with Indonesia, was included in the Federal Space Program of Russia.

In conformity with the signed agreement, it is planned to build, jointly with Indonesia, a little cosmodrome on Biak Island, located seventy kilometres away from the Equator. It will be used to launch light-weight sputniks, Director-General of the “Air Start” aerospace corporation Anatoly Karpov told Itar-Tass. The Memorandum on Intentions, which was also signed on Monday, stipulates an order to launch light-class telecommunication geostationary sputniks, he added.

Equatorial launches will substantially improve the performance of the “Air Start” complex and will make it competitive on the world market of launching services, Robert Ivanov, the corporation’s chief constructor, stated in turn. The launching of sputniks from Biak Island will make the orbiting of cargoes much cheaper.

Taking part in the meeting also was Head of the Federal Agency for Industry Boris Alyoshin.

RI helps launch Chinese satellite

The Jakarta Post

JAKARTA: The National Aeronautics and Space Agency and its Chinese counterpart successfully put Chinese navigation satellite Compass into orbit this weekend, an agency official said.

The satellite, which was launched in Xinchian, China, on Saturday at 11:07 a.m. local time, relayed an operational signal 570 seconds after the launch, agency spokesperson Syafidal told Antara in Garut, West Java, on Monday.

Meanwhile, he said the agency would launch several practice rockets from the area of Cilauteureun Pameungpeuk, 92 kilometers south of Garut, in the near future before sending a rocket into orbit.

On Jan. 10, 2007, the agency launched its first surveillance satellite, named Tubsat, from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, India. Tubsat was launched by an Indian Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle rocket, which concurrently carried Argentine and Indian satellites as well as an Indian scientific capsule.

Tubsat can monitor forest fires, volcanoes and floods, as well as transmit communications to and from remote areas across Indonesia.-- JP