Really Rocket Science

Satcom news summary for last week, courtesy of Bill McDonald:

Communications and Power Industries (CPI) wins three-year contract to supply high power, solid-state amplifiers to SWE-DISH, a DataPath company, for its Suitcase and CommuniCase product lines.
[SatNews – 05/01/2009]

Space Shuttle Atlantis to make final visit to Hubble telescope – launch to take place May 11.
[SatNews – 05/01/2009]

Eutelsat to launch Tooway broadband satellite service to UK residents in rural areas, initially with speeds of up to 2Mb, but by 2010 this will rise to 10Mb.
[Top 10 Broadband – 04/30/2009]

Soyuz to join Ariane 5 as launch vehicles lifting off from French Guiana, as Arianespace continues construction of the launch pad and support facilities.
[SatNews – 04/30/2009]

Zefiro 9A rocket motor, to be third stage of Europe’s new small launch vehicle, tested at Salto di Quirra Interforce test range in Sardinia, Italy.
[SatNews – 04/30/2009]

WildBlue Communications seeks a share of the U.S. government’s $7.2 billion broadband stimulus package to develop a new satellite-based platform that can deliver downstream speeds in excess of 18 Mbps to rural areas in need of a high-speed boost.
[Cable Digital News – 04/30/2009]

MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates gets two nice wins – a $4m contract to provide an advanced technology solution to EADS Astrium, and a multi-million dollar contract from DigitalGlobe to provide a ground station solution for WorldView-1 and WorldView-2 satellites.
[SatNews – 04/30/2009]

Japanese government task force suggests introducing an early warning satellite that can detect missile launches as part of nations first basic plan on development and use of space.
[SatNews – 04/30/2009]

Iran states that the country’s first domestically-made telecommunications satellite, Omid, launched in February, has successfully concluded its mission and re-entered earth’s atmosphere.
[SatNews – 04/30/2009]

CPI will upgrade Army’s Warfighter Information Network-Tactical military satellite electronics to add Ka band satellite capability under $3m contract with DataPath.
[Military & Aerospace Electronics – 04/29/2009]

NASA prepares to launch nanosatellite known as PharmaSat to perform experiments to help scientists better understand how effectively drugs work in space.
[R&D – 04/29/2009]

Pentagon may reach goal of doing collision analysis on 800 maneuverable satellites before October, considers possibility of tracking 500 more satellites which cannot be maneuvered.
[SatNews – 04/29/2009]

Ducommun Incorporated announces that their Miltec subsidiary has delivered flight-ready nanosatellites to the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command, completing first U.S. Army satellite development plan since 1960.
[SatNews – 04/29/2009]

Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee holds hearing to examine the challenges faced by civil and commercial space users as the number of satellites and the amount of space debris orbiting Earth continues to grow.
[SpaceRef.com – 04/28/2009]

International Space University students suggest ways to prevent space collisions in  results of 2007 study released at "Space for a Safe and Secure World" symposium.
[SatNews – 04/28/2009]

Hughes wins arbitration against Sea Launch; Sea Launch ordered to pay $52m in dispute over whether Hughes had legal right to cancel Sea Launch contract.
[Satellite Today – 04/28/2009]

German teleport and satellite service provider CEDTel GmbH acquires ND SatCom Managed Services Division.
[SatNews – 04/28/2009]

The Australian Defence Force will spend $167 million for a special payload on the Intelsat 22 satellite to be launched in 2012, to boost its tactical communications for military serving in Afghanistan and nearby theatres in the Indian Ocean.
[The Australian – 04/28/2009]

Boeing wins contract to build satellite for Intelsat, to be launched in 2012, which will serve Australian military.
[The Detroit News – 04/28/2009]

Excelerate Technology wins contracts to provide satellite systems to enhance police communications capabilities in UK.
[Public Technology – 04/28/2009]

Nigeria National Assembly pledges to assist NIGCOMSAT to secure funding for NigComSat 2 & 3.
[Daily Trust – 04/28/2009]

Harbinger Capital Partners founder Philip Falcone presses ahead with multibillion-dollar plans to build international satellite-cellphone business.
[Wall Street Journal – 04/27/2009]

TerreStar satellite to be launched in June to be largest commercial satellite yet, with 60ft mesh antenna, to enable cell-like satellite phones; SkyTerra plans two even larger satellites next year.
[Seattle Times – 04/26/2009]

NSR Report – high throughput Ka-band spotbeam satellites pushing open satellite market door – full long-term potential to change market recognized by few.
[NSR report – April 2009]

WBMSAT PS – Satellite Communications Consulting Services

 The Bass Station is a big 80’s boombox, complete with a router, etc:

The external form of the Bass-Station is a vintage 1980’s boom box. Internally, the tape and radio mechanisms have been removed and replaced with a modern miniature computer. The computer contains a sound output device, a large hard-drive, and a wireless network interface card. All the components that make up the device are standard and readily available around the world.

Going one step deeper, the computer, running a modern operating system (Linux), uses the wireless interface card to create a self-standing yet open wireless network. It functions as an access-point broadcasting its presence in a limited range making the network only accessible by a localized community. The network that is created cannot access external networks nor is it accessible from other networks like the Internet, for example.

A collection of networking services make it easy and simple for users in the presence of the network to join and begin interacting with the content that is there. A DHCP server [1] is used to automatically assign IP addresses to clients trying to join the network. A DNS server [2] is configured in a manner that will redirect users to a central location regardless of the domain that they are requesting (e.g. asking for www.google.com, or any other domain, will always direct a user to the Bass-Station’s domain.) A web server is used to serve people the main interface to the Bass-Station’s functionality. All of these services combined facilitate a person’s interaction with the content and functionality of the Bass-Station. Lastly, there is a program called the Bassment Daemon that manages the audio engine and playing of music from the stereo’s speakers.

 Or get yourself Microchip’s Internet Radio Demo Board:

The main chip on this board is the PIC18F97J60 which uses integrated MAC and PHY to interface directly to the RJ45 MigJack Ethernet cable connector. Communication over the internet is made easy by having Microchip’s TCP/IP stack programmed on the 97J60 micro controller. The microcontroller’s I/O is used to interface to the OLED graphics LCD display. This display allows for showing the IP address, mode of operation, song and station. Using this phi interface the microcontroller interfaces to the BLFI5BS1011 Mp3 audio decoder. A simple audio head set jack will allow listener to plug into standard head phones or connect to a speaker like this so that multiple people can listen at the same time. The URL website addresses for multiple internet radio stations are preprogrammed on the system. So push buttons will allow the use to scroll through the radio stations and select the desired station. Other push buttons are for volume up and down.

 Awesome:

Well if I had money
I tell you what I’d do
I’d go downtown and buy me a Mercury or two
Crazy bout a Mercury
I’m gonna buy me a Mercury
And cruise it up and down the road

Ford’s Mercury brand did make some cool cars, back in the day. I remember their product placements in the Hawaii Five-O TV series. Which, to this day, has law enforcement types exclaiming "book em , Danno!" I can’t remember the last time Mercury had a popular model (always liked the ’67 Cougar).

You know who’s got money for a Mercury? NASA! The MESSENGER spacecraft (MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging) just did a second fly-by of  the planet Mercury found there’s more to it:

Analyses of data from the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft’s second flyby of Mercury in October 2008 show that the planet’s atmosphere, magnetosphere, and geological past are all characterized by much greater levels of activity than scientists first suspected.

On October 6, 2008, the probe flew by Mercury for the second time, capturing more than 1,200 high-resolution and color images of the planet unveiling another 30 percent of Mercury’s surface that had never before been seen by spacecraft and gathering essential data for planning the remainder of the mission.

“MESSENGER’s second Mercury flyby provided a number of new findings,” says MESSENGER Principal Investigator Sean Solomon at the Carnegie Institution of Washington. “One of the biggest surprises was how strongly the planet’s magnetospheric dynamics changed from what we saw during the first Mercury flyby in January 2008. Another was the discovery of a large and unusually well preserved impact basin that was the focus for concentrated volcanic and deformational activity. The first detection of magnesium in Mercury’s exosphere and neutral tail provides confirmation that magnesium is an important constituent of Mercury’s surface materials. And our nearly global imaging coverage of the surface after this flyby has given us fresh insight into how the planet’s crust was formed.”

 Nice animation…