Upmass (9/29/22)

Good morning. It brings us no pleasure to report that SOFIA, a joint mission between the American and German space agencies, just flew its final flight. SOFIA—short for Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy—landed at 7:41am Eastern this morning.

Today’s newsletter: 🛰️ NRO study contracts📊 Q2 launches, by the #s📝 The contract report

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The NRO Awards RF Contracts

Commercial radio frequency (RF) sensing companies are opening their doors to the NRO in hopes of winning future data procurement contracts.

Driving the news: The National Reconnaissance Office awarded six study contracts to Aurora Insight, HawkEye 360, Kleos Space, PredaSAR, Spire Global ($SPIR), and Umbra Lab.

Bringing in industry: These contracts are part of an NRO initiative announced in October to buy more data from commercial remote sensing providers. This data is particularly valuable to the NRO because of its “unclassified, shareable nature,” per the press release, allowing the agency to rapidly acquire data and redistribute it with US allies.

With the war in Ukraine, the need for unclassified satellite imagery has become even more evident. “Since the early days of [the] Ukraine crisis, NRO’s commercial data providers have been collecting electro-optical and radar imagery as well as commercial RF data over the region,” Pete Muend, director of NRO’s Commercial Systems Program Office, said in a statement.

The NRO awarded the first contracts through this new initiative, the Strategic Commercial Enhancements Broad Agency Announcement (BAA) Framework, in January 2022 to five commercial synthetic aperture radar (SAR) providers: Airbus, Capella Space, Iceye, PredaSAR and Umbra.

Now, the NRO has set its sights on RF.

Commercial RF: We use space-based RF data to track objects down on Earth that emit any sort of radio signal, from marine vessels to smartphones. Each of the companies receiving contracts operate satellites that can trace these signals from orbit.

• HawkEye 360 received an NRO contract in 2019 to explore how it could integrate RF data into the NRO’s architecture.

• PredaSAR and Umbra received nods through both the SAR and RF contract awards, as their constellations have dual collection capabilities.

• Aurora Insights takes a unique approach to collecting RF data, drawing from sensors on cubesats, buildings, and vehicles.

The contracts: Under the BAA contracts, each of these six chosen ones will grant the NRO access to its systems and business plans. The US intelligence agency will use that information to assess what data fits its needs and mature that technology for future data procurement contracts.

Q2 orbital launches, by the #s

BryceTech’s latest quarterly launch briefing is out. These reports are the gold standard for rocket data. We read ‘em, reread them, and drill the slides like they’re flashcards. That way, we can memorize and recite stats on command at launch cocktail parties.

Before dissecting BryceTech’s Q2 ‘22 report, we’ll establish a key definition for those who aren’t acquainted. Upmass = payload mass launched to orbit from Earth.

Q2 headline takeaway: SpaceX effectively doubled everyone else combined in upmass.

Upmass + spacecraft breakdown:

1. The Hawthorne, CA company launched 158,666 kg upmass and 473 spacecraft in Q2.

2. Next up was China’s CASC with 38,822 kg upmass and 36 spacecraft launched.

3. Russia’s Roscosmos took bronze with 17,189 kg and eight spacecraft for the quarter.

4. ULA was next for American launchers with 13,000 kg and one (big) spacecraft.

5. Rounding out the Top 5 pack was Arianespace with 9,829 kg and two spacecraft.

Honorable mentions: ISRO @ 523 kg, Rocket Lab ($RKLB) @ 288 kg, South Korea’s KARI @ 201 kg, ExPace @ 150 kg, i-Space @ 18 kg, and Astra ($ASTR) @ 11 kg.

Cadence: SpaceX flew 16 missions, good for a launch rate of 1x/week. CASC flew 12 and Roscosmos conducted four flights.

• Rocket Lab launched three missions. Notably, though, we’d add that Rocket Lab tied CASC for second place in total spacecraft launched in Q2 (36).

• Everyone else mentioned above flew once in Q2.

Home base: If you slice up trips to orbit by nationality, US launchers flew 50% of all Q2 missions. SpaceX alone accounted for 38%. Chinese launchers flew a third of all launches.

Q1 comps: SpaceX still blew away the competition in A) upmass and B) total spacecraft launched. 90.8% of spacecraft launched in Q2 are operated by commercial entities (vs. 88% in Q1).

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🌌 Sign Up for Parallax 🌌

This afternoon, catch the fourth edition of Parallax. The weekly newsletter covers all things space science.

Every Thursday, staff reporter Rachael Zisk will walk you through the big stories across the cosmos, from distant galaxies to astrobiology experiments in Earth orbit and everything in between. Subscribe before 2pm ET to get today’s edition!

In Other News

• Here’s SOFIA’s final flight path. The observatory flew overnight for eight hours total.

• Astroscale opened a satellite production facility in the UK, dubbed Zeus.

• NASA and SpaceX pushed back the Crew-5 launch (NET 10/4) due to Ian.

• Astra confirmed it won’t launch NASA’s TROPICS payload, as previously announced.

• The two instead agreed to similar science payloads on Astra’s Rocket 4.0.

• ESA’s Samantha Cristoforetti assumed command of the space station.

• USSF will attempt to launch a satellite within 24 hours of getting the “go” order.

• ARK Invest's ETFs are snapping up shares of Rocket Lab ($RKLB).

Clarification: Yesterday, we wrote that GOP members of the Science, Space, & Tech subcommittee wrote to the FCC expressing concern over the commission overstepping congressional authorization with new debris guidelines. As a reader rightly flagged to us, the letter was also “signed by the Democratic Chairwoman,” indicating a “bipartisan concern about regulatory authority.”

The View from Space

Italy's space agency shared the first images from LICIACube, the cubesat deputized with DART destruction documentation duties. This GIF shows pre- and post-impact images. The flash you see is DART avenging the dinosaurs (aka striking Dimorphos).