Small Space News Story Roundup 38

A different kind of assortment tonight. After the first short story.

Ariane 6 seems to be on track for July 9th first flight

Following a successful Wet Dress Rehearsal on June 20th, European Space Agency officials are saying the much delayed launch appears to be within reach. 

The European Space Agency (ESA) announced during a June 25 press conference that the rehearsal was a "full success." After years-long delays, ESA is confident that their Ariane 6 rocket, deemed the future of Europe's ability to launch satellites into Earth orbit, will finally get off the ground. ESA and French launch provider Arianespace, which commercially manages the rocket, are preparing for a launch on July 9. The three-hour window opens at 2 p.m. EDT (1800 GMT).

"Of course, we're still analyzing the data — it might take a few days still. But all we have up to now says that our baby Ariane 6 is working perfectly," said Lucia Linares, head of strategy and institutional launches at ESA.

Like every new vehicle I can think of lately, this won't be a flight lifting dead weight; it will be carrying actual payloads including nine cubesats. The upper stage (called Vinci) will also carry four non-orbital experiments, including an experiment called SIDLOC that will test a system for rapidly locating satellites and two capsules that will drop from orbit into the Pacific in order to test if they can re-enter Earth's atmosphere successfully. 

The sunspot behind that epic May 10 geomagnetic storm is back

The sunspot that caused the May 10 storm, among the 20 strongest on record (second story down) that brought aurora displays down to low magnetic latitudes like New Caledonia (MLAT = -26.4°) and Puerto Rico (MLAT = 27.2°) is back. 

THAT POTENT OLD SUNSPOT IS BACK: Old sunspot AR3664, which caused the May 10th superstorm, has returned. This is its 3rd trip across the solar disk. Per tradition, it has been re-numbered 3 times: Originally AR3664, then AR3697, now AR3723. X-flares are possible as it once again turns to face Earth.

The sunspot group formerly known as AR3664, then AR3697, and now known as AR3723 is highlighted in white. Credit: SDO/HMI

The ability to create strong flares comes from the magnetic configuration of the group, and this photo doesn't show that detail. There have been no X-class flares since this group reappeared, but it did through an M9.36 class flare, just below X1 (if the numbering were continuous, M10.0 = X1.0, so M9.36 was close to X class) on Sunday, June 23, at 1300 UTC, or 9:00 AM EDT.  

A fun interview with Sir Peter Beck of Rocket Lab 

Just last Friday, we did a piece congratulating Rocket Lab on their 50th launch. Yesterday, Eric Berger at Ars Technica released a summary of an interview he did with Beck earlier in the month. I don't want to try to summarize it here, but just leave a landmark to go read the whole thing. 

Chances are that nobody has interviewed Beck as often as Eric Berger has because of how long Berger has been the space correspondent for Ars. Consequently, while it's just about all quotes from both of them, there's also some familiarity there between them. He calls it "Sir Peter Beck Unplugged" and I get that feeling.  

I will pull one of my favorite little pieces that I saw in it:

I remember running around Silicon Valley trying to raise $5 million at a time. Everybody would look at Virgin Orbit and say, "Well, how are you competing with Richard Branson?" For all intents and purposes, he had infinite capital. We have a saying here at Rocket Lab that we have no money, so we have to think. We've never been in a position to outspend our competitors. We just have to out-think them. We have to be lean and mean. If I had to boil it down to one succinct thing you could put in an article, I would say it's being ruthlessly efficient and not making mistakes.

Did you get that? "..we have no money, so we have to think" I love that quote. 

Oh, as you might expect, Sir Peter Beck calls Eric Berger "Eric". Eric Berger calls him "Pete."