At the FAA CST conference, Rich DalBello, director of the Office of Space Commerce, says the office recently completed a space traffic management pilot program in GEO using exclusively commercial data. Analyzing that pilot program now but "highly confident" it worked well. Dan Ceperley of LeoLabs says that while much of the Cosmos 1408 ASAT test debris has deorbited, risk to satellites has not declined as quickly since debris is slowly descending through heavily trafficked orbits.

Shotwell: tension between pace of innovation by us and regulators. Need to figure out how to work with regulators to make process faster. Shotwell on Starlink: really pleased to provide connectivity for Ukraine in their fight for freedom. But never intended it to be weaponized. They leveraged it in ways that were unintentional.

At the FAA Commercial Space Transportation conference today, Kelvin Coleman, associate administrator for comm'l space transportation, said his office licensed a record 84 operations (launches and reentries) last year; five years ago, only 26 operations. Coleman: we're preparing for the potential end of the "learning period" that restricts safety regs for commercial human spaceflight participants. That includes updating best practices and standing up an aerospace rulemaking committee on the issue.

Firefly Aerospace's Bill Weber says in a small launch vehicle panel at #smallsatsymposium they're preparing for an Alpha launch for a responsive space mission in May; after that, perform launches every two months. Virgin Orbit's Dan Hart: investigation into LauncherOne failure last month still in progress, but everything points to a filter in the second stage that got dislodged and "caused mischief downstream." It was "a $100 part that took us out." Working on return to flight from Mojave.

NASA is go to begin SLS tanking operations. Third time’s the charm? blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/2022/1… NASA says they’re expecting about 15,000 guests on-site for tonight’s Artemis 1 launch attempt. They estimated 25,000 guests for the first launch attempt in late August. (Big difference between a Monday morning in late summer and after midnight on a Wednesday in November…)

Call underway. Still proceeding for a Nov. 16 launch. Mike Sarafin, Artemis 1 mission manager, said analysis on the Orion RTV delimitation showed risk was bounded by current hazards. No dissenting opinions at the mission management team meeting.

“I think we’re ready to go whenever you are.” And with that, the Artemis 1 briefing gets underway. NASA’s Jim Free says the agency received confirmation CAPSTONE entered into lunar orbit after its insertion burn this evening.

NASA says the Artemis 1 briefing this evening, scheduled for 7 pm EST, will be delayed because the mission management team meeting is running behind. Could be delayed 30-60 minutes. Now no earlier than 8 pm EST. Maybe they’re watching the Packers-Cowboys game.

NASA’s Jim Free starts a media telecon on Artemis 1: Nothing preventing us from getting to a launch attempt on Nov. 16. Free: measured wind at several levels on the SLS; did not exceed certification at any of the levels.

NASA’s Jim Free says that “people feel comfortable with the imagery we have” for a night launch of SLS, so proceeding with the next launch attempt Nov. 14 at 12:07 am EST. Free says NASA has been “back and forth” on including a landing on Artemis 4; with Sustaining Lunar Development and HLS Option B, “we felt like a landing on 4 was possible.”

NASA telecon underway. Thomas Zurbuchen says SpaceX approached NASA a few months to see if a commercial crew vehicle could help reboots Hubble. Announcing we’ve signed a Space Act Agreement to look at that. Reboost, not reboots, of course.

People think SSA will be the be-all, end-all of for verification of any space security treaty, says Almudena Azcarate Ortega of UNIDIR on an #AMOSCon panel. But, not everything can be monitored at all times by all states. SSA a useful tool, but not the only one. Doug Hendrix of ExoAnalytic, a company that monitors satellites in the GEO belt: most of a satellite’s life is boring, but monitoring continuously we find interesting things like breakups. #AMOSCon

Good morning from the Advanced Maui Optical and Space Surveillance Technologies (AMOS) Conference for three days of talks on space situational awareness topics. First up: Lt. Gen. Michael A. Guetlein of Space Systems Command. #AMOSCon Lt. Gen. Guetlein: the threat is only getting worse in space, citing activities by China and Russia; also “closely monitoring” efforts by Iran and North Korea. #AMOSCon

Post-impact briefing about to start on NASA TV. Project team confirms their final estimate was an accuracy of 17 meters from the center of the pixels. Some additional analysis to do to calculate exact impact point.

Big launch panel coming up at #WSBW, with executives from Arianespace, Blue Origin, ILS, MHI, SpaceX and ULA. SpaceX’s Tom Ochinero: trying to get to a little over 60 launches this year, and 100 next year. Includes 6 Falcon Heavy launches in next 12 months.

In a #WSBW finance panel, Peter Cannito of Redwire Space says a drop in valuations of space companies “creates an opportunity for companies like ours” that has acquired such companies in the past. Vaibhav Lohiya, Deutsche Bank Securities: consolidation for the sector is good; helps companies reduce and rationalize capital expenditures. Also growing interest in vertical integration to secure their supply chains. #WSBW

Coming up on 10 minutes before the launch of Firefly’s second Alpha. Presumably launch preparations are going well, but few specific updates during this lengthy pre-launch webcast. T-3 minutes.

NASA’s Jim Free: requesting dates of Sept. 23 and 27 on the Eastern Range for next Artemis 1 launch attempts. Still working with the Eastern Range on a waiver for FTS battery retest. Proposed dates avoid DSN conflicts with DART impact on Sept. 26. Mike Bolger, Exploration Ground Systems program manager, says work is underway to replace seals on two liquid hydrogen lines. Work could be done by the end of the day today if weather holds. That would support another tanking test Sept. 17.

Jim Free: will not in this launch period, which ends Tuesday. What happens in next two periods (late Sept/early Oct, and mid-late Oct) will depend on options the team comes up with by Monday or Tuesday. Mike Sarafin: inadvertent overpressurization of hydrogen line during chilldown. Can’t rule out the quick-disconnect fitting saw some effects of that, but too early to tell.

NASA is go to begin SLS tanking. blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/2022/0… Launch controllers are go to begin loading the SLS core stage.

One more Artemis 1 prelaunch briefing, starting shortly, with updates on launch preps. Launch weather officer Melody Lovin says weather should trend better through the 2-hour launch window: 60% go at the start to 80% at the end.
For backup day Monday 70% go, but a little more uncertainty.