Luxembourg and the United Arab Emirates to Cooperate in Space Exploration
At a meeting on October 10, 2017, in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (UAE), Dr. Ahmad Belhoul al Falasi, UAE's Minister of State for Higher Education and Chairman of the UAE Space Agency, met with Luxembourg's Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Economy, [...]
Comprehensive Space Law Calendar For 2019
In order to stay informed, it is highly important that you remember and attend Space Law events. Here are the upcoming events for 2019! Do not miss out on essential opportunities to stay up to date on the most progressive law in the universe. [...]
MASCOT Landing on Asteroid Ryugu a Successful Mission
An asteroid called 162173 Ryugu us a near-Earth object measuring approximately 1 kilometer (0.6 mi) in diameter. It is a dark object of the rare spectral type Cg, with qualities of a C-type asteroid and also a G-type asteroid. The current value, for mining [...]
Night Sky Events This Month – December 2018
December 2 – 69P/Taylor reaches its brightest December 3 – C/2018 L2 (ATLAS) at perihelion December 5 – Conjunction of the Moon and Mercury December 7 - New Moon - The Moon will located on the same side of the Earth as the Sun and will not be [...]
Planetary Resources Acquisition
Planetary Resources once aimed to be the leading provider of resources for people and products in space. It described itself as being the world’s first commercial deep space exploration program. The purpose of the program was to identify and unlock the water resources necessary [...]
NASA Encourages Commercial Companies to Take Charge
Now that it is not on the governmental list of things to do, commercial companies are proposing missions to the moon at a rapid pace. Lunar missions have not had this activity planning since the Apollo program. The commercial companies now have the means [...]
Night Sky Events This Month – November 2018
November 4 – 64P/Swift-Gehrels at perihelion November 5 – Conjunction of the Moon and Venus November 5, 6 - Taurids Meteor Shower - The Taurids is a long-running minor meteor shower producing only about 5-10 meteors per hour. It is unusual in that it consists of two [...]
Night Sky Events This Month – October 2018
October 1 – M110 is well placed October 2 – Moon at Last Quarter; M32 is well placed October 3 – NGC 253 is well placed October 4 – Close approached of the Moon and M44 October 5 – Moon at perigee October 7 – 1 Ceres at solar conjunction; [...]
Night Sky Events This Month – September 2018
September 1: Low in the west-southwestern sky Venus will be situated only a finger's width to the lower left of the bright naked-eye star Spica in Virgo. Visible in binoculars or telescope September 2: Last Quarter Moon September 2: Mercury at perihelion September 2: Aldebaran passes the moon [...]
Master’s Degree or Ph.D. in Asteroid Mining
The first mention of asteroid mining was in the science fiction story by Garrett P. Serviss called Edison's Conquest of Mars published in the New York Evening Journal in 1898. Now, there is a new space mining program at the Colorado School of Mines. [...]
Comparison of The American Space Free Enterprise Act and The Space Frontier Act
The American Space Free Enterprise Act and the Space Frontier Act take two different approaches towards authorization and continuing supervision, but both bills do so with the goals of streamlining the process to make is less burdensome for applicants to obtain a license. The [...]
Is Space Technology Outpacing Space Law?
Within five to seven years, more satellites will be launched into space than in the history satellites. Space policy hasn’t been a high priority on our government’s agenda. Today’s most innovative companies’ plans are being disrupted by antiquated rules and regulations. The United Nations [...]
President Trump Wants a Sixth Branch of the United States Armed Forces in Space
“When it comes to defending America, it is not enough to have merely an American presence in space, we must have American dominance in space.” Those were Donald Trump’s words when he first directed the Department of Defense and Pentagon to establish a United [...]
Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law Conference on “The Weaponization of Outer Space: Ethical and Legal Boundaries”
The Center for Ethics and the Rule of Law (CERL) is a non-partisan institute dedicated to the preservation of the rule of law in 21st century regarding warfare and national security. The only center of its kind housed within a law school, CERL draws [...]
Book Review: The Space Barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the Quest to Colonize the Cosmos
Author Christian Davenport is a staff writer at the Washington Post covering the space and defense industries. As a frequent radio and television commentator, he has appeared on MSNBC, CNN, PBS NewsHour, and several NPR shows, including All Things Considered and Diane Rehm. The [...]
Orbital Debris Mitigation Practices and Why They Are So Important
One of the top priorities for NASA is regulating the increase of orbital debris in near-Earth space. Orbital debris includes man-made objects orbiting about the Earth with no useful purpose and also naturally occurring primitive materials such as meteoroid particles. Primitive materials are those [...]
Timeline of the Evolution of Space Debris
1960s: Need to better understand space environmental threats to human spaceflight mission. Biggest concern is natural space debris specifically micrometeoroids. 1970s: Explosions begin creating more human-generated space debris. Kessler & Cour-Palais warn human-generated space debris may eventually become bigger threat than natural space debris. 1980s: More explosions, [...]
Falcon Heavy Leads the Way to Planetary Exploration
One of the greatest visionaries in the galaxy is set to launch the one of the most powerful and operational rockets ever assembled into space this week. Elon Musk, who's imagination is as deep as a black hole, is not only the founder of [...]
The Militarization of Space
Regular readers may recognize a recurring theme of the Captain's Blog in examining the ways that nations have abandoned and continue to depart from the spirit, if not the letter, of the foundational Outer Space Treaty of 1967. While other international treaties, notably the Limited [...]
Asgardia: Will you be a citizen?
While many of us were contemplating our upcoming holiday menus, a relatively-new "space nation" called Asgardia was launching its first satellite, the eponymous Asgardia-1, from a Nasa facility in Virginia. While this may at first appear trivial or gimmicky, an astute observer will note [...]
European Space Industry to Use Strap-on Rockets to Remain Price Competitive
France's space launch industry received a needed endorsement on September 14, 2017, when the European Space Agency (ESA) became the first customer to contract with Arianespace SAS for launch services using its next generation Ariane 6 rocket. ESA contracted for two Ariane 6 rocket launches, with [...]
President Trump Nominates Jim Bridenstine to Lead Nasa
Today, President Donald J. Trump nominated Oklahoma Republican Congressman James "Jim" Bridenstine to serve as the next administrator of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the $18 billion-dollar US agency leading the federal government's space exploration efforts. Bridenstine gained recognition during his three terms [...]
Luxembourg Allows Commercialization of Space for Profit
As astute readers would expect, Luxembourg has become the first European state to follow America's lead and codify a legal framework to bypass the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 and the Moon Treaty of 1979 and allow the commercialization of the resources in outer [...]
NASA Partners for Spacecraft Development with NextSTEP
If you are like most Americans, at some point in your life you may have dreamed of space travel. The allure of traversing the heavens or planting a flag on the moon in an astronaut suit have danced in the visions of many children [...]