It really can't be said enough how much progress in spaceflight has happened thanks to SpaceX, and it honestly feels a bit cliche to even acknowledge it at this point. But I gotta admit, we do see a certain thrill to see other public and private organizations showing the world that SpaceX doesn't have to be the only game in town when it comes to launch especially. Instead of a monopoly, how about a bit of healthy competition nipping at your heels? Talk about a motivator. "T-minus, 20 seconds to ALOS, T-dress, open aboard." Today is November 5th, 2024. I'm Maria Varmasus, and this is T-minus. The ISS welcomes NASA's 31st SpaceX Resupply Mission. The strike has ended at Boeing's West Coast facilities. Rocket Lab launches its 54th Electron Mission. And our guest today is Revimbo Samanga. And Revimbo was recently awarded the 2024 Space Law Award for Young Achievers by the International Institute for Space Law. And we'll be talking about that achievement and her time at the IAC later in this show. And you definitely don't need me to tell you this, but there's a minor event going on in the United States today. And we just want to note, whoever makes it to the White House, we hope you keep the space industry growing. Okay, let's dive into today's space until briefing, shall we? Late last night, a Falcon 9 rocket launched NASA's 31st SpaceX commercial resupply mission to the International Space Station. The Dragon capsule made its predetermined journey through low Earth orbit to the ISS, docking at the station's Harmony module at approximately 9.52 a.m. EST today. The mission carried over 6,000 pounds of supplies and scientific experiments, including tools and studies aiming to advance space research and support astronaut health and safety. The experiments include investigations into immune system function in microgravity, a project studying fire behavior in confined spaces, and technology for recycling plastic waste on the ISS. This cargo also brings fresh food, supplies, and hardware, enhancing the crew's daily life and research capabilities. A huge congratulations to our friends at KMI who have their payload on board the mission, along with biopharmaceutical experiments from Redwire and many research projects, along with Japan's wooden satellite to test the use of timber in lunar and Mars exploration, which is expected to be released into orbit at a later date. The seven-week strike at Boeing West Coast factories is over. Today members of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace accepted a new contract offer, which includes a 38% pay increase over the next four years. About 33,000 machinists at Boeing had been on strike for these last weeks, and the strike did mainly affect production of Boeing's planes, causing the company to lose an estimated $100 million a day in lost revenues, according to an analysis from Reuters. Machinists at Boeing will now be returning to work tomorrow. Rocket Lab is celebrating a winning streak after launching its 54th Electron mission, deploying a single satellite to low Earth orbit for a confidential commercial customer. The mission was Rocket Lab's 12th Electron launch this year, continuing to best the company's previous record of 10 annual launches achieved in 2023. As always, the mission had a fun name, and this one was Changes in Attitudes, Changes in Latitudes Mission, and it launched from Rocket Lab Launch Complex 1 in New Zealand. The company is also celebrating its speedy turnaround. The mission was launched less than 10 weeks after the contract signing, making it one of the company's fastest turnarounds yet. When it comes to human spaceflight, it's worth getting things done right. And that is why ISRO says it is delaying its planned human spaceflight Dagan Yan mission, H1, and pushing it out to 2026. ISRO's chairman, S. Samanath, said ISRO is being conservative with its timeline out of an abundance of caution for human safety, while also hashing out the very real challenges of starting up India's own human spaceflight program from scratch. In September, Samanath told reporters, and I quote, "I don't want what happened to the Boeing Starliner, so we should be very careful." The first crewed Dagan Yan mission was originally slated for 2025, so this announcement marks a year's delay. However, the first of three scheduled test flights, Dagan Yan's G1, which will have a robotic crew member named Viometra, is still scheduled to take place next month. Australia has granted the country's first orbital launch permit to Gilmore Space Technologies for its maiden AERUS rocket launch from the Boeing Orbital Space Port in North Queensland. An Australian launch permit is required under the nation's Space Act 2018 to launch an object from Australia to an altitude of over 100 kilometers. It comes with a number of conditions that must be met before launch and a mandatory 30-day notification period. Gilmore Space CEO and co-founder Adam Gilmore said, "With this green light, we will soon attempt the first orbital test flight of an Australian-made rocket from Australian soil." And we here at T-Minus wish them all the best of luck. Axiom Space is in talks with India's space agency ISRO and India's private launch companies to explore the best fit for its missions and to diversify its supply chain. Perli Pandya, director of Axiom's international government business, said that Indian and European companies could be used to transport raw materials to the Axiom space station. The move comes after India and the United States entered into a space flight agreement in August to work alongside Axiom's upcoming mission to the ISS. The UK has signed a deal for a new satellite to support the nation's military. The Juno project is worth £40 million to contractor Surrey Satellite Technology. The satellite will be able to capture daytime images of the Earth's surface, strengthening the UK's intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance capabilities. Juno is expected to launch in 2027 and will have advanced imagery sensors building on the capabilities of Taiki, UK Space Command's first satellite, which it actually launched in August of this year. Spire Global have released their third quarter financial results. The Earth Observation Company brought in $40 million of new contracts during Q3, and this is the largest value of bookings that the company has received in a quarter. Spire entered the third quarter of 2024 with a cash and marketable securities balance of $45.8 million and ended the quarter with a balance of $36.6 million. And sadly, Reaction Engines, a developer of hypersonic engine technology since 1989, is officially out of business. The UK-US-based hypersonic propulsion and thermal management systems company was focused on developing advanced space propulsion systems. However, Reaction Engines was forced into closure after failing to raise additional funding. The majority of the UK team have been laid off in the UK, and the US office closed their doors on October 31. And that is it for our daily briefing. As always, you can read more in the show notes or over at space.n2k.com. Hey T-minus crew, if you're just joining us, be sure to follow T-minusSpaceDaily in your favorite podcast app. And also, if you could do us a favor, please spread the word about this show. A growing audience is what keeps us going, and since you're a part of the T-minus crew, we would love your help. So if you find our show informative and useful, please share T-minus with your friends and coworkers so they can listen in and join the crew. Thank you for your support. [Music] Today's guest is Space Policy Analyst, Ruvimbo Samangah. And we started our chat by catching up on Ruvimbo's 2024 Space Law Award for Young Achievers and what it means to her. [Music] I was awarded the Young Achievers Award for Space Law. And this is an award, a very new one, offered by the International Institute of Space Law, which recognizes individuals who are not only pioneering in their field, but also show great promise of contributing immensely to the development of space law in the future. I was very honored to receive the award alongside my good colleague Scarlett O'Donnell. And together, I think we represent the next generation of individuals using space law and policy to support capacity building in the space industry. So excellent opportunity for me, and I hope it opens a lot of doors. I hope so for you as well. I'm so curious to hear about how your time at the IAC went. I've never been. I've heard that it's quite an event. I'm very curious how it was for you. Oh, wow. It's overwhelming. It's an amazing kind of overwhelming. Your one opportunity to perhaps get in touch with colleagues that you see once a year, in my case. But it's also an opportunity to get, I think, all the important stakeholders in one place. That's from government to industry to research. You really have a melting pot of really the greatest minds. And we're so fortunate that this year was the largest gathering, actually, in the IAC history. It's the largest space gathering in the world to date because we had over 12,000 professionals in one space. Not very common to have that. And I think it's very important that we share these figures to show that space continues to grow immensely and to attract crowds of all different ages. I think also what was of note was that the UNIAF conference, which is a prelude to the IAC, the demographics actually show that there was a larger portion of young professionals attending, which shows, again, a great interest in the next generation. And I think that is marvelous considering that not only are we contributors to future development, but we are the beneficiaries and we deserve, I suppose, a say or a voice in what occurs. You mentioned the UNIAF workshop. Can you tell me a little bit more about that, the one that happened right before? Certainly. So every single year, the United Nations and the International Astronautical Federation host a workshop as a prelude to the IAC. I very much appreciate this workshop. This was my first opportunity to join. And what I appreciated most was just the intimate space that it provided. So while the IAC is really fun and really engaging, you do often tend to get lost in the broad networks and programs on offer across the five days. UNIAF workshop really gives you an opportunity to hone in on particular things, particular groups of people and to share in a much smaller space what you've been working on and have an opportunity to network with like-minded individuals. This was the 31st workshop of its kind. It was the workshop on space technology for socioeconomic benefits. And the theme of the workshop was actually space sustainability as a game changer for development. You'll realize space sustainability is becoming quite the buzzword in the industry. And as such, we were all in a position to discuss how we are bringing sustainability not only through space, but to the space industry itself. And I was very pleased to make a presentation at this workshop. And yeah, it's a wonderful opportunity. And I think it presents you a more focused group of individuals to discuss and share ideas. And as already mentioned, this year we had a weighted population of young professionals, which I quite appreciated. Highlights perhaps from there. We have these really cool networking sessions afterwards split into different themes. We also had different games. I must give a shout out to one of my colleagues Anna Horova, who actually came up with a really cool game concept on space sustainability. Well, essentially you have to work on creating a sustainable orbit and you have different roles in the game. I was a financier in the game and I successfully led my team to bankruptcy, but you know, it was all in the fun spirit of it all. We enjoyed it so much. And again, as always, the food and the networking was exceptional. Of course. I'm so curious for you as you move forward. I mean, again, you've just received this wonderful award and you are doing so many things. Is space sustainability something that you are going to be continuing to focus on moving forward? Is there something that is a particular area of interest for you amongst your many, I'm sure? Of course. I think space sustainability has been embedded in my research for a very long while, but I increasingly find myself wanting to contextualize it for Africa. And for me, space sustainability for Africa, well actually to elaborate on my point a bit more, we look at space sustainability as a main year matter of space debris and just clearing up our orbits, but space sustainability also includes ensuring that all stakeholders can continue to contribute to space in one way or another. And when it comes to Africa, we need to have a starting point in those contributions. And that is something I would want to earnestly begin to work towards using my passion that is space law and support Africa in that kind of regulatory capacity building. Because at the end of the day, you cannot have sustainable space without sustainable regulations, without a sustainable ecosystem, without sustainable industry or sustainable research. So it's finding ways to weave sustainability into every aspect of space industry development, not just with regards to launch and space systems, but even down to the very fabric of how can we make space education and outreach sustainable, or even accessible as a first point to sustainability. Those are the intricate questions and maybe more philosophical leanings I'm going towards, but you really have to start at the fundamentals in order to be sustainable, there has to be a necessary starting point of inclusivity and accessibility. So let's see how that goes. Yeah, I love that. And truly, that is the all-encompassing, comprehensive meaning of sustainability, not just like the very industry-specific silo that is often used. I love that. And that is such an important point. I really appreciate that. Revenbo, I just want to make sure, if there's anything that's coming up soon that you wanted to share with us, or if there's anything you want to get across to the audience before we close out, I want to give you opportunity. Certainly, I'm very passionate about the work that I do for the Bailows Space Science Institute, which is a research collaboration founded in 2018 by the Arizona State University and Lockheed Martin. Essentially what we do is we make space science globally accessible, we provide affordable training, and we help countries build knowledge, infrastructure, and skilled teams. In April of this year, Vice President Kamala Harris issued a call to bring the benefits of space to communities across America. Milo is very honored to be recognized as one of the organizations contributing to this effort. We've had a slew of milestones in capacity building, ranging from helping Ecuador to sign the Artemis Accords to launching various mission academies for climate intelligence and even for lunar development in Puerto Rico and also in New Zealand and Australia respectively. We have a global cohort of ambassadors that are continuing to expand our global reach, and we anticipate that there will be a huge need for capacity building, especially in the space science industry. I find this so important because it's one thing to have representation in the industry, but it's another to have a truly capable group of representatives to drive the industry forward and this is what I'd honestly love to put my efforts towards and happy to continue my mission as an ambassador in this regard. Wonderful institute and anyone willing to collaborate or partner is welcome to reach out. We'll be right back. Welcome back. And another one bites the dust or at least creates a trail of it. NASA's Neo-Wise spacecraft launched back in 2009 has come to a fiery end as planned late last week. The spacecraft was originally known as the WISE mission and it's been mapping the entire sky at infrared wavelengths over and over for nearly 15 years. And during that time, more than 100,000 amateur scientists have used this data in citizen scientists projects like the Milky Way project, disk detective, backyard worlds planet 9, world's cool neighbors and exo asteroids. But NASA is quick to point out that although the spacecraft has come to the end of its mission, the WISE and Neo-WISE project itself has not. The data that has already been collected contains trillions, yes trillions of detections of astronomical sources. And that's likely enough to keep citizen science projects busy making new discoveries for many years to come. NASA says it needs you and it encourages all to join one of these projects today to help unravel the mysteries of the infrared universe. That's it for T-minus for November 5th, 2024. Brought to you by N2K CyberWire. For additional resources from today's report, check out our show notes at space.n2k.com. For privilege that N2K and podcasts like T-minus are part of the daily routine of many of the most influential leaders and operators in the public and private sector. From the Fortune 500 to many of the world's preeminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies. This episode was produced by Alice Carruth. Our associate producer is Liz Stokes. We're mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Trey Hester. With original music by Elliot Peltzman, our executive producer is Jennifer Iben. Our executive editor is Brandon Karp. Simone Petrella is our president, Peter Kilpe is our publisher, and I am your host, Maria Varmasus. Thank you for listening. We'll see you tomorrow. T-minus. Bye. 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