0511-T-Minus-20250430
[MUSIC] Today is April 30th, 2025. I'm Maria Varmazis, and this is T-minus. [MUSIC] UK scientists, researchers and businesses working on the latest innovations in quantum and space technologies have been given access to more horizon Europe funding. [MUSIC] Firefly Aerospace says the upper stage of their Flight A006 mission did not reach orbital velocity, and the stage and payload are in the Pacific Ocean. [MUSIC] Spire Global to design, build and operate 16 satellites with enhanced second generation payloads for myriota. [MUSIC] Apex has raised $200 million in a series C funding round, and TruAnomaly raises $260 million. [MUSIC] The three-person Shenzhou-19 crew has returned to Earth. [MUSIC] [MUSIC] Happy Wednesday, everybody. I hope you're having a fantastic week. Let's dive into today's intelligence briefing. And we're starting off with a welcome back to Earth to China's Shenzhou-19 crew. The capsule carrying three Tyco-nauts touched down at the Dongfang landing site in North China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region earlier today. The spacecraft undocked from the Tiangong Space Station and returned to Earth in around seven and a half hours. Chinese media stated that the capsule used the fast return procedure, which is a strategy common in recent missions, with the spacecraft completing just five orbits instead of the usual 11 to de-orbit. The China manned space agency called their mission a complete success. The three Tyco-nauts stayed in orbit for 183 days, during which they carried out three spacewalks. The crew looked to be in good spirits and images shared on Chinese media, with on-site medical teams confirming that the crew were in good health. Satellite manufacturing company Apex has raised $200 million in a series C funding round. The company says the funding will allow them to scale production to meet rapidly expanding customer demand for its satellite bus platforms. The funding raise follows the successful one year on orbit milestone of Apex's first spacecraft mission. Apex manufactures off-the-shelf satellite buses, and they expect production on their 50,000 square foot factory in Los Angeles to step up as they work to support rapid delivery for Golden Dome, proliferated warfighter space architecture, and other programs. And they're not the only company announcing the closure of a series C funding round. Truonomaly has also raised a bunch of money, $260 million in their case, in an over-subscribed round. The company says the new funding will accelerate the next phase of growth, vertical integration, facility expansion, product development, and implementation. Truonomaly has a busy 18 months ahead with the Mission X Flight Test 3, the Victus Hayes Tactically Responsive Space Mission, the first Jackal Mission to Geosynchronous Orbit and CIS Lunar Space, and new product offerings in the works. Today, Spire Global announced that they are going to design, build, and operate 16 satellites with enhanced second generation payloads for Myriota. With this agreement, Myriota is expanding into satellite hardware in space through Spire Space Services. Once launched, Myriota's IoT connectivity will become operational across over 40 satellites. According to the press release, the expansion of Myriota's global space infrastructure will allow for more scalable and reliable IoT connectivity for smart devices worldwide. Myriota says their customers will have enhanced security, faster data access, reduced latency, and improved device control and firmware updating capabilities. Next up, we have an update now on yesterday's Firefly Aerospace Launch, the Flight A006 message in a booster mission experienced an anomaly. Firefly says the rocket experienced a mishap between stage separation and second stage ignition that led to the loss of the lightning engine nozzle extension, substantially reducing the engine's thrust. Initial indications showed Alpha's upper stage reached 320 km in altitude. However, upon further assessment, the team learned that the upper stage did not reach orbital velocity, and the stage and the payload have now safely impacted the Pacific Ocean in a cleared zone north of Antarctica. Firefly says it is working closely with Lockheed Martin and the FAA to conduct an investigation and determine the root cause of the anomaly. UK scientists, researchers, and businesses working on the latest innovations in quantum and space technologies have now been given access to more Horizon Europe funding under the new 2025 Horizon Europe work program. The UK government says access to Horizon Europe funding and the opportunities for international collaboration that Horizon presents will be an important boost to the space and quantum industries, helping to drive the government's plan for change. Recent UK-EU engagement has ensured that the UK retains open access to all calls and a chance to bid for a share of the approximately 80 billion pounds that is available through Horizon. That concludes today's Wednesday Intel Briefing, and 2K Senior Producer Alice Carruth has more on the stories that didn't make today's headlines. Alice? Thanks, Maria. Check out the two additional articles included in today's show notes on V2X being awarded $140 million to support the US Space Force operations at Ascension Island and Axiom Spaces crew and launch schedule details for the upcoming Ax4 launch. And in addition to the selected reading section of the show notes, where can we find those links? We also include links to the original sources of all the stories we mentioned throughout the show on our website, space.intuk.com. Just click on this episode title. AT-MINUSCREW, if you find our podcast useful, please do us a favor and share a 5-star rating and short review in your favorite podcast app. That will help other space professionals like you to find the show and join the T-MINUSCREW. Thank you so much. We really appreciate it. We'll be right back. Welcome back. If you have ever wanted to help classify galaxies and maybe even be the first human to lay eyes on one, now is your chance. No astrophysics degree required, although if you've got one, that's always a bonus. NASA and the Galaxy Zoo project have put out a call for citizen science volunteers to help sort through over half a million dazzling James Webb Space telescope images all as part of a quest to understand how galaxies have changed over cosmic time. Now I have mentioned Galaxy Zoo on the show now and then in the past, as I am personally quite a fan, and if you don't know, it has a long track record of real scientific impact. Since 2007, volunteers around the world have helped uncover galaxy mergers, trace the growth of spiral arms, and even explore how black holes shape their host galaxies. And now with Webb's powerful instrumentation, the galaxies that we all can help sort through are even farther and fainter than ever. Some just starting to form pretty darn close to the beginning of the universe's existence. Me, right? So to tackle the flood of data, Galaxy Zoo pairs humans with an AI helper named Zubat. Now Zubat takes on the easy stuff, but when it gets stumped by a tricky or a faint galaxy, it turns to people like you and me, and presumably you're a person, no judgment. It's as big a time commitment as you want it to be. I've actually used Galaxy Zoo myself when I've had a spare moment or two, and it's quite fun and easy to just pitch in. Just a few glances and clicks really, but it's amazing to think that you might actually be the first person ever to see that galaxy on your screen and get to help scientists understand it. So if you've got a few minutes, head to Galaxy Zoo and take a trip across the universe, one galaxy at a time, or science! That's it for T-Minus for April 30th, 2025, brought to you by N2K Cyberwire. For additional resources from today's report, check out our show notes at space.n2k.com. We'd love to know what you think of this podcast. You can email us at space@n2k.com or submit the survey in the show notes. Our feedback ensures we deliver the information that keeps you a step ahead in the rapidly changing space industry. N2K's strategic workforce intelligence optimizes the value of your biggest investment, your people. We make you smarter about your team while making your team smarter. N2K's senior producer is Alice Carruth. Our producer is Liz Stokes. We are mixed by Elliot Peltzman and Tre Hester, with original music by Elliot Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jennifer Eiben. Peter Kilpe is our publisher, and I'm your host, Maria Varmazis. Thanks for listening. We'll see you tomorrow! [Music] [Music] [BLANK_AUDIO]
