Tag: JAXA
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Video: Next space station trio finishing training at Star City
Expedition 48-49 Soyuz commander Anatoly Ivanishin of Roscosmos and flight engineers Kate Rubins of NASA and Takuya Onishi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, along with their backups, conduct final qualification training at the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, on May 26 and 27. Ivanishin, Rubins and Onishi are scheduled to launch…
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Japanese orbiter officially begins science mission at Venus
Artist’s concept of Japan’s Akatsuki spacecraft at Venus. Credit: JAXA Five months since a belated arrival at Venus, Japan’s Akatsuki spacecraft has officially started a modified scientific survey of the sweltering, shrouded planet’s atmosphere and climate. The probe’s science cameras are collecting regular images of Venus’s exotic clouds, and Japanese engineers are optimistic Akatsuki can…
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Japan gives up on rescuing black hole observatory
Artist’s concept of Japan’s Hitomi satellite. Credit: JAXA/Akihiro Ikeshita Japan’s space agency says it has ceased efforts to rescue a failed X-ray astronomy satellite after it spun out of control and broke apart in orbit, declaring the nearly $400 million mission lost two months after its launch. Controllers on the ground lost contact with the…
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Attitude control failures led to break-up of Japanese astronomy satellite
Artist’s concept of Japan’s Hitomi satellite. Credit: JAXA/Akihiro Ikeshita Japan’s Hitomi X-ray observatory was beset by a series of attitude control problems March 26 that caused the satellite to spin out of control and shed sizable chunks of its power-generating solar panels or deployable telescope, according to engineers analyzing fragments of telemetry data sent to…
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U.S. military rules out collision as cause of Hitomi satellite’s woes
The Hitomi satellite is seen Nov. 27 at a press day held before its launch. Credit: JAXA As Japanese ground controllers struggle to restore communications with a tumbling space telescope in orbit, the U.S. military’s space surveillance experts have eliminated one cause for the satellite’s troubles. A military spokesperson told Spaceflight Now in an email…
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Concerns grow for X-ray astronomy satellite ASTRO-H
Japan’s ASTRO-H X-ray astronomy satellite is in trouble, just weeks after launch. Following a loss of nominal communication, observers have noted the spacecraft is tumbling, while tracking information has cataloged pieces of debris in the area of the satellite. The spacecraft is a high-energy astronomy mission led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). ASTRO-H Failure:…
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Japan’s newest space telescope goes silent
Updated on March 28. Artist’s concept of the Hitomi observatory. Credit: JAXA/Akihiro Ikeshita Japan has lost contact with the newly-launched Hitomi space telescope, and ground observations indicate the satellite has shed debris and may be tumbling in orbit more than 350 miles above Earth. Ground controllers lost contact with the Hitomi black hole observatory at the…
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Photos: H-2A rocket soars on groundbreaking astronomy mission
Burning a mixture of super-cold liquid hydrogen, liquid oxygen and pre-packed solid propellant, Japan’s H-2A rocket vaulted into a deep blue evening sky over the beaches of Tanegashima Island on Wednesday with a satellite that will see the surroundings of black holes better than ever before. The 174-foot-tall (53-meter) rocket blasted off at 0845 GMT…
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Japanese H-IIA rocket launches ASTRO-H mission
Japan launched the ASTRO-H x-ray astronomy satellite via its H-IIA rocket Wednesday, with a launch from the country’s Tanegashima launch site occurring at 17:45 local time (08:45 UTC). ASTRO-H, which was previously known as the New X-ray Telescope (NeXT), is a high-energy astronomy mission led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). ASTRO-H Mission: JAXA’s…
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Black hole observatory launched from Japan
The H-2A rocket flies into the sunset sky over the Tanegashima Space Center at 0845 GMT (3:45 a.m. EST; 5:45 p.m. local time). Credit: JAXA Japan launched a pioneering observatory with X-ray vision Wednesday to peer into the mysterious, light-starved neighborhoods around black holes and study the genesis of galaxies and other cosmic mega-structures billions…