Category: Science

Commercial space is no longer the sole domain of satellite telecommunications. Nearly every sector of the space enterprise is opening up to commercial providers.

Two of our three finalists for this year’s Commercial Space Achievement award represent longstanding commercial pillars of the space industry: launch and satellite communications.

The third is a pioneer in one of the most daunting space sectors to commercialize: human spaceflight.

The SpaceNews editorial team selected the three achievements below as some of this year’s biggest. The winner of this category, chosen with valuable input from previous recipients of a SpaceNews award, will be revealed during our annual awards celebration.

Tickets are on sale now for the SpaceNews 2023 Icon Awards, being held Tuesday, Dec. 5, at the InterContinental Washington D.C. – The Wharf.

Let’s take a closer look at this year’s honorees, one of which will be named 2023’s Civil Space Achievement:

Intelsat and SES earn billions by meeting C-band clearing deadlines

Intelsat and SES are due a combined $7 billion windfall for returning publicly owned C-band to the FCC, on top of the $2 billion already received for helping make the spectrum available for U.S. telecom networks.

SpaceX launch tempo

SpaceX has already exceeded its record-setting launch rate for all of 2022, with 80 launches and counting performed since the start of 2023 . Not even China (government and commercial launches combined) is launching as often as SpaceX.

Virgin Galactic’s first commercial SpaceShipTwo flights

After years of development delays, including a fatal accident in a 2014 test flight, Virgin Galactic started commercial flights in June, continuing them on a monthly basis since then. This allows the company to finally serve customers who, in some cases, bought tickets more than 15 years ago while working on a new generation of vehicles that promise more frequent and less expensive suborbital flights.

Stay tuned for more updates as we spotlight the honorees for our final awards category Nov. 13.

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AUSTIN, Texas — SpaceX launched a cargo Dragon mission to the International Space Station Nov. 9 from one Florida pad as it completes work on a neighboring pad to support crew and cargo missions.

A Falcon 9 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at 8:28 p.m. Eastern and placed a cargo Dragon spacecraft into orbit on the CRS-29 mission. The Dragon is scheduled to dock autonomously with the ISS at about 5:20 a.m. Eastern Nov. 11. It will remain at the station until early to mid December.

The launch was originally scheduled for Nov. 5 but was delayed to replace a Draco thruster on the spacecraft that had a valve leaking nitrogen tetroxide propellant, said Benji Reed, senior director of human spaceflight programs at SpaceX, at a prelaunch briefing Nov. 8. After the thruster was replaced, technicians detected traces of nitrogen tetroxide in the area, but decreased once the system was fully pressurized.

The Dragon is carrying 2,950 kilograms of cargo. Key payloads being ferried to the station on the spacecraft include a laser communications demonstration called ILLUMA-T that will provide high-bandwidth communications through the Laser Communications Relay Demonstration payload on the STPSat-6 satellite in geostationary orbit. Also on Dragon is the Atmospheric Waves Experiment (AWE), which will study phenomena called gravity waves in the Earth’s upper atmosphere, including their links to space weather.

The spacecraft is carrying other supplies, experiments and hardware for the station and its crew. Among them is a tool bag to replace one that floated away during a spacewalk Nov. 1 by NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O’Hara.

The bag lost in the spacewalk had some ancillary equipment, like tethers and sockets, inside. “It’s unfortunate we lost them but it’s not a huge impact,” said Dana Weigel, NASA ISS deputy program manager, during the prelaunch briefing. NASA is still investigating how the bag floated away.

The launch, like other launches of the current version of Dragon carrying crew and cargo, took place from LC-39A. SpaceX, though, is completing a tower at nearby Space Launch Complex 40 that is designed to allow its use for Dragon missions. Workers recently installed the crew access arm, one of the last major components for the tower.

“We are creating that capability off of pad 40 to be able to fly Dragons, cargo or human spaceflight missions,” Reed said. He noted that being able to have SLC-40 support Dragon launches would serve as a “relief valve for a heavy manifest” of missions using LC-39A, which is also used for Falcon Heavy launches. “Sometimes it’s better for our manifest and our customers’ needs to be able to have another place to fly Dragon.”

Having a Dragon capability at SLC-40 also ensures that Dragon missions can continue to launch if LC-39A becomes unavailable for an extended period “for whatever reason.” Besides hosting Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches, SpaceX is building a Starship launch pad at LC-39A.

Spaceflight Now reported that the tower may be first used for the Ax-3 private astronaut mission to the ISS, scheduled to launch in early January. Launching Ax-3 from SLC-40 would allow LC-39A to be used for the IM-1 lunar lander mission launching as soon as Jan. 12, which must launch from that pad because it is set up to fuel the lander just before launch.

Reed declined to confirm if Ax-3 would be the first crewed mission launching from SLC-40. “When it comes to the upcoming manifest, we’re working through that,” he said. “The good news is that, with 40 coming online, we have more options.”

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A meta-analysis finds the established stress generation model applies not only to depression, but also other mental health disorders.

A recent quantitative meta-analysis, published in the Psychological Bulletin, concludes that those who suffer from mental disorders are more likely to find themselves in stressful situations of their own making.

The team, co-led by Angela Santee, a psychology graduate student at the University of Rochester, and Katerina Rnic, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of British Columbia, looked at 95 longitudinal studies, spanning over 38,000 study participants, and more than 30 years of research.

They found that psychopathology—such as mental illness or disorders, including depression—predicted dependent stressful life events (events that the person, at least in part, contributed to) more strongly than it predicted independent or fateful events.

The stress generation model

The meta-analysis bore out the stress generation model, developed in 1991 by University of California, Los Angeles, psychology professor Constance Hammen. According to the model, some people contribute more than others to the occurrence of dependent stressors—that is stressful life events that occur, at least in part, due to a person’s behavior or personal characteristics—such as relationship breakups, failing a class, or job loss because of conflict with a coworker. Conversely, according to the model, people do not influence independent stressors like fateful events that occur regardless of a person’s influence—such as the death of a loved one, or job loss due to an economic downturn.

While Hammen’s model had spawned plenty of research over the past three decades, the resulting literature had never been quantitatively summarized before.

“People with depression might be more likely to have arguments with others, or put off completing important tasks at work or home,” says Rnic. “This can lead to more stressors in their relationships, work, education, finances, health—all domains of life.”

Importantly, though, the team found that the theory of stress generation not only holds for people with depression but also across many other mental health disorders, such as anxiety, personality disorders, substance use, and childhood disruptive disorders.

The finding is crucial, the team argues, because it means that people have some agency over the stress they experience. To Santee, this degree of stress malleability could be a silver lining:

“It’s a powerful realization that some of the stressors we experience are within our control and so, theoretically, we can act to control how much stress we experience and the impact of that stress on us,” Santee says. “We all have the ability to shape our worlds.”

The meta-review’s findings include:

• There’s clear evidence of stress generation across a broad range of psychopathologies, with a significantly larger effect for dependent stress (caused by the person), rather than independent stress (fateful outside events).
• Stress generation effects were larger for people with depression than people with anxiety.
• While stress generation occurs across all mental disorders and demographic groups, the effects were strongest among children, adolescents, and young adults.
• The team found no differences in stress generation by gender, race, or geographic location, which indicates a universal phenomenon.
• Over time, dependent stress (caused by the person) worsened a person’s mental illness symptoms, possibly contributing to chronic psychopathology, such as chronic depression.
• Interventions seeking to prevent stress generation may lessen chronic psychopathology.
• Importantly, the new meta-analysis offers strong evidence that stress generation seems to act as a factor that maintains and feeds a person’s depression.

“This finding is crucial because the major reason that depression is such a burden on society is that it’s a recurrent and often chronic problem,” says Lisa Starr, a senior coauthor of the meta-analysis, an associate professor in the University of Rochester’s psychology department, and Santee’s advisor.

How can someone break this cycle?

Being able to target the self-perpetuating stress generation with specific interventions can lessen a person’s mental illness or psychological disorder. That’s why the researchers embarked on a second undertaking: trying to isolate the specific processes that contribute to, or protect against, the occurrence of life stress. Treatments that target stress generation could reduce “the personal and economic cost of mental disorders,” the team writes.

The result is a second meta-analysis, published in Clinical Psychology Review, which looked at both modifiable risk and protective factors in stress generation, incorporating the findings of 70 studies with a total of nearly 40,000 participants, and spanning more than 30 years of research.

Risk factors that predict stress generation over time are:

• Personal characteristics, traits, and behaviors commonly associated with mental disorders
• Ineffective interpersonal emotion regulation, such as excessively seeking reassurance from others or excessive co-rumination—that is, conversations with others that focus repetitively on one’s own stresses
• Repetitive negative thoughts, including excessive ruminating and worrying
• Excessive standards for oneself
• The tendency to withdraw or avoid challenging situations or social interactions

Addressing these risk factors in treatment approaches, the authors argue, may be crucial to breaking the vicious cycle of stress generation. Because a plethora of factors contribute to the generation of stress, a multi-pronged approach may be most effective. The team also found that preventive factors remained generally understudied.

Additional coauthors of the two meta-analyses are from the University of Rochester; the University of British Columbia; and the University of Western Ontario.

Source: University of Rochester

WASHINGTON — The global satellite operator SES will provide services to the U.S. Defense Department under a five-year agreement worth up to $270 million, the company announced Nov. 8.

The agreement is for satellite communications services from the SES O3b broadband constellation in medium Earth orbit. The contract is a task order awarded as part of a so-called blanket purchase agreement SES signed in 2018 with DoD’s Defense Information Systems Agency.

The blanket purchase agreement makes the O3b constellation available to the U.S. armed forces as a managed service. This includes broadband satellite services as well as gateway services, terminals, technical support, installation services, terrestrial backhaul and training.

SES, headquartered in Luxembourg, provides services to the U.S. government via its subsidiary SES Space & Defense, based in Reston, Virginia.

“The new blanket purchase agreement signifies the DoD’s continued interest in MEO as a cornerstone commercial satellite communications capability,” said David Fields, president and CEO of SES Space & Defense.

Technical problems in next-generation O3b satellites 

DoD for years has been a customer of SES’ O3b constellation. SES recently started deploying its next-generation O3b mPower satellites, which the company said will provide 10 times more throughput than the legacy O3b satellites.

However, electrical issues on the first four O3b mPower satellites will significantly reduce their operational life and broadband capacity, SES said last month.

SES interim CEO Ruy Pinto said getting the performance originally expected from the next-generation MEO constellation will require Boeing to build two more O3b mPower satellites than initially planned, alongside upgrades on five others already in the works.

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WASHINGTON — The European Union is in the final stages of completing a deal with SpaceX to launch four Galileo navigation satellites in 2024.

In press briefings during the European Space Summit in Seville, Spain, Nov. 7, Thierry Breton, commissioner for the internal market for the European Commission, said he was “finalizing the discussions” for a pair of Falcon 9 launches, each carrying two Galileo satellites, tentatively scheduled for April and July of 2024.

The last obstacle to completing a launch contract, he said, was negotiating a security agreement to protect sensitive technologies on the Galileo satellites, which previously had been launched from the European spaceport in French Guiana, when those satellites are being prepared for launch from the United States.

The launch contract itself was completed in July, Breton noted, and that the European Commission had approved a European Space Agency proposal to use the Falcon 9 for launching those satellites. He said the European Commission would spend 180 million euros ($192 million) on the Falcon 9 launches.

At an Oct. 19 meeting of the ESA Council, ESA Director General Josef Aschbacher said that the final decision for using SpaceX to launch the Galileo satellites was in the hands of the Commission. “We have prepared on the ESA side the contractual arrangements with an external launch company, but whether or not the launch will be decided to take place with SpaceX is not in our hands,” he said. “It is a decision of the European Commission.”

There had been discussions for more than a year about using a non-European rocket, like the Falcon 9, for launching those satellites because of delays in the Ariane 6, the retirement of the Ariane 5 and the withdrawal of the Soyuz after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Those satellites would augment the existing operational Galileo constellation and serve as on-orbit replacements if other satellites fail.

“We have no major anomalies ongoing in orbit. We have no trends that indicate it is absolutely urgent to launch,” said Francisco-Javier Benedicto Ruiz, ESA’s director of navigation, at last month’s ESA Council meeting. Nevertheless, “we want to carry on deploying.”

ESA had already contracted with SpaceX for three Falcon 9 launches, one of the Euclid astronomy spacecraft that took place in July and launches in 2024 of the Hera asteroid mission and EarthCARE Earth science satellite. ESA said it went with the Falcon 9 after the loss of the Soyuz, delays in the Ariane 6 and concerns about the Vega C, which remains out of service since a launch failure in December 2022.

The reliance on SpaceX for launching European spacecraft because of problems with Ariane 6 and Vega C has become a source of embarrassment and frustration for European officials. “As an institutional client, I’m not happy with what’s happened,” Breton said at one briefing, referring to Ariane 6 delays. “We had a calendar which was promised but not kept to.”

Breton said he welcomed agreements announced the day before, during the ESA portion of the European Space Summit, to shore up the European launch industry. That featured guaranteed financial support for a future batch of Ariane 6 and Vega C rockets, with up to 340 million euros a year for Ariane 6 and 21 million euros a year for Vega C. That agreement also includes a commitment of at least four Ariane 6 and three Vega C launches a year for European government customers.

He said there should be a “preference for Europe” when European institutions, including national governments, purchase launches, subtly criticizing those governments that have gone outside the continent, such as to SpaceX, for satellite launches. “This is a sine qua non condition of autonomous access to space. That is how we will ensure commercial viability of our launchers.”

In a Nov. 7 statement, Avio, the prime contractor for the Vega rocket, revealed other terms of the launch agreement. Avio will take over responsibilities for launch operations and sales of the Vega from Arianespace, a process slated to be completed by mid-2024. Avio said it expects to reach an agreement with Arianespace on how to handle the 17 currently contracted Vega launches.

The agreement also calls for allocation of existing infrastructure at the Kourou, French Guiana, spaceport for Vega rockets. That would include using the former Ariane 5 pad for launches of the Vega E, an upgraded version of the Vega C with a new liquid-propellant upper stage in development.

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Researchers have created a land change model that simulates interactions among urban growth, increased flooding, and how humans adapt in response.

The new model could offer a more realistic assessment of risk for urban planners, natural resource managers, and other local government stakeholders.

“Traditional risk assessment typically involves overlaying inundation layers—areas that may flood—onto existing development or population distribution to identify areas and communities at risk,” says Georgina Sanchez, research scholar in North Carolina State University’s Center for Geospatial Analytics and corresponding author of the work. “Yet this approach only provides a partial picture.

“Urban planners and residents are increasingly aware of the growing flood risks from climate change and are ready to respond and adapt when able,” Sanchez says. “It’s crucial for models to consider our collective adaptation efforts—like elevating buildings or moving away from high-risk zones. Our model provides deeper insights, helping us understand adaptive capacities and identify communities with limited resources—essentially characterizing the geography of impact and response.”

The model, FUTURES 3.0 (FUTure Urban-Regional Environment Simulation), is an open-source, scalable model that includes three components of flood risk: exposure, which refers to urban development patterns; hazard, which includes increases in flooding due to climate change; and vulnerability, or the adaptive response of people living in the area. The model incorporates climate data as well as demographic, socio-economic, and flood-damage data.

The researchers used the greater Charleston, South Carolina metropolitan area as their test case. Charleston is a rapidly developing urban area located in a low-lying region bordered by the Atlantic Ocean and numerous rivers.

By comparing land change projections for 2035 and 2050 against a 2020 baseline and across various policy intervention and response scenarios, they envisioned possible demographic and population shifts and identified which scenarios resulted in the least exposure to future flooding, as well as where flood risk remained highest across the landscape.

“The study underscores the importance of incorporating human adaptive response alongside demographic shifts and urban expansion for accurate exposure and risk assessment,” Sanchez says. “Not all residents or communities will have the means or capacity to build protective measures. Visualizing potential ‘what-if’ scenarios help us consider the where and when of impact and understand who is being affected and how.”

The researchers’ next steps are to engage with communities to discuss potential interventions. They are also expanding their studies at a regional scale.

“Through scenario-based modeling,” Sanchez says, “we explore questions like: how will communities respond to damage, who has the means to adapt, and what challenges do those with limited resources for protection face?

“Additionally, these scenarios let us visualize the long-term consequences of our current development choices,” Sanchez continues. “If we anticipate that 30 years from now a newly developed community may face the decision to retreat, why not think about protecting that area now?”

The work appears in Scientific Reports and has support from the US Geological Survey Southeast Climate Adaptation Science Center; the National Science Foundation program for Smart and Connected Communities; and the intramural research program of the US Department of Agriculture, National Institute of Food and Agriculture, McIntire-Stennis.

The open-source FUTURES software is accessible through the GitHub repository with the identifier doi:10.5281/zenodo.6607097.

Source: NC State

Saplings reveal how changing climate may undermine forests, say researchers.

As climate scientist Don Falk was hiking through a forest, the old, green pines stretched overhead. But he had the feeling that something was missing. Then his eyes found it: a seedling, brittle and brown, overlooked because of its lifelessness. Once Falk’s eyes found one, the others quickly came into his awareness. An entire generation of young trees had died.

Falk—a professor in the University of Arizona’s School of Natural Resources and the Environment, with joint appointments in the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research and the Arizona Institute for Resilience—refers to this large-scale die-off of the younger generation of trees as a recruitment failure. This is particularly devastating for a population of trees because the youngest are essential for forest recovery following massive die-off events, such as severe wildfires and insect outbreaks, both of which will become more frequent as the climate continues to change, he says.

To better understand how extreme climate conditions might trigger recruitment failure, Falk and his coauthors examined how five species of four-year-old trees respond to extended drought and heat.

They found that different species had different levels of drought tolerance and that all species were more tolerant of the heat wave than expected. Their findings appear in the journal Frontiers in Forests and Global Change.

In general, older trees are more tolerant of tougher conditions, Falk says. But when there are massive die-off events—which can be caused by drought and heat, sometimes with associated insects, pathogens, or wildfire—tree populations become dependent on their ability to regenerate.

“When scientists make models about future tree growth based on the conditions an adult tree can tolerate, it might not accurately reflect the future of the forests,” Falk says. “That’s why we focused on this seedling bottleneck.”

The team gathered trees from across five species found at various elevations in the Jemez Mountains of New Mexico. From lowest elevation to highest, this included ponderosa pine, piñon pine, Englemann spruce, Douglas fir, and limber pine. They then exposed the young trees to drought and heat conditions in a growth chamber, which allowed them to precisely control temperature, humidity, light, and water.

In the first round of the experiment, the team maintained the normal average temperature for each species and simply stopped watering the plants to test their response to drought conditions.

“About 8 weeks out, pretty much every tree was still dealing with it,” Falk says. “But then, as the drought got on to 12 and 14 weeks, the ponderosa pine seedlings started to die, and then the piñon seedlings started to die off, then the Engelmann spruce, and the Douglas fir. The ones that lasted longest, which really surprised us (lasting 36 weeks without water) was limber pine.”

“You would think that the species that live at lower, warmer elevations would be more drought adapted than trees living at the higher elevation,” Falk says. “But the higher elevation trees—the Douglas fir and limber pine—grow in the coolest temperatures and lived the longest. It appears that the trees are only as drought tolerant as they need to be. As climate change progresses, it will put more stress on the trees, and then there’ll probably be selection for those more drought- tolerant traits.”

Next, the team simulated an average heat wave by cranking up the temperature by 10 degrees for all species for one week.

As a result, each species died out in the exact same order, and died only slightly sooner.

“These results surprised me in a couple of ways,” says coauthor and professor emeritus David Breshears. “First, heat waves do indeed matter, but I expected them to have a larger effect than they did. So, they’re important, but the underlying drought and average warming seem to be the key drivers. Second, we found limber pine was the heartiest species and this has important implications for how our landscapes are likely to change.”

In their next experiment, the team plans to intensify the heat wave, Falk says.

“We need this type of information to help forest managers know what to expect next and guide what to plant following wildfire or other large die-off events of adult trees,” Breshears says.

Coauthors are from the University of Arizona, the United States Geological Survey, and the USDA Forest Service. The research had support from the USGS Southwest Climate Adaptation Science Center.

Source: University of Arizona

TAMPA, Fla. — A proposal to review satellite power limits set more than a decade ago to avoid signal interference between different orbits is one of the most divisive among operators ahead of WRC-23, a four-week meeting kicking off Nov. 20 in Dubai to update global spectrum rules.

These limits, known as Equivalent Power Flux Density (EPFD) limits, cap non-geostationary satellite power to avoid disrupting the geostationary spacecraft they fly under while passing over the equator.

Approving the proposal to review EPFD rules at WRC-23 would see the United Nations’ International Telecommunication Union (ITU) study these limits and — depending on the results of those studies — propose regulatory changes that would be up for debate at the next conference in 2027.

Amazon announced a coalition with three think tanks Oct. 31 to push delegations heading to WRC-23 to adopt the proposal to review EPFD rules, which were first put into radio regulations back in 1997 on a provisional basis.

The rules do not account for improvements in satellite technology and spectrum management principles over the years, according to the Alliance for Satellite Broadband, and ultimately reduce the availability and increase the cost of broadband services from non-geostationary orbit (NGSO).

Julie Zoller, head of global regulatory affairs for the Project Kuiper broadband constellation Amazon is plotting in low Earth orbit (LEO), said outdated EPFD rules constrain NGSO systems more than is necessary to protect their counterparts in geostationary orbit.

Hot topic

Executives from satellite operators SES and Telesat sparred over the proposal to review EPFD rules during a Nov. 7 webinar on the WRC-23 agenda hosted by SpaceNews. 

Luxembourg-based SES operates satellites in geostationary and medium Earth orbit. Telesat of Canada is a geostationary operator planning to deploy commercial LEO broadband satellites in 2026.

EPFD rules already strike the right balance between protecting geostationary satellites and enabling competition from NGSO newcomers, said Anna Marklund, director of spectrum management and development at SES, who pointed to large constellations such as SpaceX’s Starlink and those in the works by the likes of Amazon.

It took a lot of time and effort to establish EPDF rules, and Marklund said reviewing them would be a significant drain on resources better spent on more pressing spectrum issues.

“Satellite technology development is not tied to the EPFD,” she added.

Instead, she said the technology advances seen in NGSO are linked to types of orbits, which remain largely unchanged from when EPFD rules started to be developed two decades ago.

“The rules were written a long time ago and they’re worth revisiting,” countered Elisabeth Neasmith, Telesat’s senior director for regulatory issues.

While maybe nothing would change following the review, she said the proposal needs to be adopted at WRC-23 in order to have the conversation.

Marklund asserted SES is not opposed to having a conversation around reviewing EPFD rules, but that the time is not right to prioritize the review during treaty-level negotiations for changing spectrum rules.

Still, it might be better to refine EPFD rules so they address the protection of specific geostationary satellites rather than an entire geostationary arc that is seeing less activity amid a shift toward NGSO systems, according to Ruth Pritchard-Kelly, a principal at satellite regulation specialist RPK Advisors.

Pritchard-Kelly is a former head of regulatory affairs at SES and also at OneWeb, the LEO operator that recently merged with Eutelsat.

The proposal also has implications for ensuring equitable access to space, noted Jennifer Manner, senior vice president of regulatory affairs at EchoStar, a U.S.-based geostationary operator planning to start deploying 28 LEO satellites next year for connecting remote Internet of Things (IoT) devices.

Specifically, it would impact spectrum bands set aside in geostationary orbit for countries to use once they are ready. Manner said “I’d be shocked if the developing world didn’t weigh in on this” as they face losing orbital rights.

The EPFD issue underlines the complexity of negotiations facing WRC-23 delegates this year, said Katherine Gizinski, CEO of space consultancy firm River Advisers.

Ultimately, she said it’s important the WRC-23 negotiation process works as intended, and that all the various facets of issues on the agenda are considered as regulators seek a cohesive regulatory playing field for satellite and terrestrial communications.

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TAMPA, Fla. — Viasat expects to know next week what caused the antenna deployment issue that severely impaired its debut ViaSat-3 broadband satellite over the Americas, the operator’s CEO announced during earnings results Nov. 8. 

Mark Dankberg said Viasat would also be getting more information from the antenna’s supplier, which he did not name, on how long it would take to ensure a second, mostly built ViaSat-3 could launch without the issue that reduced the throughput on its first by more than 90%.

According to a CBS News report citing a Viasat executive before the April 30 SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch of ViaSat-3 F1, the first of three planned 1 terabit per second (Tbps) satellites, Northrop Grumman’s Astro Aerospace provided the antenna.

Dankberg said a third ViaSat-3 under development, which uses different antennas from another supplier and so is unaffected by the anomaly, now has a contract with an undisclosed provider to launch roughly this time next year.

Boeing is under contract to deliver all three ViaSat-3 geostationary satellites for payloads provided by Viasat. 

The second satellite, ViaSat-3 F2, was previously slated to launch on an Atlas 5 rocket from United Launch Alliance this fall to cover Europe, the Middle East, and Africa, and the final ViaSat-3 F3 satellite was set to cover Asia Pacific.

Either ViaSat-3 F2 or ViaSat-3 F3 will instead replace ViaSat-3 F1 over the Americas, Dankberg said, and ViaSat-3 F1 would then be relocated.

Doubling down on mobility

ViaSat-3’s satellite system is software-defined on the ground, which Dankberg said enables the company to optimize ViaSat-3 F1’s remaining throughput for mobile connectivity needs.

The Carlsbad, California-based company’s fixed broadband business depends more on the volume of bandwidth than on dynamic beam steering, he added, and will decline until the next ViaSat-3 launches and gets in position.

However, Viasat expects strong demand for mobile connectivity on airplanes, ships, and from government customers will still enable the company to report growth for its fiscal year 2024 that ends March 31, 2025, and fiscal year 2025 ending March 31, 2026.

Previously a core focus for Viasat, the U.S. fixed broadband market represents less than 15% of the group’s total revenues following its recently closed acquisition of British satellite operator Inmarsat.

Viasat has also stopped work on ViaSat-4, a high throughput satellite the operator was planning before acquiring Inmarsat to target fixed broadband demand.

“We expect the key technology work that was performed on ViaSat-4 will apply to a future broadband satellite that will deliver better returns in mobility applications,” Dankberg said. 

He said the decision to stop investing in ViaSat-4 would save the company hundreds of millions of dollars in the near term.

Mammoth insurance claims

Viasat is preparing to file a $421 million insurance claim for ViaSat-3 F1. 

A problem the Inmarsat-6 (I-6) F2 spacecraft encountered with its power subsystem while raising orbit after its February launch will also result in a total loss, Dankberg said, and was insured for $349 million. 

I-6 F2 was expected to provide only a small contribution to near-term revenue, according to Dankberg, and was part of a longer-term evolution of Inmarsat’s redundant global L-band coverage to a newer generation of satellites. He said Viasat is preparing plans to replace I-6 F2 with a new satellite order.

ViaSat-3 F1’s impairment, I-6 F2’s total loss, and the canned ViaSat-4 project resulted in a $900 million write-off, after taking into account expected insurance proceeds. 

While ViaSat-3 F2 is already insured, the company is still finalizing coverage for ViaSat-3 F3 as the insurance market grapples with one of the worst years for losses on record.

Viasat reported $1.2 billion in revenue for the three months to the end of September, up 85% compared with revenue from continuing operations in the same period last year. Inmarsat provided $427 million of those revenues, reflecting year-on-year growth of 16%.

However, Viasat reported a net loss of $767 million for the second quarter of its fiscal year 2024, compared with a $70 million net loss from continuing operations the prior year, mainly due to its sizable net write-down charges.

Adjusted EBITDA, or earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, jumped 210% year-on-year to $486 million compared with continuing operations. Inmarsat provided about half of this, reflecting year-on-year growth of about 10%.

Viasat, which last year sold its tactical data link business for nearly $2 billion, said the financial results were primarily driven by the Inmarsat acquisition, strong demand for commercial inflight connectivity, and its government security services.

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Approximately one in eight military families with at least one child reported using a food bank, pantries, or other charitable food distribution resources in the past year, new research shows.

For the study, researchers surveyed more than 8,325 families with an active duty service member in the United States Army or Air Force in spring 2021. Of those, 13.2% reported having to use food distribution resources at least once in the past 12 months. The odds of using a food pantry increased by 35% for each dependent child in the family.

The study found Army families were 131% more likely to use a food bank than Air Force families. Lower-ranking service members were more likely to use food distribution resources than higher-ranking individuals. And Asian, Black, and multiracial families were about 50% more likely to use food distribution services than white families.

“If we look at the American population in general, about half of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck,” says Catherine O’Neal, lead author of the study and an assistant professor in College of Family and Consumer Sciences at the University of Georgia. “So it’s not really all that surprising that what we’re seeing with the military reflects the broader population.”

Previous research has shown one in four military families experience some level of food insecurity. The US Department of Agriculture defines food insecurity as lacking access to enough food for each person in a household to live a healthy life.

The present study highlights a disconnect between the likely number of people who need help feeding their families and those actually receiving much-needed assistance.

“Stigma is a common suspect for why people don’t utilize the resources available to military families,” O’Neal says. “There’s this idea that they will be perceived as somehow less than or not capable.

“Alleviating the stigma connected to using food resources and making sure people are connected to their communities and know what resources are available to them are key to helping solve this problem.”

Two-income families were 27% less likely to use a food bank than single-earner households, according to the study.

But it’s difficult to hold down a job when your family moves every couple of years. And moving so frequently gets expensive. While military families receive a base allowance for housing, some find it isn’t always enough to cover finding a place to live in more expensive cities with a saturated housing market.

The COVID-19 pandemic created additional financial stressors for many families, both military and civilian, as did inflation.

“Military families are first and foremost families,” O’Neal says. “No one is immune to the potential of financial stress. Any efforts to address food insecurity will have to be a multi-pronged initiative that addresses the many contributing factors.

“As one part of that effort, military financial literacy efforts are underway to help military families understand how to maximize their pay and get the most out of their money.”

Published by Public Health Nutrition, the study relied on data from the National Military Family Association, a nonprofit advocacy group dedicated to improving the lives of US military families.

Source: University of Georgia