Government delays response to Reform of the Outer Space Act 1986 consultation

A statement on the UK Space Agency (UKSA) site says:

Due to the range of views received during the Reform of the Outer Space Act 1986 consultation the Government response has been delayed.

We hope to be in a position to publish it during the first half of 2013.

Further details will be posted in due course.

The Outer Space Act covers all UK satellites irrespective of size, from tiny low cost educational CubeSats up to large commercial £500 million satellites.

The key aspects of the consultation are the proposals to waive the capped liability and insurance requirement for in-orbit operation of any satellite that meets the criteria of a CubeSat and to remove the requirement for unlimited indemnity from satellite operators.

The existing Outer Space Act imposes heavy additional costs (>£50,000 per annum) on those wishing to launch small educational CubeSats. The additional costs act as a major deterrent and to-date no such UK CubeSat has been launched.

Reform of the Outer Space Act 1986: Consultation http://www.uk.amsat.org/?p=8783

Mission confirmed: UK's Sarah Brightman to blast off to space

Private Spacefarer Sarah Brightman Undergoes Medical Tests

The Space Adventures agency has confirmed that Phantom of the Opera star Sarah Brightman has signed an agreement with the Russian Space Agency and secured herself a space trip in 2015.

Brightman will become the next private spacefarer to the ISS following Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte who traveled into space in 2009.

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Mission confirmed: UK’s Sarah Brightman to blast off to space

Private Spacefarer Sarah Brightman Undergoes Medical Tests

The Space Adventures agency has confirmed that Phantom of the Opera star Sarah Brightman has signed an agreement with the Russian Space Agency and secured herself a space trip in 2015.

Brightman will become the next private spacefarer to the ISS following Cirque du Soleil founder Guy Laliberte who traveled into space in 2009.

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Pictures released of UKube-1 CubeSat

Clyde Space have released pictures showing the progress of UKube-1 as they prepare the satellite for a Soyuz launch planned for March 2013.

UKube-1 is the UK Space Agency’s first CubeSat and plans to carry an amateur radio 435/145 MHz linear transponder developed by AMSAT-UK.

Last year as part of the UKube-1 project and a student project at Cornell, the deployable solar panels were on a zero-G flight.

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Prison Inmates Build Deployers for CubeSats

NBC News reports that inmates at San Quentin prison are building CubeSat orbital deployers.

P-PODs, Poly Picosatellite Orbital Deployers are aluminum boxes designed to hold tiny satellites known as CubeSats, which ride “piggyback” into space as secondary payloads.

NBC quotes Ariel Wainzinger, a man with ten months left on his sentence, as saying: “You come to prison and you think it’s gonna be all gloom and doom and you find yourself with a lot of different opportunities and you take advantage of it.”

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Cuba to Spain on amateur radio satellite FO-29

Hector Martinez CO6CBF - 640

Hector Martinez CO6CBF

Hector, CO6CBF reports on his successful transatlantic contact between Cuba and Spain using the amateur radio satellite FO-29.

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