Iran has successfully put into orbit its newest bio-space capsule with the domestically-built Salman launcher.

The 500-kilogram capsule, developed by the Aerospace Research Institute of Iran, affiliated to the Ministry of Science, Research and Technology, was launched to an altitude of 130 kilometers from the Earth’s surface on Wednesday.

The launch is a step to send humans into space in line with the Iranian government’s plan to revive various sectors of the space industry and consolidate bio-space knowledge.

It was a test for space technologies in the areas of launch, recovery and speed control systems, as well as impact shields, capsule aerodynamic design, and the systems related to control and monitoring of biological conditions.

Salman launcher is manufactured by the Aerospace Industries Organization, a subsidiary of the Iranian Defense Ministry. It is capable of launching bio-capsules weighing 500 kilograms.

Spokesman for the Aerospace Research Institute said the 13th government of the Islamic Republic has practically revived the bio-space.

Hossein Dalirian said several bio-capsules systems were tested for the first time, and that the launcher, which was the first version, “performed very well” its the first launch.

He said Salman launcher achieved great success in its first try and carried the 500-kilogram capsule in very good condition.

“This capsule is the result of relying on domestic power and the efforts of space industry experts in the Ministry of Defense.”

Despite sanctions imposed by Western countries in recent years, Iran has managed to take giant strides in its civilian space program.

Iran sent its first bio-capsule containing living creatures into space in February 2010, using a Kavoshgar (Explorer) carrier.

Speaking to Fars news agency, Iran’s telecoms minister Issa Zarepour said Tehran will soon conduct suborbital tests of the new generation of bio-capsules, hoping that they will bring the country closer to its space goals.

The capsule launched on Wednesday “is about half a ton and has the ability to carry a human, but its suborbital tests are underway,” he added.

“It should be taken into account that we are still 5 to 6 years away from reaching the point where we can send humans into space.”

Zarepour also noted that the Islamic Republic is trying to revitalize works in the field of launching biological capsules after a 10-year closure.

Iran is among the top 10 countries leading the space industry and among the 7 leading the bio-space.

Source: Presstv

India on Wednesday made history when its Chandrayaan-3 lander successfully touched down on the Moon’s south pole, thought to be a potential source for water and oxygen, days after Russia’s mission failed.

The Indian space agency launched the rocket on July 14, blasting off from the country’s main spaceport in the southern state of Andhra Pradesh.

The Moon landing is a historic moment for the world’s most populous nation, as it rapidly closes in on milestones set by global space powers.

Chandrayaan-3, which means “Mooncraft” in Sanskrit, touched down shortly after 6pm India time (1230 GMT) near the little-explored lunar south pole.

A previous Indian effort failed in 2019, and today’s success comes just days after Russia’s first Moon mission in almost 50 years, destined for the same region, crashed on the lunar surface.

K. Sivan, the former head of the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), said it had made corrections after the failure of four years ago, when scientists lost contact with the previous lunar module moments before its slated landing.

“Chandrayaan-3 is going to go with more ruggedness,” he said prior to the successful landing. “We have confidence, and we expect that everything will go smoothly.”

The mission was launched nearly six weeks ago in front of thousands of cheering spectators, but took much longer to reach the Moon than those of the Apollo missions in the 1960s and 1970s, which arrived in a matter of days.

India is using rockets much less powerful than those the United States used back then, meaning the probe needed to orbit Earth several times to gain speed before embarking on its month-long lunar trajectory.

The spacecraft’s lander, Vikram, which means “valour” in Sanskrit, detached from its propulsion module last week and has been sending back images of the moon’s surface since entering lunar orbit on August 5.

A day ahead of the landing, the ISRO said on social media the landing was proceeding on schedule and that its mission control complex was “buzzed with energy and excitement”.

“Smooth sailing is continuing,” the agency posted on X, formerly known as Twitter.

India has a comparatively low-budget aerospace programme, but one that has grown considerably in size and momentum since it first sent a probe to orbit the Moon in 2008.

The latest mission comes with a price tag of $74.6 million – far lower than those of other countries, and a testament to India’s frugal space engineering.

Experts say India can keep costs low by copying and adapting existing space technology, and thanks to an abundance of highly skilled engineers who earn a fraction of their foreign counterparts’ wages.

In 2014, India became the first Asian nation to put a satellite into orbit around Mars and is slated to launch a three-day manned mission into Earth’s orbit by next year.

‘Very, very important’

Sivan, the former ISRO chief, said India’s efforts to explore the relatively unmapped lunar south pole would make a “very, very important” contribution to scientific knowledge.

Only Russia, the United States and China have previously achieved a controlled landing on the lunar surface.

If successful, it would have beaten Chandrayaan-3 by a matter of days to become the first mission of any nation to make a controlled landing around the lunar south pole.

But the Luna-25 probe crash-landed on Saturday after an unspecified incident as it was preparing for descent.

Punishing sanctions since the outset of the war in Ukraine have affected Russia’s space industry, which has also been beleaguered by corruption and a lack of innovation and partnerships.

Source:  Reuters

The submersible that went missing during a tourist expedition to the Titanic imploded near the wreckage, killing all five people on board, the US Coast Guard said Thursday, bringing a grim end to a massive international search for the vessel.

Among those on board the vessel was the tour operator’s boss, a French submarine operator known as “Mr Titanic”, a British aviation tycoon and a wealthy Pakistani businessman and his son.

Stockton Rush

Stockton Rush was the chief executive of OceanGate Expeditions, a company based in Washington state which operates the tourist dives and was founded in 2009.

According to his company website, Rush began his career in 1981 as the youngest jet transport rated pilot in the world, aged 19.

In 1984, Rush became a flight test engineer on the F-15 fighter jet program for the McDonnell Douglas company.

But over the last two decades, he threw himself into several ocean-related tech ventures including Seattle’s BlueView Technologies, which makes small, high-frequency sonar systems.

After a long period when trips were postponed after Rush failed to get the proper permits for the project’s support vessel, OceanGate Expeditions started taking paying customers to the Titanic’s wreck in 2021.

Paul-Henri Nargeolet

Nicknamed “Mr Titanic”, French submarine operator Paul-Henri Nargeolet was one of the vessel’s crew.

The 77-year-old, who served in the French navy for 25 years, has dived all over the world and spoken openly about the risks of his exploits in the most inaccessible waters of the world’s oceans.

Connecticut-based Nargeolet had already undertaken more than 30 dives to explore the Titanic and had supervised the recovery of around 5,500 objects, including a fragment weighing 20 tonnes that is displayed in Los Angeles.

His research produced a 2022 book where he questioned the findings of British and American enquiries into the 1912 disaster, arguing that five smaller holes were to blame rather than a 100-metre gash that followed Titanic’s collision with an iceberg.

Hamish Harding

Harding, 58, was a British aviation tycoon with three Guinness World Records and had a history of thrill-seeking adventures.

A year ago, he became a space tourist through Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin company.

He founded Action Aviation, a company that buys and sells aircraft with offices in Dubai and London’s Stansted airport, with UK media reporting that the UAE-based businessman is a billionaire.

He was based in the Indian city of Bengaluru for five years, as managing director of a logistics company, before establishing Action Aviation in 2004.

His Guinness records are for longest duration and distance traversed at full ocean depth by a crewed vessel, and the fastest circumnavigation via both poles by plane.                 

Shahzada and Suleman Dawood                

Prominent Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood, 48, was the vice chairman of Karachi-headquartered conglomerate Engro.

His son Suleman, 19, was a university student, and both had British citizenship.

A statement by the family-run holding group Dawood Hercules described Shahzada as a “loving father” to two children with a keen interest in “photography, especially wildlife photography, and exploring different natural habitats”.

Engro had an array of investments in energy, agriculture, petrochemicals and telecommunications. At the end of 2022, the firm announced revenue of 350 billion rupees ($1.2 billion).

Shahzada’s father Hussain Dawood is regularly listed among Pakistan’s richest men by the domestic press.

Shahzada’s profile on Engro’s website said he also serves as a trustee on the board of The Dawood Foundation – a high-profile family education charity founded in 1960.

He was educated in the United States and Britain, the profile said.

Source: AFP

A U.S. Navy acoustic system detected an ‘anomaly’ Sunday that was likely the Titan’s fatal implosion, according to a senior military official.

The Navy went back and analyzed its acoustic data after the Titan submersible was reported missing Sunday. Coast Guard officials on Thursday announced that the craft suffered a catastrophic implosion, killing all five aboard.

That anomaly was “consistent with an implosion or explosion in the general vicinity of where the TITAN submersible was operating when communications were lost,” according to the senior Navy official.

The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive acoustic detection system.

The Navy passed on the information to the Coast Guard, which continued its search.

The Wall Street Journal on Thursday first reported the Navy’s involvement.

A submersible carrying five people to the Titanic imploded near the site of the shipwreck and killed everyone on board, authorities said Thursday, bringing a tragic end to a saga that included an urgent around-the-clock search and a worldwide vigil for the missing vessel.

Coast Guard officials said during a news conference that they’ve notified the families of the crew of the Titan, which had been missing since Sunday.

The sliver of hope that remained for finding the five men alive was wiped away early Thursday, when the submersible’s 96-hour supply of oxygen was expected to run out and the Coast Guard announced that debris had been found roughly 1,600 feet (488 meters) from the Titanic in North Atlantic waters.

“This was a catastrophic implosion of the vessel,” said Rear Adm. John Mauger, of the First Coast Guard District.

OceanGate Expeditions, the company that owned and operated the submersible, said in a statement that all five people in the vessel, including CEO and pilot Stockton Rush, “have sadly been lost.”

The others on board were: two members of a prominent Pakistani family, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood; British adventurer Hamish Harding; and Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

“These men were true explorers who shared a distinct spirit of adventure, and a deep passion for exploring and protecting the world’s oceans,” OceanGate said in a statement. “We grieve the loss of life and joy they brought to everyone they knew.”

OceanGate has been chronicling the Titanic’s decay and the underwater ecosystem around it via yearly voyages since 2021.

Rescuers rushed ships, planes and other equipment to the site of the disappearance.

Authorities were hoping underwater sounds detected Tuesday and Wednesday might help narrow their search, whose coverage area had been expanded to thousands of miles — twice the size of Connecticut and in waters 2 1/2 miles (4 kilometers) deep.

But the Coast Guard indicated Thursday that the sounds were likely generated by something other than the Titan.

“There doesn’t appear to be any connection between the noises and the location (of the debris) on the seafloor,” Mauger said.

Mauger said it was too soon to say whether the implosion happened at the time of the submersible’s last communication on Sunday. But it was not detected by sonar buoys used by search crews, he said, which suggests it happened before they arrived several days ago.

“We had listening devices in the water throughout and did not hear any signs of catastrophic failure from those,” he said.

The Coast Guard will continue searching near the Titanic for more clues about what happened to the Titan. Efforts to recover the submersible and the remains of the five men who died will also continue, Mauger said.

The White House thanked the U.S. Coast Guard, along with Canadian, British and French partners who helped in the search and rescue efforts.

“Our hearts go out to the families and loved ones of those who lost their lives on the Titan. They have been through a harrowing ordeal over the past few days, and we are keeping them in our thoughts and prayers,” the statement said.

The Titan launched at 6 a.m. Sunday and was reported overdue Sunday afternoon about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. John’s, Newfoundland, as it was on its way to where the Titanic sank more than a century ago. By Thursday, when the oxygen supply was expected to run out, there was little hope of finding the crew alive.

Broadcasters around the world started newscasts at the critical hour Thursday with news of the submersible. The Saudi-owned satellite channel Al Arabiya showed a clock on air counting down to their estimate of when the air could potentially run out.

‘Technology can fail’

At least 46 people successfully traveled on OceanGate’s submersible to the Titanic wreck site in 2021 and 2022, according to letters the company filed with a U.S. District Court in Norfolk, Virginia, that oversees matters involving the Titanic shipwreck. But questions about the submersible’s safety were raised by former passengers.

One of the company’s first customers likened a dive he made to the site two years ago to a suicide mission.

“Imagine a metal tube a few meters long with a sheet of metal for a floor. You can’t stand. You can’t kneel. Everyone is sitting close to or on top of each other,” said Arthur Loibl, a retired businessman and adventurer from Germany. “You can’t be claustrophobic.”

During the 2 1/2-hour descent and ascent, the lights were turned off to conserve energy, he said, with the only illumination coming from a fluorescent glow stick.

The dive was repeatedly delayed to fix a problem with the battery and the balancing weights. In total, the voyage took 10 1/2 hours.

The submersible had seven backup systems to return to the surface, including sandbags and lead pipes that drop off and an inflatable balloon.

Nicolai Roterman, a deep-sea ecologist and lecturer in marine biology at the University of Portsmouth, England, said the disappearance of the Titan highlights the dangers and unknowns of deep-sea tourism.

“Even the most reliable technology can fail, and therefore accidents will happen. With the growth in deep-sea tourism, we must expect more incidents like this.”

Source: AP

Russian space agency Roscosmos said on Tuesday the three astronauts who were left stranded by a pressure leak in their return capsule last year will be able to return on the Soyuz MS-23 replacement capsule in September.

Russian cosmonauts Dmitry Petelin and Sergei Prokopyev and NASA astronaut Frank Rubio flew to the ISS in September 2022 aboard a Soyuz MS-22 capsule.

They were scheduled to return home in the same spacecraft, but it began leaking coolant in mid-December after being hit by what US and Russian space officials believe was a tiny space rock.

Russia plans to send a rescue ship, a Soyuz MS-23, on February 24.

Before the leak, the trio had been due to return to Earth on March 28, 2023.

But on Tuesday, Russia’s Roscosmos space agency said in a statement that their return “at the moment is scheduled to take place aboard the Soyuz MS-23 in September, 2023.”

Roscosmos said the extended space stay — normally ISS missions last six months — posed no health risks for the crew, adding that they had taken the news of their mission extending “positively.”

In 2021, Russia’s Pyotr Dubrov and the US’s Mark Vande also spent a year on the ISS after their mission was extended, it said.

The launch of the rescue Soyuz capsule was itself postponed earlier this month after another vessel — a Russian supply ship docked at the ISS, the Progress MS-21 — had also leaked coolant, sparking concern.

On Tuesday Roscosmos said that particular leak was caused by an “exterior impact,” based on photos and videos that showed holes on the capsule’s exterior, including on the radiator and solar panels.

Space has remained a rare venue of cooperation between Moscow and Washington since the start of the Russian offensive in Ukraine and ensuing Western sanctions on Russia.

The ISS was launched in 1998 at a time of increased US-Russia cooperation following the Cold War “Space Race.”

Russia has been using the ageing but reliable Soyuz capsules to ferry astronauts into space since the 1960s.

But in recent years Russia’s space programme has been beset by a litany of problems which have led to the loss of satellites and vehicles.

Source: AFP

The world is littered with millions of oil and gas production facilities which include active wells and processing plants. More than 100 million people on the African continent live within half a mile of these sites and they are exposed to pollutants daily. What is more unfortunate is that when fossil fuels get burned by automobiles, power plants and industrial facilities, they release even more impurities into the atmosphere.

Air pollution from fossil fuels is known as the “invisible killer” and it has been scientifically proven that air pollution can lead to respiratory, cardiovascular, and other diseases and it is responsible for millions of deaths on the African continent. Fossil fuel development can also result in the leaking of toxic substances into the soil and drinking water sources, causing cancer, birth defects and liver damage.

In Africa, low-income communities are disproportionately impacted since these groups tend to live in neighborhoods with more pollution and they lack the resources to help themselves or to fight back. The health threats from oil and gas production are very real and it is crucial to reduce fossil fuel development, especially in rural areas of the continent where regulations by governments are not stringent enough and most African governments lack the resources to carry out inspection and evaluation missions. 

These operations are changing life in communities where they are implemented, triggering climate change whose impact is clearly visible. Many reports 2020 was one of the warmest on record, and the trend is only continuing with increased human activity, leaving poor communities even more desperate. These extreme weather events are directly linked to fossil fuels which release heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere.

While global warming is a global phenomenon, the poor are disproportionately affected because of the economic and financial situation. Due to unjust housing policies and practices, these communities often live in treeless, concrete neighborhoods which are more susceptible to extreme weather events. These vulnerable segments of the continent’s population also have a harder time accessing natural landscapes which can help mitigate climate impacts.

Though it is held that Africa accounts for a small percentage of global emissions, it is also held that most of its emissions come from fossil fuel extractions. Experts hold that if Africa were to make that transition to greener and cleaner fuel sources, the continent would rid itself of some of the health issues it is facing right now. Africa can have less fossil fuel extraction and more responsible renewable energy as a means of ridding itself of the environmental issues it is currently facing.

Also, though oil and gas extraction infrastructure can create jobs and improve lives, it can also leave behind radical impacts on wildlands. The construction of roads, facilities and drilling sites requires the use of heavy equipment, and this can destroy big chunks of pristine wilderness. The damage is often irreversible. Even if oil and gas companies eventually abandon their operations sites, it can take centuries before they fully recover. What is more disheartening is that  many fossil fuel developments are located in a semi-arid climate which receives little precipitation. A full recovery would require human intervention and a bundle of resources.

Moreover, too much noise from drilling equipment, air pollution or damaged landscapes can ruin anyone’s life. The unsightly effects of oil and gas can ultimately hurt local communities which depend on their natural environment for tourism and food. In many parts of the continent, outdoor recreation is a big driver of local and national economies but spills from drilling sites have hurt so many people on the continent like in Nigeria’s Delta region where the country’s government and oil companies are doing very little to clean up the mess the oil companies have generated. 

Oil and gas extraction is also a menace to wildlife. Loud noises, human movement and vehicle traffic from drilling operations can disrupt animals’ communication, breeding, and nesting. Powerlines, wellpads, fences, and roads can also fragment habitats for many species. Elephants, lions, monkeys, and other species are today endangered species in many parts of the continent due to increased drilling and other human activities. 

In Southern Africa where most of the continent’s exploration takes place, animals which were noted for making age-old treks have faced a series of obstacles due, in part, to intense activity in major natural gas and oil fields. The continent’s wildlife population is shrinking, and these animals sometimes must navigate past enormous well pads and noisy compressor stations to find what forage has not been bulldozed. Future energy development on the continent could ultimately have major impacts on the abundance of these animals.

Big oil spills are big killers of wildlife and can cause long-lasting damage to marine ecosystems. Smaller spills during oil and gas extraction do not always make headlines but can also be dangerous. Drilling fluids injected into wells for lubrication—known as “mud”—are supposed to be captured in lined pits for disposal. However, they often leak and are splashed around drilling sites.

Big and small oil spills are common in top producing countries like Nigeria and Libya. These incidents can have devastating effects on local wildlife through direct contact, inhalation, and ingestion of toxic chemicals. The glare from oil and gas sites in oil-producing countries like Nigeria is so strong that it is visible from space.  Much of that light is produced by the burning, or flaring, of natural gas, well pads and storage sites. 

Scientists have found that the bright glow can hurt pollinators such as bees. These insects have the very important job of moving pollen around, which helps to generate new fruits and plants. But luminosity disrupts their sleep, feeding and reproductive cycles, which in turn leads to the dwindling of plants in those parts of the continent. The brightness is also changing important cultural landscapes on the continent and if left unchecked, it could herald the death of some of Africa’s rich culture, especially as many people walk away from the polluting drilling sites. 

By Atem Thomas Ashu  With extractions from https://www.wilderness.org/articles/blog/7-ways-oil-and-gas-drilling-bad-environment