Minutes of March 14 Oklahoma Space Alliance Meeting
Oklahoma Space Alliance met March 14, 2026, at the Cyber Hall and Gaming Lounge at Norman Computers in Norman, Oklahoma. Attending were Clifford McMurray, Adam Hemphill, Mark Deaver (briefly), John Northcutt, Tim Scott, Dave Sheely and Syd Henderson, with Robin Scott joining us by phone. OSA President Clifford McMurray. presided over the meeting He did an Update discussing links to material covered in the meeting and this is online https://osa.nss.org/Update2603.pdf so I’ll cover the details that aren’t covered there.
We are still waiting for Artemis II to go back to the launch pad. Syd remarked that the Artemis launches seem to be referred to alternately with Roman numerals or Arabic numerals depending on the source. [The same seems to have been true for the Gemini and Apollo missions. Hence the movie Apollo 13 although the mission patch says Apollo XIII. From that I conclude NASA itself uses Roman numerals, as confirmed by the Artemis II mission patch and who am I to say otherwise?--Syd]
NASA is revising its Moon plans. They are not talking about using SLS beyond Artemis V. There is speculation that the office handling the Lunar Gateway will be transformed into a lunar base office, [Gateway is probably dead.]
ISS will continue for at least two years beyond its previous decommission date to keep a permanent human presence in space and allow time to transfer to commercial space stations. I note that this means a permanent American human presence; the Chinese may well intend to have their own.
The impact of DART with Dimorphos also changed the orbital speed of its parent Didymos around the Sun by several microns per second. The orbital period of Dimorphos around Didymos was changed by thirty minutes. I don’t know how much the change to Didymos changes the orbital period around the Sun.
The upgrade to Artemis IV was not going to happen because we now have viable alternatives. Specifically, the Centaur V upper stage.
A science payload on MTN (Mars Telecommunications Network) is not precluded but not necessary.
Astrolab/Interlune anticipate a fleet of lunar harvesters. Is Astrobot a part of Astrolab?
RocketLab may have a mission to Venus this year, perhaps via Neutron rocket. But this may get delayed because Neutron is.
Vast will have the sixth (?) private mission to the ISS and Haven-1 next year.
The March 4 Kairos flight failed two minutes after launch. One of the previous Kairos made it to orbit but the satellites were lost. The March 4 flight was the third failure of Kairos in three tries.
Mauve, the first commercial space telescope, was spawned out of University College in London.
“The Year of the Horse calls for the vigor of a galloping steed:” commentator on Shenzhou 21. We watched videos from the Tiangong Space Station.
After the meeting on April 11, we will adjourn to Kip McMurray’s for a Yuri’s Night pizza party.
Project Hail Mary debuts on March 20. Shall we put a group together a week later to see it?
We watched a video on Haven-2, VAST’s project to replace the ISS. They start off with four modules linked in a row that will separate to form an X-shaped space station around a central core. They can attach several modules to each wing.
We watched a video on SpaceX unveiling VAST’s Haven-1.
Vast’s Spinning Stick will use 6-8 modules end-to-end to generate artificial gravity to go to Mars.
We watched a video on life within SpaceX’s Dragon capsule. Dragon has seven launch spots in Florida alone.
--Minutes By OSA Secretary Syd Henderson
Contact person for Oklahoma Space Alliance is Clifford Mcmurray
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