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Divining clues about Bigelow’s plans

05.18.06

Bigelow Aerospace is not nearly as secretive as it was just a couple of years ago: it now invites journalists to tour its Las Vegas facility where it is working on inflatable module designs, and it’s even revamped its web site. Still, it’s not very forthcoming about its plans, particularly in the near term. We do know the launch of Genesis 1 (or Genesis Pathfinder 1, by some accounts), its first prototype, is planned for next month on a Dnepr rocket, but that information comes from the Roskosmos manifest, not Bigelow itself. Today, the Allied Defense Group announced that its SeaSpace subsidiary has sold two 6.1 meter antennas to Bigelow. These antennas will be used at “commercial ground station facilities in Alaska and Hawaii.” The contract is a follow-on to a deal last year where SeaSpace sold a similar antenna system to Bigelow. The report doesn’t offer any more details, although the note that the antennas will be located at commercial facilities in Alaska and Hawaii suggests that Bigelow may be working with a company like Universal Space Network, which operates a worldwide network of ground stations, including locations in Alaska and Hawaii. That doesn’t mean too much in the overall scheme of things, other than to suggest that Bigelow does seem to be continuing to make progress.