TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb 6, 2025--
SFL Missions Inc. has been awarded a competitive bid contract by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) to conduct a conceptual design study of the planned High-Altitude Aerosols, Water vapour, and Clouds (HAWC) satellite mission. HAWC is Canada’s contribution to NASA’s Atmosphere Observing System (AOS) mission slated for launch in 2031.
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“The HAWC mission will collect atmospheric data that will support extreme weather prediction, climate modeling, and air quality forecasting,” said Michael Henderson, SFL Missions Inc.’s Guidance, Navigation and Control Specialist.
Under the Phase 0 contract, SFL Missions will study the design requirements of the planned HAWC satellite (HAWCsat) and the Aerosol Limb Imager (ALI) instrument that will fly onboard. ALI will measure aerosols, which are tiny solid and liquid particles suspended in the atmosphere. Emanating from forest fires and volcanoes, as well as power plants and industrial processes, aerosols impact weather, climate, and air quality.
ALI will be complemented by the Spatial Heterodyne Observations of Water (SHOW) instrument also carried aboard HAWCsat. SHOW will measure water vapour in the upper atmosphere, a key component of cloud formation which drives heating and cooling of Earth.
ALI and SHOW will make measurements in coordination with a third Canadian instrument, called Thin Ice Clouds and Far InfraRed Emissions (TICFIRE), which is flying on the NASA AOS satellite. HAWCsat will fly in formation leading the AOS spacecraft by 310 seconds.
SFL Missions is uniquely qualified to study the design of this mission due to the importance of formation flying of HAWCsat with the AOS spacecraft. SFL Missions has expertise in precise attitude control, accurate sensor pointing, and autonomous formation flying technologies that have been developed and refined for low-mass smaller satellites.
“Success of the mission depends on the HAWC spacecraft flying in a precise orbit relative to the AOS satellite, so that both capture measurements from the same portion of the atmosphere at the same time, but from different angles,” said Henderson.
The study phase, or Phase 0, of the CSA HAWC mission design will be completed by November of this year.
About SFL Missions Inc. ( https://sflmissions.com )
SFL Missions Inc. generates bigger returns from smaller, lower cost satellites. Small satellites built by SFL Missions consistently push the performance envelope and disrupt the traditional cost paradigm. We build quality small satellites at low cost that work the first time and enable NewSpace companies to mass produce through our Flex Production program. Satellites are built with advanced power systems, stringent attitude control and high-volume data capacity that are striking relative to the budget. We arrange launches globally and maintain a mission control center accessing ground stations worldwide. The pioneering and barrier-breaking work of SFL Missions is a key enabler to tomorrow’s cost-aggressive satellites and constellations.
Artist's rendering of the CSA HAWC satellite (upper) flying in formation with the NASA AOS satellite (lower) in orbit. (Credit: Canadian Space Agency)
LOS LLANITOS, México (AP) — On a dirt field on Mexico’s Pacific coast, five cousins between the ages of 8 and 13 strip down and kick off their shoes. Nearby, adults help them fasten the pre-Hispanic-style “fajado,” securing loincloths and leather belts that wrap around their hips.
The Osuna children grab the rubber ball, all 3.2 kilograms of it — around 7 pounds or seven times heavier than a soccer ball — and begin playing. Only the hips may touch it, forcing players to leap through the air or dive low when it skims the ground.
As Mexico prepares to co-host the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the nation is looking back 3,400 years to one of the oldest team sports: the ancient ballgame known as ulama, a ritual practice nearly erased during the Spanish conquest that survived only in the remote pockets of northwestern Mexico before its late 20th-century rebirth. Today, authorities and its modern players are leveraging the momentum of international soccer to shine a spotlight on the ancient sport once again.
While players acknowledge that tourism fueled the sport’s revival, many worry that projecting an “exotic” image undermines a tradition central to their identity.
“We must rid the game of the notion that it is a living fossil,” said Emilie Carreón, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, UNAM, and director of a project aimed at studying and practicing the sport.
That's exactly what the Osuna family is trying to do. After ulama player Aurelio Osuna died, his widow, María Herrera, 53, continued his legacy, teaching the ballgame to their grandchildren in their small village in Sinaloa, 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) northwest of Mexico City.
“This seed will bear fruit someday,” she said.
According to the Popol Vuh, the sacred Mayan book, the world was created from a ballgame, where light and darkness clashed to balance life and death and set the universe in motion.
Long before the Maya, the Olmecs — the earliest known Mesoamerican civilization — practiced the sport; the recreation of this clash of opposing forces was common in various pre-Hispanic cultures. The evidence is in millennial rubber balls unearthed in Mexico and in nearly 2,000 ball courts found from Nicaragua to Arizona.
The game, depicted in codices, stone carvings and sculptures, had many variations and meanings, from fertility or war ceremonies, to political acts and even sacrifices.
While some players were beheaded — possibly the losers — Guatemalan archaeologist and anthropologist Carlos Navarrete explained this occurred only during specific periods and in certain regions. The physically demanding game was primarily a big social event, drawing crowds for fun and betting.
Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés was impressed by the spectacle presented by the Aztec emperor Moctezuma but the Spanish ultimately banned ulama and ordered the destruction of its courts, likely viewing the tradition as a form of resistance to Christianity. For the Catholic Church “the ball was the living devil,” Carreón said.
The game — played by hitting the ball with the hip, the forearm or a mallet — survived only on the Mexican northern Pacific coast, where the colonial process led by Jesuit priests was less aggressive and ulama was accepted in Catholic festivities, said Manuel Aguilar Moreno, a professor of art history at California State University.
On the opening day of the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, spectators watched as burly men contorted their bodies in unexpected ways to keep the rubber ball moving for as long as possible. The exhibition sparked studies about the ballgame and how to preserve it in the following decades.
Luis Aurelio Osuna, 30, Herrera’s eldest son, began playing hip ulama after school, just as his father did decades ago in Los Llanitos, a ranch next to the port city of Mazatlán. Now his three children also play.
Osuna and his mother teach the children how to hit the ball and guide them through the complicated rules, which include a scoring system with points that are won and lost.
They do it out of passion, but also out of pragmatism in a state where organized crime is pervasive.
“We need to find a way to keep them entertained with good things,” said Osuna.
Hip ulama teams have up to six players and the Osuna family sometimes participates in tournaments or exhibitions.
Decades ago, matches were big events tied to religious feasts, sometimes stretching on for an entire week. But those days are gone, as interest waned and rubber balls became hard to get.
In the 1980s, filmmaker Roberto Rochín documented the work of perhaps the last rubber ball-maker in the mountains of Sinaloa. The artisan made them similar to the Olmecs, who discovered that mixing hot rubber sap with a plant created a strong, elastic and durable material. This civilization made some of the oldest balls of the world.
During the 1990s, staff from a resort in the Mexican Caribbean traveled across the country in search of Sinaloan families who could represent the ballgame as a tourist attraction in the Riviera Maya, where no one played it anymore.
“It’s pure spectacle: they paint their faces and put on feathered costumes,” Herrera said. Yet, she acknowledges the value. “That’s where the revival began.”
The ballgame began to spread and to be known outside Mexico. Osuna, with the family team his father had formed, ended up playing hip ulama in a Roman amphitheater in Italy. It attracted so much attention that they were hired for a deodorant commercial, he said.
As the World Cup approaches, authorities and corporations are launching exhibitions in Mexico City and Guadalajara, and featuring ulama players in ad campaigns highlighting Mexican heritage — a move that has sparked mixed feelings.
“We’re not circus monkeys,” says Ángel Ortega, a 21-year-old ulama player from Mexico City who recently participated in a TV commercial alongside football players.
Ilse Sil, a player and member of the UNAM project led by Carreón, believes that institutional support will help to preserve ulama but officials need to promote the game in communities and schools to recruit more young players, as it remains a marginal sport with approximately 1,000 players mainly in México and Guatemala.
In Los Llanitos, Herrera’s grandchildren love playing. They don't care where — in the dirt field, in a court or even in the house corridor — but always with the precious inheritance: a handmade decades-old rubber ball from the mountains of Sinaloa. They say it cushions the blows better.
Eight-year-old Kiki is the most enthusiastic. He says he is determined to keep practicing until he fulfills the dream of leading a team of his own.
Follow AP’s coverage of Latin America and the Caribbean at https://apnews.com/hub/latin-america
Juan Osuna plays ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
The Osuna family poses for a photo before a match of ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, that they organized in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Iker Salgueido plays ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Iker Salgueiro stands still as an adult fastens a pre-Hispanic-style “fajado,” or leather belt, in preparation for ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
Youth play ulama, a traditional Mesoamerican ballgame dating to pre-Hispanic times, in Los Llanitos on the outskirts of Mazatlan, Mexico, Saturday, April 25, 2026. (AP Photo/Marco Ugarte)
