Space news

A U.S. military data relay satellite and a rideshare platform with its own suite of payloads rocketed into a sunset sky over Florida’s Space Coast Sunday on a Falcon Heavy launcher, putting on a dazzling show for local residents and visitors as the rocket’s two side boosters returned to Cape Canaveral for landing.

A SpaceX Falcon Heavy lifted off Jan. 15 at 5:56 p.m. Eastern from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center, Florida, carrying the U.S. Space Force USSF-67 mission to geostationary Earth orbit.

A trickle of Falcon Heavy launches may soon turn into a flood.

SpaceX’s fifth Falcon Heavy lifted off shortly after sunset on the US Space Force’s USSF-67 mission, producing one of the massive commercial...

The United States and Japan signed an agreement Jan. 13 to enable further cooperation between the two countries in space exploration, but without announcing any new initiatives.

Engineers are troubleshooting thruster problems on a cubesat launched last month to search for water ice at the moon, the latest in a series of technical issues among small satellites recently launched to the moon and beyond.

The latest Falcon Heavy mission launched Sunday, Jan. 15, at 5:56 PM EST (22:56 UTC).

During an event hosted by NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington Friday, representatives from the United States and Japan gathered to sign an agreement that builds on a long history of collaboration in space exploration between the two nations.

Dragonfly, NASA’s unique robotic exploration mission using a rotorcraft to fly a science laboratory around the surface of Saturn’s moon Titan, is continuing to march through its preliminary design steps.

Five Earth observation satellites from Japan’s Axelspace are helping NorthStar Earth and Space keep tabs on orbits ahead of the Canadian firm’s proposed Space Situational Awareness constellation.

An option under consideration for NSSL Phase 3 is to create “on ramps” to allow emerging launch providers to compete

Two astronauts on the International Space Station will conduct a spacewalk Friday, Jan. 20, to install hardware for future power system upgrades.

World View, a company that is developing stratospheric balloon platforms as an alternative to spacecraft for research and tourism, announced Jan. 13 it will go public through a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger.

Northrop Grumman and the U.S. Space Force say converted launch vehicle payload adapter rings, upgraded with power and propulsion to create full-fledged satellites, are proving effective in more rapidly delivering military instruments and sensors to orbit. The fifth such mission is set to launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket Saturday.

NASA has selected Shawn Quinn as manager of the Exploration Ground Systems program based at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, effective Sunday, Jan. 15.

Payloads: Actiwatch Plus (AWP): The crew connected the AWP devices to a Human Research Facility (HRF) Rack 1 Universal Serial Bus (USB) hub to charge them and transfer data for subsequent downlink. The Actiwatch is a waterproof, non-intrusive, sleep-wake activity monitor worn on the wrist of a crewmember. It contains a miniature uniaxial accelerometer that …

Two U.S. military satellites set to ride SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket into geosynchronous orbit more than 22,000 miles above Earth were mated with their launch vehicle Friday at Kennedy Space Center ahead of a scheduled liftoff Saturday just after sunset.

SpaceX and its chief executive, Elon Musk, say the first orbital launch attempt of its Starship vehicle is approaching, but the company must first overcome both technical and regulatory obstacles.

“This is not the outcome we were hoping for today."

The newest version of the ESPA ring deploys experiments but also more advanced operational smallsats

Media are invited to a news conference with NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and other agency leadership at 10 a.m. EST on Wednesday, Jan. 18, at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

La NASA ha seleccionado a 60 equipos ganadores del segundo desafío estudiantil TechRise, un concurso nacional diseñado para involucrar a estudiantes de tecnología, la ciencia y la exploración espacial. Estos equipos trabajarán juntos para construir experimentos científicos y tecnológicos como preparación para una prueba de vuelo suborbital.

NASA has selected Banner Quality Management Inc., of Friendswood, Texas, to provide safety and mission assurance, engineering, and technical services to the agency in various locations across the country.

NSF has reached an agreement with SpaceX to mitigate the effects of the company’s second-generation Starlink satellites on astronomy, even as another organization goes to court to block the constellation’s deployment.

NASA selected 60 winning teams for the second TechRise Student Challenge, a nationwide contest designed to engage students in technology, science, and space exploration. These teams will work together to build science and technology experiments in preparation for a suborbital flight test.

On Dec. 21, 2022, NASA announced that its InSight lander mission on Mars had ended after efforts to regain contact with the spacecraft failed. InSight did not respond to communications beginning on Dec. 18, 2022.

The U.S. Space Force is holding discussions with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration about replacing a geostationary weather satellite over the Indian Ocean.

Cybersecurity specialist SpiderOak raised $16.4 million in a Series C investment round led by Empyrean Technology Solutions, a space technology platform affiliated with Madison Dearborn Partners, a Chicago-based private equity firm.

Companies and governments are now launching satellites by the thousands each year, and that changing landscape brings with it the evolving challenge of cybersecurity in space. Think, scores of sensitive data, some of national security, flowing between Earth and remote devices constantly moving miles above the surface. 

Earth's average surface temperature in 2022 tied with 2015 as the fifth warmest on record, according to an analysis by NASA. Continuing the planet's long-term warming trend, global temperatures in 2022 were 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit (0.89 degrees Celsius) above the average for NASA's baseline period (1951-1980), scientists from NASA's Goddard Institut

La temperatura promedio de la superficie de la Tierra en 2022 empató con 2015 como la quinta más cálida registrada, según un análisis de la NASA. Continuando con la tendencia del calentamiento a largo plazo del planeta, las temperaturas globales en 2022 estuvieron 0,89 grados centígrados (1,6 grados Fahrenheit) por encima del promedio para el perío

Payloads: Combustion Integrated Rack/Solid Fuel Ignition and Extinction (CIR/SoFIE): The crew replaced the 21% O2/79% N2 manifold bottle with a new bottle containing 85% O2/15% N2. This was performed in support of the upcoming SoFIE Growth and Extinction Limit (SoFIE-GEL) experiment. SoFIE-GEL studies burning in microgravity, measuring the amount of heating in a fuel sample …

What you're actually looking at is an area of the Moon that is in total darkness.

Virgin Orbit says its first LauncherOne mission from the United Kingdom failed to reach orbit Jan. 9 when an anomaly caused a premature shutdown of the rocket’s upper stage.

SpaceX has revealed a new and mysterious reason to delay its own rocket launch: something called “constellation optimization.” Known as Starlink 2-4,...

As Virgin Galactic moves closer to resuming flights of its SpaceShipTwo suborbital vehicle, the company is reorganizing its leadership and parting ways with a senior executive.

Gen. B. Chance Saltzman said he wants to make sure the Space Force is not caught unprepared for the next conflict

A SpaceX Cargo Dragon 2 spacecraft has safely returned to Earth after delivering several tons of NASA supplies to the International Space...

Commercial innovation should be harnessed to compete with China and also deter conflict, Space Force procurement official Col. Eric Felt said Jan. 11

Update: SpaceX’s fifth Falcon Heavy launch is on track to launch as early as 5:56 pm EST (22:56 UTC), Sunday, January 15th....

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy will welcome Japan’s Prime Minister Kishida Fumio, U.S. Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken, and other U.S. and Japanese leaders to NASA Headquarters in Washington at 4:30 p.m. EST Friday, Jan. 13.

While Congress and the Biden Administration recognize the potential threat posed by space weather events, the United States still needs to improve its ability to monitor and model the phenomenon.

The European Investment Bank said Jan. 11 it is lending SES 300 million euros ($323 million) as part of efforts to increase the competitiveness of Europe’s space industry.

NASA has awarded contracts to IBEX IT Business Experts, LLC of Norcross, Georgia, Bryce Solutions, LLC of Alexandria, Virginia, and Strategy Consulting Team of Fairfax, Virginia, to provide human capital support across the agency.

Payloads: Confocal Space Microscope (COSMIC): The crew performed the necessary steps to replace the Light Emitting Diode (LED) fluorescent source in the COSMIC facility. The Confocal Space Microscope (Confocal Microscope) is a JAXA facility that provides fluorescence images of biological samples aboard the ISS. Confocal microscopy uses spatial filtering techniques to eliminate out-of-focus light or …

Russian space agency and NASA officials said Wednesday they will accelerate the launch of the next Soyuz spacecraft to the International Space Station, and fly it to the complex next month without anyone on-board to replace a Soyuz crew ferry ship damaged Dec. 14 by a high-speed impact, likely from a tiny particle from deep space. The schedule shuffle will mean two Russian cosmonauts and one U.S. astronaut will stay in space several months beyond their planned return to Earth in late March.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is taking stock of its dependence on specific bands of the radio frequency spectrum and looking for ways to mitigate the impact of interference or government sales.

The temperature inside the vehicle could reach the low 40s Celsius during Earth return.

The first mission by ABL Space got off the ground on Tuesday, but the company’s RS1 rocket suffered an issue early in the flight that caused it to fail shortly after lifting off.

Russia will launch a Soyuz spacecraft without a crew to the International Space Station in February after concluding a damaged Soyuz spacecraft docked there cannot safely return its crew to Earth.