Space news

It may be time to service your satellite.

European Space Agency (ESA) and Arianespace teams have conducted the launch of the historic Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) mission to the three largest icy moons of Jupiter — Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa. The launch, dubbed Flight VA260, is the first of two Ariane 5 missions of 2023 and the penultimate flight of the Ariane 5 rocket, lofting JUICE on a trajectory that will result in a summer 2031 arrival and orbit insertion at the Jovian system.

Millennium Space Systems announced the handoff April 13 of the Tetra-1 microsatellite to the U.S. Space Force Space Systems Command for the start of mission operations.

The head of a NASA Mars mission flying on Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket says he is confident the vehicle will be ready in time for a launch next year.

Canadian small satellite operator Kepler Communications said April 13 it has raised $92 million to start deploying an optical data-relay constellation next year.

Relativity Space has decided to retire its Terran 1 small launch vehicle after a single flight that failed to reach orbit, focusing its resources on a revised version of its larger Terran R rocket.

The way in which commercial imagery is procured by the government does not necessarily support military commanders’ needs for timely intelligence, officials said at the Planet Explore 2023 conference.

Inmarsat and Taiwanese chipmaker MediaTek announced plans April 12 to jointly develop technologies needed to enable more mass market devices to connect directly to the British satellite operator’s network.

Payloads: Cold Atom Lab (CAL): The crew used a Grab Sample Container (GSC) to sample the air around the CAL experiment hardware. The GSC will be returned to the ground for analysis of the sample. CAL produces clouds of atoms that are chilled to about one ten billionth of a degree above absolute zero — …

Through packaged services, partnerships and APIs, ground segment providers aim to make communicating with satellites as easy as possible. That does not mean that operators can wait until the last minute to consider data delivery.

Relativity Space is not going to launch again until at least 2026.

Relativity Space is shifting its strategy in an attempt to accelerate work on the reusable rocket it’s developing, the company announced on Wednesday. Chief among the changes: adjusting its manufacturing approach to blend its 3D-printing-first approach with traditional metal-bending techniques.

ISRO's Gaganyaan program, aimed at sending humans into space, has reached a significant milestone by accomplishing the final long-duration hot fire test of the human-rated L110-G Vikas Engine. The final qualification firing, conducted on April 6, 2023, at the ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC) in Mahendragiri, lasted for the intended 240 seconds.The air-lit liquid core stage of the human-rated launch vehicle (LVM3-G) uses two L110-G Vikas engines. With this test, all the planned qualification tests of the engine have been successfully completed.

Fifty years after the conclusion of the Apollo program — arguably the greatest technological achievement in human history — the eyes of the entire world are once again fixed upon […]

WASHINGTON — Slingshot Aerospace, a space tracking and data analytics company, announced April 12 it is expanding its network of ground-based optical telescopes to increase coverage of low Earth orbit.  […]

Europe’s first mission to Jupiter is ready to launch on the next to last flight of the Ariane 5 on April 13.

In an effort to keep up with the ever-increasing demands of U.S. military services, the Space Force will propose a new plan to acquire high-capacity satellite communications.

The Federal Communications Commission established a standalone Space Bureau April 11 to be led by Julie Kearney, a law and policy veteran tasked with spearheading its efforts to modernize satellite regulations.

On April 11th, SpaceX updated the official Starship webpage to include the timeline for Starships Integrated Flight Test. SpaceX has also officially confirmed that both the Booster and Ship stages will attempt a soft-water landing during the course of the inaugural launch.

Payloads: Cardinal Heart 2.0: The crew changed the media and sampled eight of the sixteen tissue chambers. The media contains buffers, food, and nutrients needed to support the cells. They also performed fixation operations on the remaining eight of the sixteen tissue chambers. Fixation refers to a group of techniques which are used to preserve …

A second pair of O3b mPower satellites for upgrading SES’ medium Earth orbit broadband network are due to arrive at their SpaceX launchpad in Florida this week, Boeing announced April 11.

The National Space Council recently completed three public listening sessions on the issue of In-Space Authorization and Supervision, often described broadly as mission authorization. These terms seem vague and bureaucratic, […]

Ball Aerospace announced plans April 11 to work with Loft Federal and Microsoft’s Azure Orbital on the Space Development Agency’s National Defense Space Architecture Experimental Testbed program.

"We needed a way to have a compelling commercial services offering."

Virgin Orbit is proposing a rapid sale of the company or its assets in bankruptcy, hoping to conclude the process before the end of May.

Rocket Lab has shifted a pair of Electron launches of NASA storm-monitoring cubesats from Virginia to New Zealand, avoiding a potential conflict with another launch.

China has selected near-Earth object 2019 VL5 for a combined asteroid deflection and observation test to launch 2025.

On April 10th, Rocket Lab announced the preliminary launch timeline for the two dedicated launches of four NASA’s TROPICS satellites. The two launches are expected to be on May 1st and May 16th 2023, launching from RocketLab’s LC-1A and LC-1B launchpads in New Zealand.

The ground terminals used to operate U.S. military and intelligence satellites are running out of capacity and in dire need of upgrades, warns a new report from the Government Accountability Office.

Within the space sector, long known for opaque pricing, transparency is gaining traction

Payloads: Cardinal Heart 2.0: The crew recorded microscopy video for the tissue samples in the Biocells. A previous investigation showed that four weeks of microgravity exposure caused significant changes in heart cell function and gene expression that could lead to long-term damage or cardiac muscle atrophy. Effect of Microgravity on Drug Responses Using Heart Organoids …

A series of large fundraising deals in Europe since the start of the year is raising hopes that the region could be turning a corner for early-stage space investments. European […]

SpaceX engineers have a million questions about the performance of these vehicles.

As Canada celebrates its first astronaut to go to the moon, it is starting a new project that could eventually enable a Canadian to walk on the lunar surface.

A new report recommends that current restrictions on the FAA’s ability to regulate safety for people flying on commercial spacecraft be allowed to expire later this year.

Northrop Grumman is developing a geostationary communications satellite that will compete against a Boeing design in a military procurement estimated to be worth $2.4 billion.

As preparations for the Artemis 2 mission ramp up, NASA has established a congressionally mandated office to oversee planning for that and future missions to the moon.

"A column of burning, clear hydrogen shot up into a mushroom cloud."

A detailed timeline and expectations of events for the day of Starship's orbital test flight.

Payloads: Engineered Heart Tissue-2 (EHT-2): The crew gathered the EHT-2 tissue chambers and performed the steps necessary to exchange the media, obtain samples for later analysis, and add treatments to the appropriate tissue growth areas. A Human iPSC-based 3D Microphysiological System for Modeling Cardiac Dysfunction in Microgravity-2 (Engineered Heart Tissues-2) continues work with 3D cultured …

SpaceX successfully launched Intelsat’s IS-40e communications satellite April 7, which will help the operator meet growing demand for connectivity on planes while also carrying its first hosted payload for NASA.

A comparison of two recent wargames reveals that the United States’ current course of action to ensure space resilience may not adequately deter and defend against emerging new Chinese space […]

SpaceX offered its strongest signals yet that it is nearing the first full-scale launch of its Starship vehicle, now expected for later this month.

Axiom Space’s second private astronaut mission to the International Space Station, commanded by a former NASA astronaut and including two Saudi astronauts, is scheduled to launch as soon as May 8.

Also, India gets closer to a human spaceflight.

A NASA instrument to provide unprecedented resolution of monitoring major air pollutants – down to four square miles – lifted off on its way to geostationary orbit at 12:30 a.m. EDT Friday.

SpaceX has launched its 23rd mission of 2023 with the company’s Falcon 9 rocket lofting the Intelsat-40e/TEMPO payload to a geostationary transfer orbit (GTO). Liftoff of the Intelsat-40e/TEMPO mission occurred at the opening of a 119-minute window at 12:30 AM EDT (04:30 UTC) on April 7 from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) in Florida.

NOAA is once again requesting a significant budget increase for future weather satellite programs after Congress cut its funding request for 2023.

U.S.-based Norwegian Cruise Line said April 6 it has started trialing Starlink ahead of plans to potentially deploy the satellite broadband service across eight cruise ships this year.

Thule Air Base, a U.S. military installation in Greenland where Space Force units conduct missile warning operations, has been renamed Pituffik Space Base.