Space news

COO Gwynne Shotwell says that SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet program had a “cash flow positive quarter” in 2022 and “will make money”...

NASA has awarded the Simulation and Software Technology III contract to CACI Federal of Chantilly, Virginia, to provide simulation and software technology support and related services for the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Students from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. School No. 9 in Rochester, New York, will have an opportunity this week to hear from a NASA astronaut aboard the International Space Station.

The Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel (ASAP), an advisory committee that reports to NASA and Congress, issued its 2022 annual report Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2023, examining the agency’s safety performance, accomplishments, and challenges over the past year.

Payloads: Electrostatic Levitation Furnace (ELF): The crew performed the steps necessary to remove the processed boron carbide-stainless steel (B4C-SS) samples and install the next set of samples to be processed. The ELF is an experimental facility designed to levitate/melt/solidify materials by containerless processing techniques using the Electrostatic Levitation method. With this facility, thermophysical properties of …

Increasingly, the European Space Agency is aligned with NASA and the West.

As the two-year landing anniversary of NASA’s Perseverance rover and its small scouting helicopter Ingenuity draws near, the pair continue to explore Jezero Crater and unlock the many secrets of the red planet.

Seattle startup Stoke Space has revealed plans to develop an efficient rocket engine similar to the Raptors that power SpaceX’s Starship. Formed...

Of the trillions of stars scattered throughout the universe, one of the most common are the white dwarfs, which are the dormant, burned out, and leftover cores of low/medium mass stars. For decades, scientists have only measured the masses of white dwarfs within binary star systems. While these measurements provide insight into the true masses of white dwarfs, the measurements typically feature high amounts of uncertainty.

Media accreditation is open for SpaceX’s 27th commercial resupply mission for NASA to the International Space Station. Liftoff of the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket is targeted for no earlier than Friday, March 10, from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The early death toll is 1,600 people, but this number will grow.

Issue 43. Subscribers 1,379. To my 106 new subscribers, enjoy your first issue and, as always, if you have any comments, suggestions, or tips, please reply to this email.Not yet subscribed? What’s happening with Space Rider? I want to state my bias upfront. I have a huge amount of love for the Space Rider project. I acknowledge that it has seen its fair share of challenges and its delayed debut is frustrating. However, there is so much about the project to be excited about from the parafoil recovery to the robotic arm and the mission possibilities it opens up, and, of course, the name is just perfect.

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket Monday night from Cape Canaveral with Amazonas Nexus, a powerhouse satellite owned by the Spanish company Hispasat to connect trans-Atlantic airline passengers, maritime traffic, and rural communities across the Americas.

SpaceX has successfully launched Spanish connectivity provider HISPASAT’s Amazonas Nexus satellite into a geostationary transfer orbit. The mission kicks off a surge...

SpaceX has launched the Amazonas Nexus satellite for Hispasat on a Falcon 9 rocket from SLC-40 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Liftoff occurred at 8:32 PM EST on Monday, Feb. 6 (01:32 UTC on Tuesday, Feb. 7) under extremely favorable weather conditions.

A nearly five-ton satellite for the Spanish company Hispasat is ready for liftoff from Cape Canaveral Monday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, beginning a mission to provide in-flight internet and other communications services over the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean.

LONG BEACH, California – It was a few days into the new year yet Relativity Space’s factory was anything but quiet, a din of activity with massive 3D printers humming and the clanging of construction ringing out.

It is possible that the balloon's flight termination system failed.

NASA has selected Astrotech Space Operations, LLC of Titusville, Florida, and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide commercial payload processing services for agency missions launching from multiple locations.

NASA is awarding $11.7 million to eight Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) through the new Data Science Equity, Access, and Priority in Research and Education (DEAP) opportunity. These awards will enable HBCU students and faculty to conduct innovative data science research that contributes to NASA’s missions.

Payloads: ADvanced Space Experiment Processor (ADSEP): The Calibration Tissue Cassette was removed from the ADSEP Facility. ADSEP is a thermally controlled single-middeck-locker equivalent that accommodates up to three cassette-based experiments that can be independently operated. Its companion hardware consists of a collection of several experiment cassettes, each doubly or triply contained, that accommodate experiments in …

The NASA-developed flight software for the agency’s Space Launch System (SLS) vehicle successfully flew the program’s first launch on the Artemis I mission on Nov. 16. The vehicle’s Integrated Avionics and Software conducted the final countdown and first eight minutes of launch, commanding the Core Stage, RS-25 engines, and Solid Rocket Boosters (SRB) to orbital insertion.

The Peregrine lander is ready for launch. Sort of.

"If you have someone who is worried, don't slough it off. Deal with it."

A day and a half after its 200th launch overall, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket has successfully launched for the 200th time. Falcon...

Continuing work left over from a spacewalk last month, astronauts Nicole Mann and Koichi Wakata headed outside the International Space Station Thursday to finish installing a mounting bracket for new solar arrays due to arrive at the complex on a SpaceX resupply mission in June.

Smile. You’re on camera (in space). 

NASA has appointed veteran astronaut Joe Acaba as chief of the Astronaut Office at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. A decorated veteran of multiple spaceflights, as well a former U.S. Marine and former educator, Acaba is the first person of Hispanic heritage selected to lead the office.

La NASA ha nombrado al astronauta veterano Joe Acabá jefe de la Oficina de Astronautas del Centro Espacial Johnson de la agencia. Veterano condecorado de múltiples vuelos espaciales, así como ex marine estadounidense y exeducador, Acabá es la primera persona de ascendencia hispana seleccionada para dirigir la oficina.

Astronauts Koichi Wakata and Nicole Mann have completed another spacewalk, continuing work to enable the final set of upgraded ISS Roll-Out Solar Array (iROSA) “solar wings” to be installed on ISS sometime this summer.

Payloads: None Systems: USOS EVA 85: ISS Roll Out Solar Array (IROSA) Prep 1A Troubleshooting EVA: Today, ISS crewmembers Nicole Mann and Koichi Wakata completed the 85h USOS Extravehicular Activity (EVA). The main goal of this EVA was to troubleshoot interface issues encountered during a previous EVA installation activity that was initiated but not completed. …

SpaceX’s launch team in Florida is counting down to an overnight blastoff early Thursday, with a Falcon 9 rocket set to loft 53 more Starlink internet satellites into orbit. Liftoff from Kennedy Space Center is scheduled for 2:43 a.m. EST (0743 GMT).

SpaceX is preparing for a surge of geostationary communications satellite launches after several slow years. In the late 2010s, orders of large...

Twenty years ago, the space shuttle Columbia broke apart high over Texas on the way to landing in Florida, killing a crew of seven astronauts in a tragedy with long-lasting consequences that still reverberate across the space program.

SpaceX ended January with and began February with two Starlink missions. These launches occurred two days apart from separate launch sites.

Payloads: Fluid Dynamics in Space (FLUIDICS): The crew disconnected and stowed the Fluidics HDD and its cable from the CMAU Z-book laptop. The measurement of liquid displacement within a sphere in microgravity relates to a given kinematic representation of a spacecraft’s fuel tank. The FLUIDICS investigation evaluates the Center of Mass (CoM) position regarding a …

More clarity on the company's financial situation should come by late March.

"We all know that to engineer is human."

Axiom Space says the customers for its upcoming private astronaut missions to the International Space Station are dominated by governments rather than individuals.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says that the company could eventually develop an expendable version of its next-generation Starship rocket. Starship is extraordinarily...

On behalf of President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris awarded former NASA astronauts Douglas Hurley and Robert Behnken the Congressional Space Medal of Honor Tuesday for their bravery in NASA’s SpaceX Demonstration Mission-2 (Demo-2) to the International Space Station in 2020.

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket Tuesday from California’s Central Coast with 49 Starlink internet satellites and a rideshare space tug for the Italian company D-Orbit, itself carrying tech demo experiments and cremated human remains for customers in the United States, Germany, New Zealand, and Switzerland.

SpaceX has launched its Falcon 9 rocket for the 200th time. Measuring 70 meters (230 ft) tall and 3.7 meters (12 ft)...

Threats to U.S. satellites are becoming more complex and unpredictable, which will require new ways of training and preparing for a possible conflict, Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, U.S. chief of space operations, said Jan. 31.

NASA has awarded a modification to extend the period of performance of the Goddard Logistics and Technical Information II (GLTI II) Services Contract with TRAX International Corporation of Las Vegas.

Hyperspectral imaging startup Orbital Sidekick raised $10 million in an investment round led by Energy Innovation Capital.

Capella Space announced Jan. 31 it is forming a new business unit, Capella Federal, that will offer “increased Earth observation access to select U.S. defense customers.”

When it comes to NASA, most people look to the skies as rockets, rovers, and astronauts push the boundaries of space exploration. But the benefits of going above and beyond can be found here on Earth through products and services born from NASA innovation.

SpaceX ended January with and will begin February with two Starlink missions. These launches will occur two days apart from separate launch sites.

Outside of space circles, the space medal is not a particularly well-known honor.