Space news

A 3D printer developed by Airbus under a European Space Agency contract will be the first to print metal components aboard the International Space Station. Aboard the first Northrop Grumman Cygnus mission to be launched by a SpaceX Falcon 9 is a 180-kilogram 3D metal printer. The Cygnus spacecraft, which carried the name of late […] The post European-Made 3D Printer Will Be the First to Print Metal in Space appeared first on European Spaceflight.

Firefly Aerospace plans to make the responsive launch operations it demonstrated for the U.S. Space Force last year the norm for upcoming launches of its Alpha rocket.

Private Astronaut Mission (PAM) Axiom 3: Outreach, Commercial, and Payload Activities: Today, the Ax-3 crew continued to wrap up their time onboard the ISS and prepare for undock. They completed one final NASA-supported PAO event: a Farewell Ceremony with the Expedition 70 crew. The Ax-3 crew also took imagery of the RSat Cube Target prior to …

Eutelsat said Feb. 2 it has stopped providing services from an aging geostationary satellite over the Americas following an unspecified anomaly.

As Starlink and other constellations come online, satellite phones could revolutionize the free flow of information.

Blue Origin is highlighting the capabilities of an orbital transfer vehicle design it announced last year, including the ability of the spacecraft to serve as a fuel depot.

I'd like to see it go boom

Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technology has raised 6.7 billion yuan ($943 million) for the construction of its G60 low Earth orbit megaconstellation.

While the continent prepares for the maiden launch of Ariane 6, a small company from the Netherlands is getting ready to perform what could be Europe’s first rocket launch of 2024. T-Minus Engineering is preparing to launch a pair of its DART rockets from the Esrange Space Centre in Sweden. The two rockets will be […] The post T-Minus Engineering to Launch First European Mission of 2024 appeared first on European Spaceflight.

The United States risks taking a backseat in emerging space capabilities if regulations fail to catch up to industry progress, according to executives speaking here at the SpaceCom conference.

February is set to get off to a busy start with two Chinese launches. A Chinese multistage solid rocket, Jielong-3, will launch from a barge in coastal waters off Yangjiang in the South China Sea on Feb. 2 at around 03:00 UTC. The payload consists of at least five satellites for a rideshare mission, including an interactive art installation venture, led by artists Xu Bing and Beijing Wanhu Creation.

Lunar night has descended on JAXA’s Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, in the Shioli crater on the Moon. For the next 14 Earth days, temperatures will drop below […]

More than 40 members of Congress from California have asked the White House to reverse cuts NASA has imposed on the Mars Sample Return (MSR) program, warning of job losses and a “decade of lost science.”

NASA’s Artemis moon mission program regularly faces a wide swath of questions – from legislators, auditors, companies and even just the American public – about goals, timeline, cost and more.

Cygnus NG-20 Arrival: Following launch on Tuesday, January 30th, the Cygnus NG-20 cargo vehicle was captured at 3:59 AM CST and berthed to the ISS at 7:07 AM CST today, February 1st. Cygnus was berthed to the Node 1 Nadir port and has successfully delivered more than 8,200 pounds of science investigations, crew supplies, and …

"Building and integrating in space is very expensive."

The U.S. Air Force is pressing forward with plans to demonstrate point-to-point rocket travel perhaps in a few years.

"I'm curious to see if this request brings many new players to the table."

Silicon Valley startup Orbital Composites and Michigan-based Virtus Solis plan to conduct a 2027 space-based solar power demonstration.

German startup POLARIS Spaceplanes has completed the first rocket-powered roll test of its MIRA demonstrator. MIRA is 4.25 metres long and is equipped with four kerosene-fed turbine engines and one of the company’s AS-1 LOX/kerosene linear aerospike engines, which is designed to produce 1kN of thrust. Testing of the vehicle under the power of its […] The post POLARIS Spaceplanes Conduct First Rocket-Powered Roll Test appeared first on European Spaceflight.

NASA is hosting a workshop later this month to learn about options for low-cost missions to an asteroid that will make a close approach to the Earth in 2029, a move that has confused some scientists who believe a shelved smallsat mission can meet NASA’s needs.

Intuitive Machines and NASA say they are in the final stages of preparations for the launch of that company’s first lunar lander mission, but exactly when the spacecraft will lift off remains unclear.

With the completion of fuel line and umbilical disconnection testing, the European Space Agency and its project partners have successfully completed all major Ariane 6 ground tests, paving the way for a mid-year debut. On 30 January at the Guiana Space Centre, ESA, CNES, and the project’s prime contractor, ArianeGroup, completed a rehearsal of the […] The post ESA to Begin Dismantling Ariane 6 Test Article appeared first on European Spaceflight.

Voyager Space and Airbus announced today they will launch their Starlab commercial space station on SpaceX’s Starship. Unlike the International Space Station and other space station concepts, Starlab can be […]

The Office of Space Commerce has entered into a research partnership to explore how SpaceX’s automated satellite collision avoidance software could support plans for a civil space traffic coordination system.

Over the next couple of months, the U.S. Space Force organization responsible for delivering weather information to Defense Department customers will take a hard look at weather data requirements.

This month, the Axiom Mission 3 (Ax-3) crew joined the seven existing astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) from the Expedition 70 mission, comprised of the crews of Crew-7 and MS-24 — becoming the first all-European crewed mission to the Station.

Col. Joyce Bulson said the Space Systems Command ontinues to evaluate other refueling solutions for potential use.

China’s experimental reusable spacecraft recently performed maneuvers to raise its orbit but is apparently yet to release objects as it did in previous flights.

Private Astronaut Mission (PAM) Axiom 3: Outreach, Commercial, and Payload Activities: The Ax-3 crew continued their mission today with completion of a variety of live and recorded outreach and commercial events. Live events included an ESA-sponsored ICE Cubes Media Set event between Walter Villadei and High School Students in Rome, Italy, and an ICE Cubes …

Starlab Space, a joint venture of Voyager Space and Airbus Space and Defense, announced Jan. 31 it reached an agreement with SpaceX to launch the consortium’s Starlab space station on the currently under development Starship system. The companies did not discuss further details of the terms of the agreement or provide an expected launch date. However, a spokesperson for Starlab Space said the company was “confident that Starlab would be launched before the decommissioning of the International Space Station, currently scheduled for 2030”, preventing the possibility of a low Earth orbit spaceflight gap.

On January 30th, at 12:07:15 PM Eastern Time, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 lofted the Northrop Grumman Cygnus spacecraft as part of the NG-20 mission in a historic first for both Commercial Cargo providers. This mission is the first of a 3 mission agreement between the two companies to continue to resupply the International Space Station and comes after the original Antares 230+ vehicle flew its final mission during NG-19. This interim arrangement is expected to last until 2025 with the replacement Antares 330 set to debut that year.

The construction industry must adapt and evolve in order to capitalize on and do its part to further the space economy.

Despite a much shortened mission, the company said it successfully accomplished many of the objectives of the technology demonstration..

A contract written in the stars.

Starlab Space, the joint venture developing the Starlab commercial space station, has selected SpaceX’s Starship to launch the station on a single flight.

Exotrail plans to introduce a new orbital vehicle aimed at small satellites that need to transit from geostationary transfer orbit to their final destination.

"These holes may have been created by one or more stars that exploded."

Rocket Lab launched the first four satellites for space situational awareness (SSA) company NorthStar Earth and Space Jan. 31 in another test for the company’s efforts to recover and eventually reuse Electron boosters.

Italy’s Joint Forces Operational Command (COVI) has signed an operational agreement with the Italian Space Agency (ASI) for collaboration in the area of space. COVI was established in 1998 as a mechanism to allow the country’s Chief of the Defence Staff to direct all operational activity of the Italian Armed Forces, which includes the country’s […] The post Italy’s Space Agency and Armed Forces Sign Agreement to Collaborate appeared first on European Spaceflight.

Rocket Lab is preparing for its first launch of 2024, with its Electron launch vehicle poised to launch four Space Situational Awareness (SSA) satellites into low-Earth orbit from the Māhia Peninsula in New Zealand. Named “Four of a Kind,” Electron is scheduled to lift off from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex-1B in Māhia at no earlier than 7:15 PM NZDT on Jan. 31 (06:15 UTC).

Diane Howard: "The industry has to have a “clear demand signal from government users"

SpaceWERX is now weighing next steps for the program, trying to gauge the maturity of technologies, their utility and possible commercialization paths.

As the first month of 2024 closes, Blue Origin is well into production with its orbital rocket, New Glenn. The company continues to check off major milestones as high-fidelity hardware arrives at Launch Complex 36 (LC-36) ahead of a testing campaign and a NASA mission scheduled for late 2024.

Chief Master Sgt. Ron Lerch, of the Space Systems Command’s intelligence directorate, said China's rapidly advancing military space-based reconnaissance capabilities are worrisome.

SpaceX successfully sent Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS) today in a launch that left Cape Canaveral Space...

Government agencies are struggling to obtain sufficient funding for space weather observations.

Vigil could provide notice of four to five days of high-speed winds streaming toward Earth.

A SpaceX Falcon 9 successfully launched a Northrop Cygnus cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station for the first time Jan. 30.

Cygnus NG-20 Launch: The Cygnus NG-20 cargo vehicle launched today, January 30th, at 11:07 AM CST, and is planned to be captured and berthed to the ISS on Thursday, February 1st, at 3:20 AM CT and 7:40 AM CT respectively. Cygnus will be berthed to the Node 1 Nadir port and will deliver more than …