Nicholas Houghton always dreamed of working at NASA and one day becoming an astronaut. Today, he helps design systems that keep crews safe during missions aboard NASA’s Orion spacecraft, including the successful Artemis II mission around the Moon. After joining NASA as a Pathways intern, Houghton later became a full-time engineer on the Orion Crew Survival Systems (OCSS) […]
The NROL-72 mission will be the 13th to date supporting what the NRO calls its “proliferated architecture” satellite constellation. Liftoff of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket from pad 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base is scheduled for 7:13:50 p.m. PDT (10:13:50 p.m. EDT / 0213:50 UTC).
The next cargo mission to resupply the International Space Station, SpaceX CRS-34, is slated for launch at 7:16 p.m. on Tuesday, May 12, from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, weather pending.
The next cargo mission to resupply the International Space Station, SpaceX CRS-34, is slated for launch at 7:16 p.m. on Tuesday, May 12, from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, weather pending.
NASA will hold its 2026 Lunabotics Challenge Tuesday, May 19, to Thursday, May 21, at the Astronauts Memorial Foundation’s Center for Space Education at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida. Links to view the Lunabotics competition live can be found on the agency’s Lunabotics page. The competition is slated to run between 8 a.m. and 6 p.m. each day. Media are invited to attend the […]
The Optical Guidelines document provides standardized, transparent, and repeatable process for assessing the quality of optical data from commercial Earth Observation missions.
The Milky Way’s galactic bulge, the bulbous region that surrounds the galactic center, contains a dense collection of stars, planets, and other free-floating objects. This region has been studied for decades with numerous ground-based and space-based telescopes, including NASA’s Hubble and James Webb space telescopes. Soon, NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope will be the […]
NASA Astronaut Jessica Meir sits for a portrait at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston on Sept. 23, 2025. This photo was chosen as one of the 2025 NASA Photographer of the Year finalists. Meir launched on NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 mission to the International Space Station in February 2026 with fellow NASA astronaut Jack Hathaway, […]
An Italian consortium has successfully completed a suborbital demonstration of an air-launched rocket system. The project, which utilised a Dornier Alpha Jet aircraft and T4i’s HAX25 sounding rocket equipped with avionics supplied by GMV, was initiated to support Italy’s push to develop a more responsive launch capability. The Aviolancio programme, which translates roughly to “air […]
The post Italy Completes Air-Launched Rocket Demonstrator Test appeared first on European Spaceflight.
Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of May 9-16, 2026 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session […]
Katalyst Space Technologies’ Link spacecraft is set to head to orbit in June 2026 onboard Northrop Grumman’s Pegasus XL air-launched rocket. NASA awarded Katalyst a $30 million contract for the mission in September 2025.
NASA and SpaceX are targeting a mid-May launch to deliver scientific investigations, supplies, and equipment to the International Space Station. Loaded with about 6,500 pounds of supplies, the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft will lift off aboard the company’s Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Following its arrival to the orbital complex, Dragon will dock autonomously to the forward port of […]
Following Booster 19’s successful full-duration, full-thrust 33-engine static fire on May 7, 2026, its partner…
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Brian Hughes, who headed the Florida arm of President Trump’s 2024 campaign and served as NASA Chief of Staff for several months last year, is returning to the agency to […]
DNA-mimicking materials, quantum physics hardware, and spacesuit batteries wrapped up the work week aboard the International Space Station. The Expedition 74 crew also went into the weekend conducting a series of human research investigations studying the heart, the eyes, and psychology.
Description This colorized image of Mars was captured by NASA’s Psyche mission on May 3, 2026, about 3 million miles (4.8 million kilometers) from the planet. The spacecraft is approaching the planet for a gravity assist on May 15 that will give it a boost in speed and adjust its trajectory toward asteroid Psyche for […]
Listen to this audio excerpt from Anton Kiriwas, senior technical integration manager for NASA’s Exploration Ground Systems Program: When Anton Kiriwas first spotted an image of the Moon and Mars hanging over a job fair booth while in college, it captured his imagination, yet felt like a dream too distant to chase. He had no […]
For decades, NASA has advanced on-board spacecraft computer processors that coordinate and execute the functions needed to support mission success. Space computing originated in the 1960s with the Apollo Guidance Computers, which were pivotal for guidance, navigation, and control computations during NASA’s first Moon missions. For decades, radiation-hardened processors have been the backbone of the […]
NASA astronaut Chris Williams captured the Milky Way rising above Earth’s atmospheric glow on April 13, 2026, while aboard a SpaceX Dragon docked to the International Space Station. This atmospheric glow is also called airglow. It occurs when atoms and molecules in the upper atmosphere, excited by sunlight, emit light to shed their excess energy. […]
NASA announced Friday that Brian Hughes will return to the agency as senior director of launch operations, based at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. In this role, Hughes will provide enterprise-level leadership, strategic direction, and operational oversight for NASA’s launch infrastructure. Reporting to NASA Headquarters in Washington, Hughes will have direct responsibility for […]
With a small blue crane, four researchers hoist a cylindrical fuel cell, which looks like a stack of flattened silver and gold soda cans bundled together, into the air and lower it into a rectangular cart on wheels. A tangle of tubes and wires spiral away from the system, where nearly 270 sensors and 1,000 […]
The European Space Agency has begun mitigation efforts for key elements of its LISA mission after a White House budget proposal sought, for the second year running, to eliminate most of NASA’s planned support. One of these mitigation efforts was formalised on 5 May, when ESA awarded a €26.1 million contract to Thales Alenia Space […]
The post ESA Begins Developing Replacements for NASA’s Contributions to LISA appeared first on European Spaceflight.
NASA’s home for experimental flight is welcoming more flyers to its already high-performing fleet as it continues to support science and aeronautics test missions – continuing the legacy of pioneers like Neil Armstrong. NASA’s Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California, added multiple aircraft this year: two F-15s supersonic jets, a Pilatus PC-12 utility plane, […]
The company pivoted to a Neutron rocket launch debut no earlier than the fourth quarter of 2026 following a first stage tank test failure earlier this year. The first flight of Neutron won’t be reusable, but aims to recover the first stage during its second flight with a landing barge.
China is preparing to launch both cargo and crew missions to its Tiangong space station,…
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The Republic of Paraguay signed the Artemis Accords on Thursday during a ceremony in Asunción, becoming the latest nation to commit to the shared principles guiding civil space exploration. “Today, I am proud to welcome Paraguay as the 67th signatory to the Artemis Accords,” said NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman. “They join an ever-growing coalition of […]
DNA-inspired therapies and space agriculture topped the research schedule aboard the International Space Station on Thursday. The Expedition 74 crew members also serviced a variety of lab hardware including a quantum physics facility, a spacesuit, and life support gear throughout their busy day.
Description Engineer Fernando Mier-Hicks inspects a test stand used to investigate the performance of next-generation Mars helicopter rotor blades at high speeds inside the 25-Foot Space Simulator at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California in November 2025. Data from the tests indicate that the rotors could surpass the sound barrier without breaking apart. The […]
Description Engineer Jaakko Karras inspects a next-generation Mars helicopter rotor blade prior to supersonic speed testing in the 25-Foot Space Simulator at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California in November 2025. The three-bladed rotor hanging horizontally in the foreground is the next-gen rotor being tested. The vertically aligned two-bladed rotor provided a “headwind,” enabling […]
The rotor blades that will carry NASA’s next-generation helicopters to new Martian heights broke the sound barrier during March tests at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. Data from the tests, which took place in a special chamber that can simulate environmental conditions on the Red Planet, indicate that the fastest traveling part of […]
A full-scale mock-up of a crew cabin for a future industry lunar lander for NASA’s Artemis program now is operational for training and testing. The agency and its industry partners will use Blue Origin’s Blue Moon Mark 2 crew cabin for mission simulations as the agency prepares to dock with landers in Earth orbit in […]
The European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) have signed a Memorandum of Cooperation to deepen collaboration in planetary defence, alongside a dedicated agreement for collaboration on the Rapid Apophis Mission for Space Safety (Ramses) to the near-Earth asteroid Apophis.
A thin sliver of Earth’s edge is brightly illuminated against the vast darkness of space in this April 3, 2026, image taken during the Artemis II mission. Artemis II was the first crewed flight in a series of missions to test NASA’s human deep space capabilities, paving the way for future lunar surface missions. See […]
Through NASA, a university-designed small spacecraft is paving the way to studying particles, known as neutrinos, that move through the universe at near-light speeds. The Solar Neutrino Astro-Particle PhYsics CubeSat, known as SNAPPY, launched at 12 a.m. PDT on Sunday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space […]
The Exploration Company has successfully test fired a prototype of its 15 kN Huracan rocket engine. The engine is designed to enable the company’s future lunar vehicles to land on the surface of the Moon and to be restarted for ascent and orbital rendezvous. While The Exploration Company is currently focused on delivering its Nyx […]
The post The Exploration Company Fires Up Rocket Engine for Moon Lander appeared first on European Spaceflight.
A team of researchers demonstrated NASA and IBM’s open-source Prithvi Geospatial artificial intelligence foundation model aboard two in-orbit platforms.
The four crew members of NASA’s Mars simulation recently marked 200 days into their 378-day Red Planet mission on May 7. Currently, the crew is in a simulated two‑week loss‑of‑signal period that mimics a Mars-Earth communications blackout when Mars moves behind the Sun. During this blackout, the crew works without contact with mission control, using […]
A team of Cornell University students are turning heads within industry and the federal government with the results of their research into creating a national air transportation management system in which thousands of drones could safely operate together. NASA is sponsoring their work through the University Student Research Challenge (USRC), which provides grants to college […]
The European Space Agency (ESA) is using Extended Reality (XR) to support training, enhance operations, improve simulation environments, and to bring the wonders of space to the public.
This latest Picture of the Month from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope features Messier 77 (M77), a barred spiral galaxy famous among astronomers for its combination of relative proximity and spectacular features to study. It is located 45 million light-years away in the constellation Cetus (The Whale). This new image from Webb’s Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) highlights its swirling spiral arms, the dust in its disc and its piercingly bright core like never before.
NAS Ames Science Directorate Stars of the Month: May 2026 The NASA Ames Science Directorate recognizes the outstanding contributions of (pictured left to right) Lora Jovanavić, Tammy Moore, Frances Donovan, and Jaden Ta. Their commitment to the NASA mission represents the entrepreneurial spirit, technical expertise, and collaborative disposition needed to explore this world and beyond. […]
