Space news

NASA and its partners will discuss the upcoming crew rotation mission to the International Space Station during a pair of news conferences on Monday, Aug. 3, from the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. Mission leadership will provide an overview of NASA’s SpaceX Crew‑13 mission at 12 p.m. EDT. Next, crew members will discuss their […]

While the focus of late has been on Starship’s test program, three companies developing new… The post Making Progress: Relativity’s Terran R, Rocket Lab’s Neutron, and PLD Space’s Miura 5 appeared first on NASASpaceFlight.com.

Three Expedition 74 crew members are packing up cargo and handing over their responsibilities with less than one week to go before returning to Earth. The International Space Station’s three newest crewmates are already in the second week of their mission getting used to life on orbit and researching how microgravity affects the human body.

An aircraft powered by a megawatt-class hybrid-electric engine developed in collaboration with NASA and built by GE Aerospace, demonstrated flight of an innovation that can inform new generations of fuel-saving aircraft power systems. Mounted to a Saab 340B aircraft, the engine flew at Farnborough International Air Show in the United Kingdom. It was the public […]

An aircraft powered by a megawatt-class hybrid-electric engine developed in collaboration with NASA and built by GE Aerospace, demonstrated flight of an innovation that can inform new generations of fuel-saving aircraft power systems. Mounted to a Saab 340B aircraft, the engine flew at Farnborough International Air Show in the United Kingdom. It was the public […]

The first of six new airborne campaigns will hit the skies this summer.

Fifty years ago, NASA’s Viking 1 and 2 landers made the first successful landings on Mars, opening a new era in planetary exploration. Behind that achievement was a team at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, whose steady leadership and technical expertise helped turn an ambitious idea into a mission that reshaped how we […]

“Touchdown, we have touchdown!” At 5:12 a.m. PDT, July 20, 1976, mission controllers at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory erupted in cheers as they learned that the Viking 1 lander had survived its descent through the thin Martian atmosphere. Forty minutes later, the lander’s first image began to appear on their monitors, slowly forming line by […]

The UK Space Agency has missed a deadline to award a £75.6 million contract for the country’s first mission to capture and remove dead satellites from low Earth orbit. A call for Phase 3 of the mission’s development was published in July 2025, with the contract initially expected to be awarded by 30 March 2026. […] The post UK Misses Deadline to Award Contract for Space Debris Removal Mission appeared first on European Spaceflight.

The energy sector has spent decades learning how to manage complex disputes that touch on sovereign power, geopolitics, regulation and private capital. Those same dynamics are at play in the […] The post Pipelines to payloads: risk management lessons for the space economy appeared first on SpaceNews.

The Starlink 17-39 mission is SpaceX’s 85th Falcon 9 rocket launch of the year. Liftoff from pad 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base is scheduled for 7:36 a.m. PDT (10:36 a.m. EDT / 1436 UTC).

The European Space Agency’s terrestrial planet hunter Plato has recently completed a series of key tests inside the Maxwell Test Chamber at ESTEC, demonstrating that its electronic equipment is fit to work in space.

HELSINKI — A six-month-old Chinese startup aiming to use artificial intelligence to compress rocket engine development cycles has raised $29.5 million in angel funding. LegendSpace, full name Linjie Hangtian (Beijing) […] The post AI rocket engine startup LegendSpace raises $29.5 million angel round appeared first on SpaceNews.

The four Artemis II astronauts visited ESTEC, ESA’s technical centre in the Netherlands, on 13 July as the first stop in a series of post-flight visits to the European teams that made their mission possible.

From 22-26 June, 30 university students from Europe and Canada came together at the European Space Agency (ESA) Academy’s Training and Learning Facility in Belgium to explore the fundamentals of global navigation satellite systems (GNSS). The course prepared the next generation of navigation professionals with lectures from experts and hands-on exercises where students applied their new knowledge.

The hills and basins of Seattle, Washington, have been sculpted by glaciers and modified by humans.

Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week plus a day of July 19-26, 2026 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate […]

The island nation of Mauritius signed the Artemis Accords July 17, becoming the 70th nation to do so in less than six years. The post Mauritius becomes 70th nation to sign the Artemis Accords appeared first on SpaceNews.

The maximum value of the National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 1 contract was raised from $5.6 billion to $17 billion The post Space Force triples launch contract ceiling amid rising demand appeared first on SpaceNews.

Defense Production Act funding was awarded to Martin Materials Solutions, a small business that makes radiation-resistant cover glass used on spacecraft solar arrays and thermal-control systems The post Pentagon awards $7.1 million to expand U.S. production of cover glass for satellites appeared first on SpaceNews.

Skyroot Aerospace’s Vikram-1 rocket successfully lifted off on its inaugural flight July 18, becoming the first commercial Indian rocket to reach orbit. The post Skyroot Aerospace reaches orbit on first Vikram-1 launch appeared first on SpaceNews.

NASA and Draper have terminated plans for a lunar lander mission after significant delays in development of the spacecraft. The post NASA terminates Draper lunar lander mission appeared first on SpaceNews.

NASA researchers recently put a new wing design, appearing long and thin with a lightweight structural design, through a series of grueling tests to find its structural limits. What they found left them encouraged about the wing’s potential, even when they pushed it past its intended limits. The 15-foot Structural Wing Experiment Evaluating Truss-bracing (SWEET-15) […]

Description This composite of images taken by NASA’s Psyche mission shows the crescent of Mars grow as the spacecraft approached the planet for a gravity assist from May 2 to May 15, 2026. The series begins with the smallest crescent at the center of the of the image as Mars is farthest from the spacecraft, and progressively […]

Serbia and Mauritius have joined the Artemis Accords in the past two days, bringing the number of signatories to 70. Governments of any country are welcome to join the U.S.-led […]

In April 2026, NASA’s Office of the Chief Health and Medical Officer (OCHMO) initiated a working group to review updated VTE case information, additional data gathered revealing altered blood flow status within a cohort of astronauts, and discuss progress of research and clinical activities intended to mitigate the risk of VTE during spaceflight with new […]

CONTRACT RELEASE NASA has selected Chugach Intelligence Solutions LLC to provide comprehensive operations, maintenance, and repair services for NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley.  The Ames Facilities Support Services II contract ensures that the center’s historic and specialized facilities are properly maintained, fully operational, and capable of supporting the agency’s missions and tenant partners in the NASA Research Park.  The hybrid contract has a five-year period […]

This composite image, released on July 9, 2026, shows the region around a pulsar – a neutron star with a strong magnetic field that spins incredibly fast – within the Lighthouse nebula. The image contains X-ray data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory in purple, X-rays from NASA’s IXPE (Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer) in blue, and […]

Read this release in English here. Ya está abierto el plazo de acreditación de los medios de comunicación para el lanzamiento de la misión del telescopio espacial Nancy Grace Roman de la NASA. El lanzamiento del telescopio Roman está programado para no antes de las 7:20 a.m. (hora del este) del domingo 30 de agosto, […]

Media accreditation now is open for the launch of NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and the agency’s SpaceX Crew-13 missions, both targeting launch in the coming months. The Roman telescope is slated to launch no earlier than 7:20 a.m. EDT Sunday, Aug. 30, aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at […]

Description Captured by the multispectral imager instrument on NASA’s Psyche mission, this is an enhanced-color mosaic created from four individual images acquired on May 15, 2026, during the spacecraft’s flyby of Mars.  Psyche was traveling from right to left (northeast to southwest on Mars) during the six minutes that it took to acquire the images for […]

Crew swap activities are underway aboard the International Space Station as three new crewmates continue getting up to speed with living and working in microgravity and another Expedition 74 trio prepares to return to Earth. Meanwhile, scientific operations are back in full swing aboard the orbital outpost with lab residents studying how weightlessness affects the human body.

Grasshopper-like tests could begin in 2028.

From the ESA Blogs.

From 22-26 June 2026, 30 university students from Europe and Canada came together at the European Space Agency (ESA) Academy’s Training and Learning Facility in Belgium to explore the fundamentals of global navigation satellite systems (GNSS). This annual course prepares the next generation of navigation professionals with lectures from experts and hands-on exercises where students can apply their new knowledge. In this video, students and lecturers from the 2026 edition of the training course talk about the importance of satellite navigation, including Europe’s Galileo system, in their own words. 

The Republic of Mauritius has officially joined the global coalition committed to responsible space exploration, becoming the newest signatory and seventh African country to join the Artemis Accords. NASA’s Deputy Administrator Matt Anderson contributed video remarks for a signing ceremony on Friday, in the island nation’s city of Ébène. “We are honored to welcome Mauritius […]

Arianespace CEO David Cavaillolès has called on either the European Commission or the German government to place block orders for 10 to 20 Ariane 6 launches, arguing that such a commitment would transform how the company approaches its supply chain. Speaking to German defence publication Hartpunkt, Cavaillolès made the comments amid a broader discussion of […] The post Arianespace CEO Urges the EU to Procure Large Blocks of Ariane 6 Flights appeared first on European Spaceflight.

Week in images: 13-17 July 2026

SpaceX’s IPO marks the moment the space dream became a mainstream capital markets story. For decades, it has sold a vision of interplanetary civilization on behalf of the wider space […] The post SpaceX’s only problem is finding more space to work with appeared first on SpaceNews.

"We have done everything that could be done to test Vikram-1 on ground."

Serbia is the latest nation to sign the Artemis Accords, joining the U.S.-led effort more than two years after signing on to China’s lunar base project. The post Serbia signs the Artemis Accords appeared first on SpaceNews.

From the ESA Blogs.

From the ESA Blogs.

The expansive mudflats, sandy beaches, and mangrove forests of the Bijagós archipelago support an array of migratory shorebirds and large numbers of sea turtles.

SpaceX’s first attempt to launch Starship on its 13th test flight today didn’t go as planned. At the moment of startup, some of the 33 engines on Starship’s first stage […]

SpaceX aborted the launch of its latest Starship test flight July 16 when some of the vehicle’s engines failed to ignite. The post SpaceX aborts Starship Flight 13 launch attempt appeared first on SpaceNews.

The Republic of Serbia signed the Artemis Accords Thursday during a ceremony hosted by NASA at the agency’s Headquarters in Washington, becoming the 69th nation to join a large community of like-minded nations committed to the peaceful, transparent, and responsible exploration of space. “Serbia’s connection to NASA reaches back to the Apollo program, when the […]

During meetings this week with NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, Roscosmos Director General Dmitry Bakanov agreed that Russia will support operations of the International Space Station through 2030. Until now, Russia […]

With the launch of 21 York Space Systems satellites, the Space Development Agency has now placed half of its planned Tranche 1 Transport Layer constellation in orbit The post SpaceX launches 21 satellites for military data network  appeared first on SpaceNews.

NEW YORK — A study published last week in Nature Astronomy has proposed a new satellite design and technique to detect thermonuclear warheads in space. Funded in part by the […] The post Nature study identifies a new way to spot nuclear weapons in orbit appeared first on SpaceNews.