SOFIA Comes Out of Maintenance Mission Ready
First Seat on Blue Origin’s New Shepard Sells for $28 million
Blue Origin concluded the online auction for the first seat on their New Shepard rocket with a winning bid of $28 million. Nearly 7,600 people registered to bid from 159 countries, the company said. The winning bidder will fly to space on New Shepard’s first human flight on July 20, and will join Blue Origin…
NASA Selects Two Missions to Study Venus
NASA has selected two new missions to Venus, Earth’s nearest planetary neighbor. Part of NASA’s Discovery Program, the missions aim to understand how Venus became an inferno-like world when it has so many other characteristics similar to ours – and may have been the first habitable world in the solar system, complete with an ocean…
Citizen Scientists Discover Two Gaseous Planets around a Bright Sun-like Star
At night, seven-year-old Miguel likes talking to his father Cesar Rubio about planets and stars. “I try to nurture that,” says Rubio, a machinist in Pomona, California, who makes parts for mining and power generation equipment. Now, the boy can claim his father helped discover planets, too. Cesar Rubio is one of thousands of volunteers participating…
Juno Flies by Ganymede, Jupiter’s Largest Moon
The Juno space explorer craft sent into the solar system by NASA has done a close fly-by of Jupiter’s largest moon, Ganymede. The images returned to Earth were the first in two decades. The space ship came as close as 645 miles to the moon, the first time a craft has been that close since…
NASA Selects 2 Missions to Study ‘Lost Habitable’ World of Venus
NASA has selected two new missions to Venus, Earth’s nearest planetary neighbor. Part of NASA’s Discovery Program, the missions aim to understand how Venus became an inferno-like world when it has so many other characteristics similar to ours – and may have been the first habitable world in the solar system, complete with an ocean…
FAA Approves Renewal of Oklahoma Spaceport License
After completing a comprehensive review, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved the renewal of the spaceport license for the Oklahoma Space Industry Development Authority. The license authorizes the Authority to operate a launch site at the Clinton-Sherman Industrial Airpark in Burns Flat, Okla., in support of FAA-licensed or –permitted suborbital missions by reusable launch vehicles….
Aevum Rolls Out Ravn X The First Autonomous Launch Vehicle and the Largest Unmanned Aircraft System
Space logistics and autonomous launch services provider Aevum, Inc. is rolled out its Ravn X Autonomous Launch Vehicle, the world’s largest Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS), by mass, designed to deliver satellites to space as fast as every 180 minutes. Aevum’s customer and mission partner, The United States Space Force, also took part in the Ravn…
Lockheed Martin, GM Team to Develop Next-Gen Lunar Rover for NASA
Lockheed Martin and General Motors are teaming up to develop the next generation of lunar vehicles to transport astronauts on the surface of the Moon. NASA’s Artemis program is sending humans back to the Moon where they will explore and conduct scientific experiments using a variety of rovers. NASA sought industry approaches to develop a…
NASA Announces New Associate Administrator
NASA Administrator Sen. Bill Nelson announced Monday Robert D. Cabana, who has served as director of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida since 2008, will serve as associate administrator effective Monday, May 17. Steve Jurczyk, who held the position since 2018, announced his retirement Monday. “Bob has a relentless determination to expand America’s role in…
Boeing’s 1st Core Stage for NASA’s Space Launch System Arrives at Kennedy Space Center
A Boeing-built rocket core stage for NASA’s Space Launch System was unloaded from a barge last week at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center and moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building. The 212-foot (65-meter) core stage will be stacked with a Boeing/United Launch Alliance Interim Cryogenic Upper Stage, two solid rocket boosters, a Launch Vehicle Stage…
JUICE Jupiter Probe’s First Taste of Space
JUICE, the JUpiter ICy moons Explorer mission led by the European Space Agency (ESA), has left Airbus’ satellite integration center in Friedrichshafen (Germany) and is now on its way to the Large Space Simulator (LSS) chamber of the European Space Agency (ESA) in Noordwijk (Netherlands) for its first taste of space. During the next 12…
QinetiQ’s Progressive Investment Sets Standard in Training, Test and Evaluation
Providing test pilots and flight test engineers with resources and the very latest learning tools has helped to keep ETPS at the forefront of flight test training for both military and civil customers for over 75 years. QinetiQ’s latest multi-million pound investment in three new helicopters will further extend the fleet of aircraft available to…
