Washington DC (SPX) Dec 22, 2022
With Artemis, NASA looks to accomplish something unprecedented - exploration of the lunar South Pole. When astronauts reach their destination and establish a long-term presence, a unique challenge awaits. Unlike Apollo missions, which were equatorial and had abundant sunlight, Artemis missions will operate in inhospitable conditions, including the lunar night cycle and permanently shadowed

London, UK (SPX) Dec 22, 2022
The UK Civil Aviation Authority has issued the final remaining licences to Virgin Orbit ahead of a planned UK launch after requirements were met within 15 months. The licences were issued following consent from Transport Secretary Mark Harper for Virgin Orbit's launch and range licence, meaning he is in agreement with the licensing decisions made by the UK Civil Aviation Authority. Virgin

Falls Church VA (SPX) Dec 22, 2022
When considering that a full calendar year has 8,760 hours and a commercial airliner can be in service for about 30 years (or around 165,000 flying hours), then achieving a continuous performance milestone of 65 million hours is truly out of this world - exactly where Northrop Grumman navigation technology has been operating for decades. In 2022, Northrop Grumman's hemispherical resonator

Image: How Hera asteroid mission will phone home

Washington (AFP) Dec 21, 2022
NASA said farewell on Wednesday to the InSight lander that spent four years probing the interior of Mars. The US space agency said mission control had been unable to contact the spacecraft on two consecutive attempts, leading to the conclusion that its solar-powered batteries have run out of energy. "InSight may be retiring, but its legacy - and its findings from the deep interior of Ma

Washington DC (UPI) Dec 21, 2021
NASA postponed a spacewalk from the International Space Station originally scheduled for Wednesday morning because of the potential of space junk in the area. The space agency said the debris was from a fragment from the upper stage of a Russian Fregat-SB that appeared scheduled to pass near the ISS. "Based on this new data, flight control teams directed the crew to stop spacewal

Kourou (AFP) Dec 21, 2022
Flights of the new European Vega-C rocket have been suspended pending an investigation into an overnight launch failure, French firm Arianespace said Wednesday, leaving Europe with few avenues into space. Just minutes after the Vega-C rocket lifted off from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana at 10:47 pm local time on Tuesday (0147 GMT Wednesday), its trajectory deviated from its pro

Press Release N° 72–2022

Arianespace announced early today the failure of Flight VV22 carrying Pléiades Neo 5 and 6 satellites.