
Copernical Team
As first Vulcan flight nears, new space plane Dream Chaser preps for launch No. 2

The Sierra Space Dream Chaser looks like a mini space shuttle, and it's gearing up for its first trip to space atop United Launch Alliance's new Vulcan Centaur rocket in 2024.
The uncrewed spacecraft is designed for now to take cargo to the International Space Station, having won a NASA contract to join SpaceX and Northrop Grumman for commercial resupply missions.
The first nearly complete version of Dream Chaser is named Tenacity, and is set to leave Sierra Space's Louisville, Colorado, production facility to begin its journey to the Space Coast. Its first stop, though, will be to NASA's Neil Armstrong Test Facility in Sandusky, Ohio, for a battery of environmental shakedown tests in the coming weeks.
"Today we have arrived at a profound milestone in both our company's journey and our industry's future—one that has been years in the making and is shaped by audacious dreaming and tenacious doing," said Sierra Space CEO Tom Vice during an event heralding the completion of what is planned to be a fleet of Dream Chasers.
Just like the space shuttle, it will launch from Florida and land in Florida.
Ancient planet Thiea that collided with Earth may lie deep within Earth

Dust's Pivotal Role in Dinosaur Extinction Highlighted by Study

NASA discovers record-breaking black hole 13.2 billion light-years from Earth

NASA seeks input for future lunar surface resource utilization demo

Curiosity rover clocks 4,000 sols on Mars

CNES, Pasteur Inst and SupBiotech sending "Cerebral Ageing" experiment to ISS

Early production continues on advanced upper stage for NASA moon rocket

Technicians at NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans have completed a major portion of a weld confidence article for the advanced upper stage of NASA's SLS (Space Launch System) rocket. The hardware was rotated to a horizontal position and moved to another part of the facility Oct. 24.
The weld confidence article forms part of the liquid oxygen tank for the SLS rocket's exploration upper stage and is the fifth of seven weld confidence articles engineers are manufacturing for the evolved SLS Block 1B configuration of the SLS rocket. Beginning with Artemis IV, SLS will evolve to its more powerful Block 1B configuration with the advanced upper stage that gives the rocket the capability to launch 40% more to the moon along with Artemis astronauts inside NASA's Orion spacecraft.
Teams use weld confidence articles to verify welding procedures, interfaces between the tooling and hardware, and structural integrity of the welds. The dome of the liquid oxygen tank weld confidence article was first welded to its structural ring at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, using friction stir welding tooling.
Europe to hold competition to build space cargo ship

ESA Council at ministerial level - Part 1

Government ministers representing ESA’s Member States, Associate States and Cooperating States met for a Council meeting on 6 November 2023 during the Space Summit in Seville, Spain. They resolved together to strengthen Europe’s space ambitions to better serve European citizens. At the same time, ESA will open a new era of modernising the implementation of its programmes, responding to growing commercialisation and privatisation of space activities, in particular in the fields of space transportation and space exploration. The opening of the meeting was followed by an introduction by ESA Director General and statements by Member, Associate and