The high-performance computing (HPC) environment will be available for scientific research and technological development activities, supporting all ESA programmes as well as the researchers and small- and medium-enterprises from Member States.

The U.S. Space Force has certified United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur rocket, allowing that vehicle to conduct national security missions.

“We are literally shrinking in resources as a Space Force,” Gen.

Rocket Lab launched eight satellites for a German company that is expanding its constellation to detect and track wildfires.

The Commercial Satellite Communications Office last week issued a final solicitation for bids for the Marine Enterprise Commercial Satellite Services (MECS2) contract

The European Space Agency (ESA) has powered down its Gaia spacecraft after more than a decade spent gathering data that are now being used to unravel the secrets of our home galaxy.

On 27 March 2025, Gaia’s control team at ESA’s European Space Operations Centre carefully switched off the spacecraft’s subsystems and sent it into a ‘retirement orbit’ around the Sun.

Though the spacecraft’s operations are now over, the scientific exploitation of Gaia’s data has just begun.

From 25 July 2014 to 15 January 2025, the Gaia space observatory performed high-precision measurements of nearly two billion stars from its Lissajous orbit around the L2 Lagrange point, 1.5 million km from Earth. 

After 10.5 years of groundbreaking observations, Gaia’s cold gas supply for attitude control has been depleted. On 27 March 2025, Gaia will leave its Lissajous orbit and transition into a stable heliocentric orbit. Soon after, the spacecraft will be passivated, with its instruments and transmitters switched off. 

While Gaia will no longer collect new data, its scientific mission is far from over! The team continues