Intuitive Machines has agreed to purchase a company that operates ground stations in the United States and United Kingdom to help build out a lunar communications network.

Gen. Michael Guetlein defends plan to pursue space-based interceptors but warns affordability remains central challenge

Iridium Communications is buying the rest of the Aireon aircraft-tracking venture its connectivity constellation hosts to push further into aviation safety, surveillance and data services.

Cowboy Space has filed plans with the Federal Communications Commission for a 20,000-satellite “Stampede” orbital data center constellation, shortly after raising $275 million to develop rockets whose upper stages would serve as the computing platforms.

Image:

The Expedition 74 crew on the International Space Station turned into meteor chasers as Earth passed through a cloud of dust and small debris left behind by comet Thatcher in 1861.  

Each year in mid-April, as some of these fragments enter Earth’s atmosphere, heating up and leaving a bright trail behind them, humankind looks up – or down, in the case of the Station’s crew – to catch of glimpse of these shooting stars.  

ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot set up a camera to automatically record thousands of images in the hope of catching a shooting star, an elusive event that often

Image: This image, captured by Copernicus Sentinel-2, gives us a glimpse of Ecuador’s capital, Quito, sprawling for 40 km along this high-altitude valley in the Andes.

Virgin Galactic said May 14 it remains on track, technically and financially, to start commercial flights of its next-generation suborbital spaceplane before the end of the year.

Chinese satellite maker MinoSpace has seen its initial public offering application accepted, seeking $736 million for constellation and product expansion plans.

Video: 00:04:42

Before Smile can begin studying how Earth responds to the streams of particles and bursts of radiation from the Sun, the spacecraft had to complete an extraordinary journey here on Earth.

Follow the mission through its final launch preparations at Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, from fuelling and encapsulation inside its protective fairing, to meeting the rest of the Vega-C rocket that will take it to space.

Smile is flying to space on Vega-C flight VV29. At 35 m tall, Vega-C weighs 210 tonnes on the launch pad and the rocket will take Smile to orbit with three solid-propellant-powered

Week in images: 11-15 May 2026

Discover our week through the lens