Europe’s next pair of Galileo satellites have been given a green light for launch. Last Friday’s Launch Readiness Review confirmed that the satellites, the supporting ground installations, and the early operations facilities and teams are ready for lift-off on the early hours of Thursday morning, European time.

Huntsville AL (SPX) Nov 23, 2021
An exhausted star still has some punches to deliver. Astronomers have found that a white dwarf is pummeling a companion object - either a lightweight star or a planet - with incessant blasts of heat and radiation plus a relentless gravitational pull tearing it apart. Most stars, including the Sun, will become "white dwarfs" after they begin to run out of fuel, expand and cool into a red gi

Palmdale CA (SPX) Nov 22, 2021
The NASA and Lockheed Martin team behind the X-59 Quiet SuperSonic Technology (QueSST) have recently removed the aircraft from its jig system, or external supports. The next step is proving the research aircraft is structurally sound and ready for final assembly. The team has made significant progress on the X-59 QueSST assembly. In late October, they pulled the aircraft away from the jig

Moscow (Sputnik) Nov 23, 2021
Last month, the US military botched its own hypersonic missile testing, while China reportedly conducted a test of a missile capable of sending nuclear weapons around the globe this summer. Russia also successfully test-fired its "Zircon" hypersonic missile in the arctic on 18 November. US Space Force General David Thompson on Saturday warned that American hypersonic missile capabilities a

Moscow (Sputnik) Nov 23, 2021
The alleged July test of a hypersonic Chinese missile has sparked concerns in the United States over how Washington seems to lag behind Beijing in the field of hypersonic weapons' capabilities. The US military and intelligence officials were caught off-guard by China's reported hypersonic missile test carried out in July at five times the speed of sound - an unprecedented feat, The Financi

Torino, Italy (SPX) Nov 24, 2021
Nanoracks Europe is on track to set a new record as the company prepares to deploy the first-ever 0.3U CubeSat from the International Space Station (ISS). The satellite, named FEES2, was developed by the Italian company GP Advanced Projects and is approximately the thickness of a cherry. It will be one of the smallest trackable objects deployed directly from the Space Station. FEES2 (Flexi

Perth, Australia (SPX) Nov 24, 2021
Mining-tech leaders IMDEX - the company behind breakthrough drill and blast technology BLASTDOG TM - is backing development of an Australian-made lunar rover that NASA could send to the moon by 2026. IMDEX is part of a group of companies supporting Australian Remote Operations for Space and Earth (AROSE) that is looking to leverage autonomous technology prevalent in the mining sector for u

Moscow (AFP) Nov 26, 2021
Russia's new docking module Prichal on Friday successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS), the Russian space agency Roscosmos said. The new addition to the ISS completed an automated docking with the nadir (Earth-facing) port of Russia's Nauka lab module at 1519 GMT, it said. Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin congratulated the Russian crew members of the ISS on the "suc

Idaho Falls ID (SPX) Nov 24, 2021
Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has selected Aerojet Rocketdyne as the lead subcontractor for the first of three phases toward the development of a dynamic radioisotope power system for a lunar demonstration mission by the late 2020s as outlined in Space Policy Directive-6. The goal of this technology demonstration is to develop and demonstrate performance of a system that is three times m

Long Beach CA (SPX) Nov 24, 2021
Rocket Lab has confirmed it will attempt to catch a returning rocket booster mid-air with a helicopter during the company's next recovery mission. The confirmation follows the successful demonstration of helicopter shadow operations for the first time during the company's 22nd Electron launch last week in the company's latest effort to make Electron the world's first reusable, orbital-class comm