Washington DC (SPX) Aug 25, 2021
With NASA's Psyche mission now less than a year from launch, anticipation is building. By next spring, the fully assembled spacecraft will ship from the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California to NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida for a launch period that opens Aug. 1, 2022. In early 2026, the Psyche spacecraft will arrive at its target, an asteroid of the same name i

Redmond WA (SPX) Aug 25, 2021
Xplore Inc., an innovative commercial space company providing Space as a Service has announced a follow on contract with the U.S. Air Force, (USAF) to continue developing their positioning, navigation and timing (PNT) solution as a commercial service for cislunar space. Xplore's current Phase II effort culminates in a hardware in the loop testbed that will demonstrate the required performa

Denver CO (SPX) Aug 25, 2021
Voyager Space report that its subsidiary, Altius Space Machines, Inc. (Altius) was recently selected by Eta Space to provide a cryogenic coupler for liquid oxygen (LOX) transfer in support of its planned nine-month LOXSAT cryogenic fluid management mission. Eta Space was selected by NASA to execute a flight demonstration of a complete cryogenic oxygen fluid management system. The system wi

Moscow (Sputnik) Aug 25, 2021
Two space tourists could head to the International Space Station (ISS) on board the Russian Soyuz spacecraft after 2023, Deputy Director General for International Cooperation of Russian space agency Roscosmos Sergey Saveliev told Sputnik. "We have commercial customers, I think we will announce them this fall," Saveliev said, adding that the tourists, who are non-Russian citizens, will like

Jacksonville FL (SPX) Aug 25, 2021
Virgin Orbit has selected Redwire, a leader in mission critical space solutions and high reliability components for the next generation space economy, to provide state-of-the-art digital engineering solutions that will support multi-mission planning through systematic analysis and advanced modeling and dynamic mission simulation. This critical capability will enhance Virgin Orbit's end-to-end re

Kennedy Space Center FL (SPX) Aug 25, 2021
When astronauts embark on long-duration missions in the future, crews will grow food to supplement what they can bring with them. More than 20 years of continuously living and working in space aboard the International Space Station has provided many opportunities for crews and researchers to observe the challenges of growing plants in the stressful conditions of microgravity. One experimen

Moscow (Sputnik) Aug 24, 2021
Russia and China have fervently opposed US plans for the deployment of offensive weapons systems in space for over a decade, jointly proposing a treaty to prevent such arms from being deployed by any nation. Earlier this year, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that there was "still a chance" to reach an agreement on the issue. The Congressional Research Service (CRS), an agency r

Moscow (Sputnik) Aug 25, 2021
The Starlink project, aimed to blanket the surface of the planet with low-latency satellite internet, is operated by Elon Musk's company SpaceX that, in 2019, began launching small satellites into low-Earth orbit. To date, the Starlink constellation consists of over 1,600 satellites, while the goal is to use nearly 30,000. Tech billionaire and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on Monday tweeted that th

Peterson SFB CO (AFNS) Aug 24, 2021
The Department of the Air Force activated the third and final field command of the U.S. Space Force, Space Training and Readiness Command, in a ceremony here Aug. 23. Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall approved the final organizational structure for STARCOM's establishment on Aug. 13, and Chief of Space Operations Gen. John W. "Jay" Raymond wasted no time putting the new command's le

Beijing (XNA) Aug 25, 2021
China's Mars rover Zhurong had traveled more than 1,000 meters on the surface of the red planet as of Monday, the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said. China's Tianwen-1 mission, consisting of an orbiter, lander, and rover, was launched on July 23, 2020. The lander, carrying the rover with an expected lifespan of at least 9