
Copernical Team
Loss of Vega flight VV17 report issued

Lunar rocks, soil brought back by Chang'e 5 handed over to scientists

China plans to launch four manned spacecraft in next two years

Success of lunar mission hailed

Mission accomplished, now on to the next: China Daily editorial

SpaceX launches U.S. spy satellite; Falcon 9 first stage returns

Russian cosmonaut says new air leak on ISS Zvezda module not critical

Telescope photographs the next target asteroid for Hayabusa2

On December 10, 2020 (Hawai'i Standard Time), the Subaru Telescope imaged the small asteroid 1998 KY26, the target of Hayabusa2's extended mission. The positional data for 1998 KY26 collected during the observations will be used to more accurately determine the orbital elements of this object.
Operated by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), the asteroid explorer Hayabusa2 delivered a reentry capsule to Earth containing samples from the asteroid (162173) Ryugu on December 6 (Japan Standard Time).
Recently discovered comet seen during 2020 total solar eclipse

NASA's Webb sunshield successfully unfolds and tensions in final tests

Lengthened to the size of a tennis court, the five-layer sunshield of NASA's fully assembled James Webb Space Telescope successfully completed a final series of large-scale deployment and tensioning tests. This milestone puts the observatory one step closer to its launch in 2021.
"This is one of Webb's biggest accomplishments in 2020," said Alphonso Stewart, Webb deployment systems lead for NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.