Blue Origin and Dynetics each filed protests with GAO over NASA’s selection of SpaceX for the Human Lunar Landing System. Two weeks ago, NASA chose SpaceX to proceed into development, awarding it a $2.99 billion fixed price contract. It is for the first Artemis landing and a precursor uncrewed flight test. NASA is issuing a …
SpaceX SN17 Starship has an orbital heat shield. This indicates that SpaceX is expecting to rapidly progress to higher altitude flights. SpaceX is expecting they might be only two months away from an orbital test flight of Starship. SOURCES – what about it? Boca Chica Gal Written By Brian Wang, Nextbigfuture.com Brian WangBrian Wang is …
SpaceX scrubbed todays planned test flight of Starship SN15. This will be the fifth attempt to fly to 10 kilometers and return and land safely. The SN15 has had a lot of new modifications and improved Raptor engines. This should greatly improve the chances for a successful flight and landing. We will have to wait …
China has launched a 20 ton core space station module. They will launch two more lab modules in 2022. The Tianhe space station will be similar to the Soviet Salyut space station modules. The station will likely end up about half the size of the old Mir space station. The Mir had seven modules and …
SpaceX presented a version of a fully reusable two-stage Super Heavy rocket in 2016. It was the Interplanetary Transport System. China has now presented a video of a fully reusable two-stage super-heavy rocket. China’s video is more cartoonlike. China will have to upgrade its rendering for a more photorealistic video. You can compare the videos. …
The $2.9 billion NASA funding for the SpaceX Lunar Starship means that a Starship will get man-rated for four astronauts. This means getting the chance of loss of crew less than one in 500 for a lunar landing. SpaceX Lunar Starship will only initially support four astronauts because the launch will be performed by SLS …
SpaceX has launched another 60 Starlink satellites from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The Falcon 9 first stage rocket booster supporting this mission previously supported launch of GPS III Space Vehicle 03, Turksat 5A, and four Starlink missions. This was also the 81st successful recovery of a …
The Interstellar Probe is a space mission to discover physical interactions shaping globally the boundary of our Sun`s heliosphere and its dynamics and for the first time directly sample the properties of the local interstellar medium (LISM). Interstellar Probe will go through the boundary of the heliosphere to the LISM enabling for the first time …
Elon Musk is getting a lot of media coverage when he repeated his statement that it will be very risky for the first people who go to Mars. This is an obvious statement of fact. I heard radio hosts at KGO 810 radio talking about this statement with great surprise. The hosts were disparaging of …
NASA astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, along with JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon have arrived at the International Space Station. Above-The four new SpaceX Crew-2 astronauts joined the Expedition 65 crew today bringing the station population to 11. …
ULA, a 50-50 joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin, has four Delta 4-Heavy rockets left to launch in the next few years. All will launch spy satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office. The retirement was announced in 2019 and the last Delta IV Heavy should fly in 2023. ULA’s Delta 4 Heavy’s price has …
