The U.S. Space Force has reassigned the launch vehicle for its upcoming GPS III-8 satellite mission, opting to move the payload from United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur rocket to SpaceX’s Falcon 9. The decision comes as Vulcan undergoes an ongoing investigation into issues with its solid rocket boosters (SRBs).
Rocket Lab successfully launched a radar imaging satellite for Japanese company Synspective on Friday (March 20), marking another milestone in an ongoing partnership to build a next-generation Earth observation constellation.
Rocket Lab has landed its largest launch contract to date, signing a $190 million agreement with the U.S. Department of Defense to carry out a series of hypersonic test missions over the next four years.
NASA officials say they have yet to reestablish communication with the agency’s MAVEN Mars orbiter, more than three months after contact was unexpectedly lost.
NASA is preparing to return astronauts to deep space as the agency moves forward with plans to roll its Artemis II rocket to the launch pad next week, targeting liftoff as early as April 1 for a landmark crewed mission around the Moon.
NASA is taking steps to reduce the risks associated with its upcoming Artemis missions to the Moon, but the agency’s approach still contains significant gaps, according to a new report released Tuesday by NASA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG).
SpaceX is preparing for the first launch of the upgraded Starship Version 3 rocket, with CEO Elon Musk saying the debut test flight could occur in early April.
Scientists analyzing samples returned by China’s Chang'e 6 mission have revised the long-standing model used to date lunar craters, offering new insight into the Moon’s ancient impact history. The research, conducted by teams from the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Geology and Geophysics and the Aerospace Information Research Institute along with international collaborators, analyzed material collected from the Moon’s far side together with orbital remote-sensing data. Their findings, published in the journal Science Advances, show that meteorite impacts have struck the Moon’s near and far hemispheres at essentially the same rate over time.
NASA has officially selected the Centaur V upper stage, developed by United Launch Alliance, to fly on the agency’s Space Launch System rocket beginning with the Artemis 4 mission, which is currently scheduled to launch no earlier than early 2028.
In a sweeping reset of America’s return-to-the-moon strategy, newly appointed NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman announced Friday that the agency will restructure its Artemis program, adding a crucial preparatory mission in 2027 and redefining the timeline for landing astronauts on the lunar surface. Isaacman acknowledged that NASA’s earlier plan to land astronauts near the moon’s south pole in 2028 was overly ambitious without an additional stepping-stone mission to validate critical technologies and operational procedures. “We’re going to get there in steps,” he said in an interview with CBS News and later during a press conference. “We’ve got to get back to basics.”
NASA’s plans to send astronauts around the Moon for the first time in more than half a century have hit another setback. Engineers troubleshooting the Artemis II mission encountered problems repressurizing helium tanks in the upper stage of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket late Friday, forcing officials to order a rollback of the towering vehicle from Launch Complex 39B to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) for further investigation.
SpaceX has cleared a major hurdle in preparing its next-generation Starship system for flight, successfully testing the upgraded water-cooled top deck on the Orbital Launch Mount (OLM) at Pad 2 earlier this week. The full-scale demonstration validated the system’s ability to withstand the punishing heat and acoustic forces expected from the 33 Raptor 3 engines that will power the new Block 3 Super Heavy booster.
