Irene Klotz is Senior Space Editor for Aviation Week, based in Cape Canaveral. Before joining Aviation Week in 2017, Irene spent 25 years as a wire service reporter covering human and robotic spaceflight, commercial space, astronomy, science and technology for Reuters and United Press International. She also worked with Discovery Communications, Discovery News and was a founding member of Space.com.
Irene cut her teeth on the space beat at Florida Today newspaper, a business writer enchanted by the colorful entrepreneurs who wanted access to Air Force launch facilities and assets after commercial payloads were taken off the space shuttles following the 1986 Challenger accident. Commercial space remains the focus of her work, along with a keen interest in the search for life beyond Earth.
A graduate of Northwestern University, Irene is the 2014 recipient of the Harry Kolcum Memorial News and Communications Award, named in honor of the late Aviation Week managing editor and Cape Canaveral senior editor who was among Irene’s earliest mentors.
China’s Tianwen-1 mother ship arrived in Martian orbit on Feb. 10, setting the stage for a multi-spacecraft exploration initiative during the country’s first visit to the red planet.
NASA on Feb. 9 awarded SpaceX a $331 million contract for Falcon Heavy launch and support services to send the first two modules of its planned Gateway outpost toward lunar orbit.
With one of its two U.S. commercial space taxi lines not yet operational, NASA is considering bartering for an extra seat on a Russian Soyuz capsule slated to launch in April or May to the International Space Station (ISS), the agency said Feb. 9.
