Spacewalking cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Sergey Prokopyev labored outside the ISS's Russian segment Dec. 11 to survey the site of the small hole in the Soyuz MS-09 capsule’s habitation compartment that was detected in late August.

A week after NASA’s Osiris-Rex asteroid sample return mission spacecraft arrived at the asteroid Bennu, scientists see early signs of a carbon- and water-rich object.

The abort was the first unplanned shutdown during a terminal count of a Delta IV Heavy, which has flown 10 times since its debut in 2004.

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) overcame an unexpected satellite communications interruption early Dec. 8 to proceed with the berthing of SpaceX’s 16th NASA-contracted Dragon resupply capsule.

SpaceX dispatched a recovery ship to try to pick up a wayward Falcon 9 booster, which successfully delivered a Dragon cargo ship into low Earth orbit on Dec. 5 before fumbling a planned landing at Cape Canaveral.

In addition to landing successfully, NASA’s Mars Insight mission scored another triumph with the companion MarCO 6U cubesat duo.

InSight is to become the first spacecraft to place a seismometer directly on the surface of another planet to detect quakes.

Thales Alenia Space has this week completed a design review for its Stratobus surveillance and communications airship program.