The human exploration of Mars by the 2030s is within reach if global space powers — supported by sustained budgets and political backing — cooperate to overcome the technical hurdles, according to Explore Mars, Inc. The four-year-old Massachusetts nonprofit advocates focused use of the International Space Station (ISS), the possible introduction of a modest, crewed cis-lunar outpost in the 2020s and carefully paced robotic missions to achieve the goal.

HOUSTON — Spacewalking cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazanskiy met with mixed results Jan. 27 during a second attempt to install a pair of Canadian commercial Earth imaging cameras outside the International Space Station (ISS). The task outside the Russian segment of the outpost proved so troublesome during a late-December attempt that the two men were forced to retrieve the just-installed imagers for internal troubleshooting during a frustrating excursion that grew to a Russian record 8 hr., 7 min.

APPLAUSE: The U.S. commercial satellite industry is cheering lawmakers and awaiting a congressionally mandated strategy this year that could help push the Pentagon toward multiyear leases and hosted payloads providing satcom services. The fiscal 2014 defense authorization act requires the Defense Department to provide Congress with an analysis of financial or other benefits of doing multiyear acquisitions.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas V sent NASA’s newest Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS) toward its geostationary orbit late Jan. 23, beefing up the constellation as demand for space network links grows with the utilization of the International Space Station (ISS) and a swarm of scientific satellites.

Two of the five Earth-science missions NASA plans to launch this year will end up on the International Space Station (ISS), which is growing in importance as a relatively low-cost spot to operate downward-looking sensors. The station’s low altitude and relatively high inclination also can give scientists a new perspective for their observations, which typically are taken from sun-synchronous polar orbits.

The spacecraft bus that will power and point the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) passed its critical design review five months early, as the deep-space infrared instrument continues moving toward its targeted 2018 launch date.

Virgin Galactic’s plans to supplement its suborbital human spaceflight business by launching small satellites from its WhiteKnightTwo carrier aircraft are advancing with hot-fire ground tests of the two kerosene-fueled rocket engines it has designed for the application. Developed and built by Virgin Galactic engineers, the 3,500-lb.-thrust NewtonOne and 47,500-lb.-thrust NewtonTwo are the first- and second-stage engines, respectively, for the company’s planned LauncherOne rocket.

HOUSTON — Competition remains a crucial factor in the final stages of the NASA-funded Commercial Crew Program (CCP), according to Michael Lopez-Alegria, president of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF). CCP is intended to restore the U.S. ability to transport humans to low Earth orbit lost when NASA’s space shuttle fleet retired in 2011.