Space

Last month Ed Stone retired as Voyager project scientist. The mission still needed a successor.

Our roundup of the main aerospace and defense stories making the news this week.

The chairwoman of the Federal Communications Commission announced Nov. 3 that she would reorganize the agency to create a standalone Space Bureau to better support the needs of the growing satellite industry.

Virgin Galactic is set to return its first SpaceShipTwo spaceplane VSS Unity to test flights in the coming months following the completion of upgrade work and says it remains on track to begin the long-delayed start of commercial spaceflights in the second quarter of 2023.

A low-cost positioning, navigation and timing service that would use the same L-band frequency range as the Global Positioning System could be installed on hundreds of military satellites in low Earth orbit, the Space Development Agency revealed on Nov. 3.

Gen. B. Chance Saltzman takes over command from retiring Gen. Jay Raymond, who has led the Space Force since its December 2019 inception.

After a three-year hiatus, SpaceX’s heavy lifter is back in business.

A modified Sikorsky S-92 helicopter will attempt to snare the returning booster by its parachute line.

NASA has issued a draft request for proposals (RFP) from industry for a Lunar Terrain Vehicle (LTV) for exploring the Moon’s south pole as part of the

Bell will supply the vehicle’s feathering system and flight control surfaces while Texas-based structures specialist Qarbon Aerospace will produce the fuselage and wing.

As NASA presses ahead to transition International Space Station operations to multiple commercial free-flying platforms, the agency is also working to retain its international and U.S. National Laboratory partners, according to two days of testimony provided to the NASA Advisory Council’s Human Exploration and Operations Committee.

Spire Global has won a contract from DARPA to design a satellite that would carry sensors to very low Earth orbit to study the ionosphere.

A triple-core Falcon Heavy, currently the most powerful rocket operating today, lifted off from a fog-shrouded Kennedy Space Center on Nov. 1 on a challenging and classified mission for the U.S. Space Force.

No longer in safe mode, NASA’s Capstone small satellite mission continues to blaze a trail in space for the planned lunar Gateway station.

As well as a launch provider, UK-based Orbex will now become a launch site operator with assistance from Jacobs.

New research shows China’s growing capabilities to disrupt military satellite communications.

The Air Force Research Laboratory is developing an interface standard it hopes will be adopted by commercial industry, too.

NorthStar Earth & Space’s initial three space situational awareness satellites are scheduled to launch into orbit in mid-2023.

NASA plans to add a crewed lunar landing on its Artemis IV mission—previously a dedicated assembly flight for the lunar Gateway—and award a contract to SpaceX to ferry astronauts to and from lunar orbit and the Moon’s surface.

Small-satellite maker Terran Orbital has formally aligned with Lockheed Martin, receiving a $100 million investment boost.

On Oct. 31 a Long March-5B rocket blasted off at 3:37 p.m. local time from Wenchang Space Launch Site on Hainan Island.

NASA generated a nationwide total economic output that exceeded $71.2 billion in 2021, up 10.7% from 2019, while supporting 339,600 jobs and leading to $7.7 billion in federal, state and local tax revenues, according to the agency’s latest economic impact report.

The Boeing-built core stage for the second Space Launch System (SLS) rocket is nearing completion at NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility near New Orleans.

Anti-satellite threats force military satellites to use more fuel.

Working with NASA’s long-running Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the agency’s soon-to-conclude Mars InSight Lander mission has made a potentially far-reaching discovery.