Topic: Rockets
Closer Look: Commercial Lunar Payload Services

Closer Look: Commercial Lunar Payload Services

The shadow of Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost lander on the Moon. Space exploration is at a weird point in its development. Some tasks, like launching small and medium-sized satellites to low earth orbit are now as routine as overnight shipping. At the same time, landing things on the Moon somehow seems to be harder than it was in the 1960s, as mission after mission doesn’t quite nail their landing. In this kind of a moment in time, you might expect lanches to be just another contracted activity, while significant research and development money is invested into the innovations necessary to...

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Crew 10 Delayed Until March 2025

Crew 10 Delayed Until March 2025

Boeing Crew Flight Test (CFT) astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams in T-38 pre-flight activities at Ellington Field. Photo Date: August 16, 2022. Location: Ellington Field, Hangar 276/Flight Line. Photographer: Robert Markowitz In some late breaking news, NASA...

A Bit of Joy: Jury Duty Strikes Astronaut

A Bit of Joy: Jury Duty Strikes Astronaut

On Oct 28, Astronaut Don Pettit’s son posted to Twitter, “My family just got served two jury summons at once. And as if that wasn’t absurd enough, one is for the one of us in space right now.” I know that legally jobs are required to provide workers time off to serve...

Lucy Sends Science Home

Lucy Sends Science Home

Credit: NASA Back in October 2021, a mission called Lucy lifted off on a multi-year journey to visit Jupiter’s two collections of Trojan Asteroids. Today, it is making its way through the asteroid belt before circling back to use the Earth to get a gravitational...

Closer Look: Satellites versus Science

Closer Look: Satellites versus Science

Bluewalker 3 over Kitt Peak In this week’s closer look, we go where I haven’t really wanted to go before: we are going to look at the impacts of the growing number of satellites, like star links, on our ability to safely live and do astronomy. This closer look is...

Rockets Report: 2023/08/05

Rockets Report: 2023/08/05

Credit: SpaceX This week was a week of highs and lows.  SpaceX launched the biggest commercial satellite ever but the last ever Antares 230 also launched.  Plus a new radar satellite for Singapore and a bunch of Starlink and Chinese launches.First up is that...