International Space Station (ISS) Program managers are working to re-align resupply and crew rotation manifests following last week’s launch failure of the Progress M-12M/44P spacecraft. The failure of the Soyuz-U booster’s third stage grounded both the Soyuz-U rockets used to launch cargo, and the Soyuz-FG rockets used to launch crews, since both rockets share very [...]
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NASA’s three retired Space Shuttle orbiters are set to donate their entire Main Propulsion Systems (MPS) to the opening salvo of Space Launch System (SLS) Heavy Lift Launch Vehicles (HLV). The work to remove the MPS’ array of plumbing, tanks and valves from the aft of the orbiters would result in a delay of six [...]
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NASA’s next spaceship, the Orion – otherwise known as the Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle (MPCV) – is starting to resemble what it’ll look like ahead of launch, as Lockheed Martin engineers at their Denver facility work through a number of key development tasks. In a milestone for the vehicle, an Orion Ground Test Article (GTA) was [...]
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For over 30 years, the Space Shuttle Program captured the hearts and minds of millions of people throughout the world. From following the missions on TV, in newspapers, on websites, the Shuttle program has been lived by people on every continent. And through it all, the missions, the people, and the workforce have been brought [...]
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While the political side of the Space Launch System (SLS) continues to be bogged down by delays and arguments, the engineering side of the vehicle is picking up, most notably on the core stage. With Boeing’s “Pathfinder” tank completed ahead of schedule, External Tank tooling is being unwrapped for checks, ironically as ET operations officially [...]
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While Russian engineers continue to investigate the failure of their Progress M-12M, which crashed in Eastern Russia on Wednesday, half a world away Orbital welcomed their first pressurized cargo module (PCM) for its Cygnus cargo logistics spacecraft at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, in preparation for leading the charge of America’s own commercial cargo [...]
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The Russian Progress M-12M spacecraft, also known by its US designation of 44P, blasted off toward the International Space Station (ISS) from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan today (Wednesday 24th August) at around 1:00 PM GMT, which was 7:00 PM Baikonur time. Unfortunately for the ISS, around 325 seconds into the flight, the third stage [...]
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As the Space Shuttle Program (SSP) heads into its final week of operations, United Space Alliance (USA) Vice President and SSP manager Howard DeCastro has spoken about how the retirement of the fleet makes no sense, from a technical, ISS support and national security standpoint. A last ditch reversal of the decision, likely via a [...]
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NASA’s Desert Research and Technology Studies (RATS) are working through a series of tests in Flagstaff, Arizona – tests which will provide the opening baselines for manned missions to Near Earth Objects (NEOs) and a base on Mars. The latest “runs” are involving the use of the Space Exploration Vehicle (SEV), Habs, and a remote [...]
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On August 20, 1977, the intrepid spacecraft Voyager 2 launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, FL on what was supposed to be only a four year mission to Jupiter and Saturn. But exactly 34 years later, Voyager 2 has cemented itself into the upper echelons of unmanned space exploration, continuing to beam back [...]
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International Space Station (ISS) program managers at NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) have completed the Flight Readiness Review (FRR) for the upcoming ISS Expedition 29 on Wednesday. The FRR included a thorough review of all aspects of the Expedition 29 increment, the conclusion of which resulted in all groups issuing a Certification of Flight Readiness (CoFR) [...]
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With an apparent urgency to complete an orbiting constellation, China launched another new satellite in the ShiJian-11 series, just three weeks after the launch of the previous ShiJian-11 mission. However, the launch of the Long March 2C with ShiJian 11-04 failed during ascent after leaving the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 09:28UTC on Thursday.
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A Proton-M rocket, with the fiftieth Briz-M upper stage, launched Russia’s Ekspress-AM4 communications satellite, after an early morning liftoff from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. However, having launched at 03:25 Thursday local time (21:25 UTC on Wednesday) - and the Proton-M completing its mission successfully – the Briz-M failed to deploy Ekspress-AM4 into a geosynchronous transfer orbit after [...]
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An ISC Kosmotras Dnepr carrier rocket has launched eight satellites into Low Earth orbit. The rocket lifted off from Dombarovsky in southern Russia at 07:12 UTC (13:12 local time) on Wednesday. The primary payload of this, the seventeenth Dnepr launch, was Ukraine’s Sich-2 remote sensing satellite.
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In what will be a major milestone, not only for SpaceX, but for the entire space program, International Space Station (ISS) teams are working through the long list of safety requirements to approve Dragon’s debut ‘test’ mission to the orbital outpost. Several specific areas of interest are in work, including ongoing evaluations into the potential [...]
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China has launched the first of a news series of oceanographic satellites, with the HaiYang-2A (HY-2A) launched at 22:57UTC on August 15. The launch was carried out by a Long March 4B (Chang Zheng-4B) launch vehicle from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, as the Chinese ramp up their impressive launch rate.
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NASA’s Mission Operations Directorate (MOD) are preparing for involvement in an underwater simulation of protocols which may become part of a manned mission to a Near Earth Object (NEO). The tests will be carried out during October’s NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) mission, which will be based at the Aquarius underwater habitat in Key [...]
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Orbital Sciences Corporation launched a Minotaur IV rocket carrying an experimental hypersonic prototype for the United States Air Force and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency into space on a suborbital trajectory. The rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Air Force Base’s Space Launch Complex 8 at 14:45 UTC (07:45 local time) on Thursday. However, the HTV-2b [...]
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China has launched a domestic communications satellite for Pakistan’s SUPARCO (Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission) at 16:15UTC on August 11 from the Xi Chang Satellite Launch Center, in Sichuan Province. The launch of Paksat-1R was conducted by the Long March 3B/E (Chang Zheng-3B/E) launch vehicle.
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In a rare occurrence, Space Shuttle orbiters Discovery and Endeavour were purposefully visible together this morning at the Kennedy Space Center as a Shuttle shuffle took place to move Endeavour from OPF-1 to the VAB for storage and Discovery from the VAB to OPF-1 for full Transition and Retirement processing, set to culminate for the [...]
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