Author: starpathwp-production
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A look at the surprising history of the earliest rocket pioneers
When did spaceflight begin? There is no single answer. For newcomers to space, the beginning of time can be traced to as recently as December 2015. That’s when SpaceX landed its Falcon 9 rocket successfully for the first time, opening the modern era of rapid, reusable spaceflight. Increasingly, anything that came before feels anachronistic. But…
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After 11 years on Mars, Curiosity continues to climb the slopes of Mount Sharp
On Aug. 6, 2012, NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory mission, comprised of the new Curiosity rover, officially began when Curiosity was successfully lowered onto the Martian surface via a first-of-its-kind skycrane. Curiosity‘s landing location was at the base of Mount Sharp (officially referred to as Aeolis Mons) in Gale Crater — a 3.5 billion-year-old crater that scientists believe was…
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Jeanette Epps will finally go to space six years after being pulled from flight
NASA confirmed on Friday that Jeanette Epps, a former CIA technology intelligence officer selected as an astronaut in 2009, will finally launch into space in early 2024 on a SpaceX flight to the International Space Station. The crew assignment comes six years after NASA pulled Epps from what would have been her first spaceflight, just…
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Voyager 2 phones home and says everything is cool
NASA lost contact with its Voyager 2 spacecraft—the second-most distant object ever built by humans and flung into space—nearly two weeks ago due to an errant command sent to the probe. This caused Voyager to point its antenna slightly away from Earth. At the time, the space agency said it wasn’t panicking. The mission’s scientists…
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Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket launch scrubbed
Updated 12:55 a.m. EDT (0455 UTC), August 6, 2023. Rocket Lab’s 40th Electron rocket stands ready for launch on LC-1B, a the Mahia Peninsula, New Zealand. Image: Rocket Lab. Rocket Lab has called off Sunday’s attempt to launch its 40th Electron rocket due to “out-of-family sensor data”. It made the announcement about 15 minutes before…
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Rocket Report: Lack of transparency on Ariane 6, drastic cuts Down Under
Welcome to Edition 6.05 of the Rocket Report! This week’s newsletter has the distinction of including not one, but two items of news from Australia. Unfortunately, one of the items suggests rough waters lie ahead for the country’s young commercial space industry. As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don’t want to miss…
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Australian space industry hurting post government spending cut
Australian space sector concern about future funding In June, Australia canceled the National Space Mission for Earth Observation program, which would have cost over a billion dollars. This ambitious program aimed to incentivize the private sector to build satellites for various purposes, including weather monitoring and GPS services. Additionally, it would have created numerous high-skilled…
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Impulse Space Secures New Investment from Airbus Ventures
Airbus Ventures has announced its investment in Impulse Space, one of the leaders in the development of in-space transportation services for the inner solar system – which has raised $45 million in its oversubscribed Series A funding round. The round is led by RTX Ventures, with participation from Founders Fund, Lux Capital, Airbus Ventures, Space…
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Solestial’s 20-Kilowatt Solar Blanket to Power Atomos’s Orbital Transfer Vehicles
Solestial, the solar energy company for space, and in-space logistics provider Atomos Space announced a multi-mission sales agreement for a minimum of 20 kilowatts of Solestial’s ultrathin, low-mass, radiation-hardened solar blankets. Solestial’s photovoltaic system will be demonstrated on Atomos’s first mission, scheduled for February 2024, and then will provide primary power for Atomos’s solar-electric orbital…
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Satellite operators poised for $9 billion payday after clearing C-band spectrum
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched early Thursday with the last of a dozen new C-band video relay satellites purchased by Intelsat and SES to help clear spectrum for the rollout of 5G wireless services in the United States. Intelsat and SES, two of the world’s largest geostationary communications satellites operators, are on track to…