Tag: NASA
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Boeing has informed its employees of uncertainty in future SLS contracts
The primary contractor for the Space Launch System rocket, Boeing, is preparing for the possibility that NASA cancels the long-running program. On Friday, with less than an hour’s notice, David Dutcher, Boeing’s vice president and program manager for the SLS rocket, scheduled an all-hands meeting for the approximately 800 employees working on the program. The…
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Don’t panic, but an asteroid has a 1.9% chance of hitting Earth in 2032
Something in the sky captured the attention of astronomers in the final days of 2024. A telescope in Chile scanning the night sky detected a faint point of light, and it didn’t correspond to any of the thousands of known stars, comets, and asteroids in astronomers’ all-sky catalog. The detection on December 27 came from…
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Don’t panic, but an asteroid has a 1.9% chance of hitting Earth in 2032
Something in the sky captured the attention of astronomers in the final days of 2024. A telescope in Chile scanning the night sky detected a faint point of light, and it didn’t correspond to any of the thousands of known stars, comets, and asteroids in astronomers’ all-sky catalog. The detection on December 27 came from…
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NASA leaders, Artemis contractors argue importance of architecture continuity for returning to the Moon
The Artemis 2 crew, standing in from of their Artemis spacecraft, discusses their planned around-the-moon flight with reporters at the Kennedy Space Center. Left to right: commander Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen. Image: Adam Bernstein/Spaceflight Now. While assembly of the Space Launch System rocket continues at the Kennedy Space…
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Chat, are you ready to go to space with NASA?
The US space agency said Wednesday it will host a live Twitch stream from the International Space Station on February 12. NASA, which has 1.3 million followers on the live-streaming video service, has previously broadcast events on its Twitch channel. However, this will be the first time the agency has created an event specifically for…
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After a wrenching decision by NASA, private lunar lander finds a new customer
Last year was not a good one for a lunar lander company based in Pittsburgh named Astrobotic. In January, the company’s first spacecraft finally launched after years of delays, carrying dozens of payloads, scientific instruments, and time capsules. But within hours of launch, the Peregrine spacecraft developed a propellant leak in its propulsion system. Although…
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Concern about SpaceX influence at NASA grows with new appointee
Like a lot of the rest of the federal government right now, NASA is reeling during the first turbulent days of the Trump administration. The last two weeks have brought a change in leadership in the form of interim administrator Janet Petro, whose ascension was a surprise. Her first act was to tell agency employees…
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Boeing has now lost $2B on Starliner, but still silent on future plans
Boeing announced Monday it lost $523 million on the Starliner crew capsule program last year, putting the aerospace company $2 billion in the red on its NASA commercial crew contract since late 2019. The updated numbers are included in a quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. “Risk remains that we may record additional…
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Launch Roundup: Soyuz flies; New Shepard simulates lunar gravity
This week’s launch manifest is quite diverse, featuring the launches of four different rockets worldwide. Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital rocket has simulated the Moon’s gravity from just beyond the Kármán line, and Rocket Lab launched Electron for the first time this year from New Zealand. Russia launched Soyuz for the first time in 2025…
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Scientists find building blocks of life in OSIRIS-REx samples, discover potentially dangerous asteroid
Scientists from NASA’s OSIRIS-REx asteroid sample return mission recently delivered remarkable findings about asteroid 101955 Bennu after the mission returned its samples to Earth in 2023. While scientists revealed the OSIRIS-REx findings this week, a newly discovered asteroid reached level three on the 10-point Torino space impactor hazard scale, the second highest rating given to…