Tag: SpaceX
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SpaceX achieves Fully Stacked Starship milestone
Super Heavy Booster 4 and Ship 20 were mated for a short while on Friday, marking the major milestone of a fully integrated Starship stack. While the orbital launch attempt is not imminent, the duo is expected to undergo a series of ground testing objectives, including multiple Static Fire tests for the booster. This will…
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GAO denies Blue Origin’s protest of NASA’s lunar lander contract award to SpaceX
An artist’s conception shows the human landing system that was being developed by Blue Origin and its industry partners in the foreground, and a cargo lander in the background. (Blue Origin Illustration) The Government Accountability Office today turned back protests from Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture and Alabama-based Dynetics, ruling that NASA was within…
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NASA cites Falcon flight heritage to select SpaceX to launch Europa Clipper
On Friday, July 23, NASA announced that SpaceX was the winner of a commercial procurement to launch the Europa Clipper mission, which will closely study the icy Galilean moon of Jupiter in search of signs of life and/or ongoing geological activity. The mission is due to launch no earlier than October 2024. SpaceX’s heavy-lift Falcon…
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Bezos vs. Branson vs. Musk: A reality check on the billionaire space race — and space station sci-fi
Blue Origin suborbital spaceflier Mark Bezos throws a ball to Oliver Daemen in zero-G while Wally Funk floats above in the New Shepard capsule. (Blue Origin Photo) The state of commercial space travel is changing so quickly that even science-fiction authors are struggling to keep up. That’s what Time magazine’s editor at large, Jeffrey Kluger, found…
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Dragon Endeavour performs port relocation to clear way for Starliner
The SpaceX Crew Dragon Endeavour vehicle has swapped docking ports aboard the International Space Station in preparation for the upcoming Starliner OFT-2 mission. The 45-minute maneuver began at 10:45 UTC with undocking from the forward port of the Harmony module. After undocking, Endeavour backed away from the ISS to a distance of 220 meters before maneuvering towards…
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Super Heavy Booster 3 fires up for the first time
Following a rigorous test campaign with the Starship prototype vehicles, SpaceX has turned its immediate attention to the booster that will loft its interplanetary spacecraft to new heights. Booster 3, the first prototype Super Heavy to roll to the launch site, conducted a three-engine Static Fire test on Monday. The testing at the suborbital site…
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Super Heavy Booster 3 fires up for the first time
Following a rigorous test campaign with the Starship prototype vehicles, SpaceX has turned its immediate attention to the booster that will loft its interplanetary spacecraft to new heights. Booster 3, the first prototype Super Heavy to roll to the launch site, conducted a three-engine Static Fire test on Monday. The testing at the suborbital site…
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SpaceX welcomes A Shortfall of Gravitas, shuffles Of Course I Still Love You west
On the morning of July 15, SpaceX’s long awaited droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas sailed into Port Canaveral, Florida. The vessel will bring the number of Florida-based droneships back to two following the relocation of Of Course I Still Love You to the west coast, allowing for more frequent launches of Falcon 9 and Falcon…
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SpaceX prepares for first Super Heavy static fire
SpaceX is readying for the first static firing of Raptor engines connected to the base of a Super Heavy booster, known as Booster 3. The test is a critical step in verifying and validating Super Heavy’s initial design for the first series of test boosters, including Booster 4, which is expected to launch Ship 20…
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Cargo Dragon splashes down to complete SpaceX CRS-22 mission
The SpaceX CRS-22 mission has come to a close, with Cargo Dragon having departed the International Space Station on Thursday, July 8 after a series of weather delays. NASA and SpaceX teams continued to monitor weather at the landing zones ahead of a successful undocking at 10:45 AM EDT (14:45 UTC). Splashdown occurred Friday evening…