Tag: Starship
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Rocket Report: Starliner launch preps; Indian rocket engine human-rated
Welcome to Edition 6.32 of the Rocket Report! I’m writing the report again this week as Eric Berger is in Washington, DC, to receive a well-earned honor, the 2024 Excellence in Commercial Space Journalism Award from the Commercial Spaceflight Federation. Cape Canaveral is the world’s busiest spaceport, and this week, three leading US launch companies…
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SpaceX wants to take over a Florida launch pad from rival ULA
One of the largest launch pads at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station will become vacant later this year after the final flight of United Launch Alliance’s Delta IV Heavy rocket. SpaceX is looking to make the sprawling facility a new home for the Starship launch vehicle. The environmental review for SpaceX’s proposal to take over…
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Rocket Report: Falcon 9 flies for 300th time; an intriguing launch from Russia
Welcome to Edition 6.31 of the Rocket Report! Photographers at Cape Canaveral, Florida, noticed a change to the spaceport’s skyline this week. Blue Origin has erected a full-size simulator of its New Glenn rocket vertically on its launch pad for a series of fit checks and tests. Late last year, we reported Blue Origin was…
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Starship Flight 3 Fully Stacked for WDR testing
SpaceX is making good progress on Flight 3 readiness with a full stack on the pad and road closures coming up for a possible Wet Dress Rehearsal (WDR) for Booster 10 and Ship 28. SpaceX continues to work on future flight vehicles, on the path towards achieving operational status with Starship. Flight 3 Full Stack…
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Rocket Report: SpaceX at the service of a rival; Endeavour goes vertical
Welcome to Edition 6.29 of the Rocket Report! Right now, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket is the only US launch vehicle offering crew or cargo service to the International Space Station. The previous version of Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket retired last year, forcing that company to sign a contract with SpaceX to launch its Cygnus supply…
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Starlab—with half the volume of the ISS—will fit inside Starship’s payload bay
The Starlab commercial space station will launch on SpaceX’s Starship rocket, officials said this week. Starlab is a joint venture between the US-based Voyager Space and the European-based multinational aerospace corporation Airbus. The venture is building a large station with a habitable volume equivalent to half the pressurized volume of the International Space Station and…
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Wet dress rehearsal on the horizon for Starship’s third flight
SpaceX is deep into preparations for the next Starship flight, focusing on the Orbital Launch Pad (OLP). Booster 10 and Ship 28 are set to return to the launch site in the coming week or two, ahead of a Wet Dress Rehearsal (WDR) that will set the stage for the third launch of the world’s…
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Rocket Report: A new estimate of Starship costs; Japan launches spy satellite
Welcome to Edition 6.27 of the Rocket Report! This week, we discuss an intriguing new report looking at Starship. Most fascinating, the report covers SpaceX’s costs to build a Starship and how these costs will come down as the company ramps up its build and launch cadence. At the other end of the spectrum, former…
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Elon Musk’s recent all-hands meeting at SpaceX was full of interesting news
Last year was unquestionably the best year in SpaceX’s history, CEO Elon Musk told his employees during an all-hands meeting in South Texas last week. There were 96 flights of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, plus the first two test flights of the enormous new Starship rocket. In 2024, SpaceX said it aims…
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First astronaut missions to the Moon since 1972 delayed due to heat shield questions, hardware readiness
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. A quartet of astronauts will have to wait until next year before their…