The UK’s new National Space Propulsion Facility has been declared open. ESA oversaw the design, assembly and commissioning of the facility – equipped to test-fire the most powerful classes of rocket engines used aboard spacecraft – which will now be managed by the UK Government’s Science and Technology Facilities Council.

The Tana River, Kenya’s longest river, is featured in this false-colour image captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.

Livermore CA (SPX) Jun 18, 2021
Thousands of images of Earth and space have been taken by a compact space imaging payload developed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) researchers and its collaborator Tyvak Nano-Satellite Systems. Known as GEOStare2, the payload has two space telescopes that together have taken more than 4,500 pictures for space domain awareness, astronomy and Earth observations that have be

Washington DC (AFNS) Jun 15, 2021
The U. S. Space Force successfully launched the Tactically Responsive Launch-2 (TacRL-2) mission on a Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base on June 13 at 4:11 a.m. EDT, delivering a technology demonstration satellite to Low Earth Orbit. Pegasus, the world's first privately-developed commercial space launch vehicle, is an air-launched three staged rocket carrie

Louisville CO (SPX) Jun 18, 2021
Sierra Space has announced the signing of a joint agreement with Rhodium Scientific, an innovative provider of space microgravity science mission and logistics services. Specializing in space-based scientific research, Rhodium Scientific will test the viability of science operations on Sierra Space's LIFE habitat for scientific payloads planned to fly to space on a future CRS-2 mission.

London, UK (SPX) Jun 18, 2021
The centre will allow UK companies and academics to test state-of-the-art propulsion engines which are used to move small satellites in space at a more affordable rate than having to go abroad. It will also allow new types of more sustainable propellants to be tested, such as Hydrogen Peroxide and Liquid Oxygen which are more environmentally friendly in sourcing, storage and combustion. Ba

Washington DC (UPI) Jun 17, 2021
A chaotic, young star system, located 400 light-years from Earth, has offered astronomers new insights into the planet formation process. Observations of the stellar system Elias 2-27 - made using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, or ALMA - confirmed the presence of significant gravitational instabilities, a phenomenon scientists have long suspected played an important

Washington DC (SPX) Jun 18, 2021
computer halted on Sunday, June 13, shortly after 4 p.m. EDT. After analyzing the data, the Hubble operations team is investigating whether a degrading memory module led to the computer halt. The team is preparing to switch to one of several backup modules on Wednesday, June 16. The computer will then be allowed to run for approximately one day to verify that the problem has been solved. The tea

WASHINGTON — Radar satellite imagery startup Capella Space on June 14 received a $3 million research contract in support of the Space Development Agency’s National Defense Space Architecture.

Capella Space was selected through a “broad agency announcement” issued by the space agency in January seeking proposals on a wide range of technologies for “National Defense Space Architecture Systems, Technologies, and Emerging Capabilities.

Updated 6 p.m. Eastern with NASA and Coalition for Deep Space Exploration statements.

WASHINGTON — The Senate confirmed the nominations June 17 of a former astronaut to be the deputy administrator of NASA and of an ocean scientist to lead the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.