mission

Rocket Lab launches Earth-observation satellite in 1st mission from new pad

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Pad B’s debut mission went off without a hitch. Rocket Lab lofted a private Earth-observation satellite today (Feb. 28) from the newly finished second pad at its Launch Complex 1, on New Zealand’s North Island.  An Electron rocket topped with Strix-β, which will be operated by the Japanese company Synspective, lifted off from Pad B … Read more

NASA, SpaceX and Axiom will preview private Ax-1 ISS mission today: Watch live

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NASA, SpaceX and Houston company Axiom Space will discuss a landmark private space mission today (Feb. 28), and you can watch it live. Axiom Space plans to launch Ax-1, the first all-private crewed mission to the International Space Station, on March 30. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will launch a Crew Dragon capsule carrying four … Read more

NASA’s Artemis 1 moon mission, 1st flight of new megarocket, won’t launch until May

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NASA’s Artemis 1 moon mission may end up being a summertime affair. An April launch is no longer possible for Artemis 1, which will send an uncrewed Orion spacecraft around the moon using a huge Space Launch System (SLS) megarocket, agency officials said today (Feb. 24). And May could be difficult to hit as well. … Read more

NASA will update us all on its Artemis 1 moon mission Thursday. Here’s how to follow it live.

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NASA will give an update about its Artemis 1 moon mission on Thursday (Feb. 24), and you can tune in. Artemis 1 will be the first-ever launch of NASA’s new Space Launch System (SLS) megarocket. The mission will send an uncrewed Orion capsule around the moon, to ensure that the SLS-Orion duo is ready to … Read more

China says moonbound rocket stage was not from 2014 lunar mission: report

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China says a rocket stage set to slam into the moon on March 4 isn’t from one of its missions, contradicting several recent reports. Several independent observations suggest the rocket is from the Chang’e 5-T1 mission in 2014, following a misidentification that said the stage was part of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that launched … Read more

Mystery Deepens as China Denies Owning Space Junk Set to Crash Into Moon

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China on Monday denied responsibility for a rocket set to slam into the Moon, after experts said the piece of space junk likely came from Beijing’s lunar exploration program. Astronomers initially thought the wayward object was a chunk of a SpaceX rocket that blasted off seven years ago and was abandoned in space after completing … Read more

Soar over the desert in footage from drone practicing for mission to Saturn’s strangest moon

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In a scene reminiscent of the recent “Dune” movie, the predecessor of a mission bound for Saturn‘s strangest moon soars over the California desert. A new YouTube video shows a drone flying above Imperial Dunes in California in September 2021 to perform testing for the Dragonfly mission, which is a life-hunting drone expected to launch … Read more

The Thing About to Crash Into The Moon May Not Be a SpaceX Rocket After All

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A piece of space debris due to crash into the Moon in early March may not be a SpaceX rocket after all. According to an update posted by astronomer Bill Gray, who wrote the Project Pluto software used to track near-Earth objects, the object on a collision course is not a discarded SpaceX Falcon 9 … Read more

India will launch its first space mission of 2022 tonight. Here’s how to watch live.

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India’s first launch of 2022 will send a new Earth observation satellite to space after a sibling satellite was lost in a failed launch last year. You can watch the launch of the EOS-04 satellite live on Sunday (Feb. 13) at 7:29 p.m. EST (0029 GMT or 6:29 p.m. local time Monday, Feb. 14), assuming … Read more